Ramen gif

This took about 45 minutes (with 5 frames) in Photoshop.

The image I had in my mind was frame #4, and was the "key" I started with. The ramen bowl coming down from a jump, with the broth, noodles, egg, and green onions trailing behind (anticipation for their follow through after the bowl comes down in frame #1.

This way of imagining/capturing the whole gif in one still image is how I start these sorts of gifs. It has to read quickly, and clearly, since you don't have a lot of real estate to work with, time-wise.

Once I had the "suspended in air" frame, worked from there, figuring out where I could make do without by moving the layers around, blocking out the animation, creating a new layer and where a new one had to be drawn (in Photoshop, so long as you aren't rotating or transforming a layer, you can "reuse" it in frame animation without affecting other frames).