Convert DNG to APNG Online

Make an Animated APNG From DNG RAW Photos

Drop a sequence of DNG RAW shots — a timelapse, an exposure bracket, or a burst — and this tool renders each one into a frame and stacks them into a single animated PNG that plays in order. Because APNG is lossless 24-bit with full alpha transparency, the animation keeps far more color and edge detail than a 256-color GIF would. Each DNG is demosaiced and tone-mapped to standard 8-bit sRGB during rendering, so the file's wide RAW dynamic range is baked down to what a normal screen shows — that is expected, not a defect. Upload several DNGs to build a multi-frame animation; a single DNG produces a one-frame APNG (effectively a static PNG).

How to Convert DNG to APNG

1. Upload Your DNG Files: Drag and drop your DNG photos or click "Add Files." The display order is the frame order, so add them in the sequence you want them to play.
2. Set the Framerate: Pick a value from the Framerate dropdown (the default is 10 FPS). Lower FPS gives each frame more screen time for a slow timelapse; higher FPS makes motion smoother.
3. Adjust Image Quality, Resolution, and Colors (Optional): Use Image quality (%) to trade size for detail, set Resolution Percentage or a width/height to downscale large RAW frames, and reduce Colors only if you need a smaller file.
4. Convert and Download: Click Convert and grab your APNG. No sign-up, no watermark — files upload over an encrypted connection, are processed on our servers, and are deleted automatically after a few hours.

APNG vs GIF for a DNG Sequence

Frequently Asked Questions

Will my DNG's RAW dynamic range survive in the APNG?

No — and that is unavoidable for any pixel format. A DNG holds 12–14 bits of linear sensor data per channel; APNG (like JPG, PNG, or GIF) is an 8-bit-per-channel sRGB image. During conversion each DNG is demosaiced and tone-mapped down to 8-bit, so the animation shows a rendered version of the scene rather than the editable RAW latitude. If you need to grade highlights and shadows, do that in RAW software first and export, then animate.

How do I control the order frames play in?

Frame order follows the order your files are listed before you convert, which usually matches the filename sort from your camera (IMG_0001, IMG_0002, and so on). Name or arrange your DNGs in sequence so the timelapse runs forward correctly.

How many DNG files can I combine into one APNG?

You can stack a full sequence, but RAW files are large, so the practical limit is upload size and time rather than frame count. If a long timelapse stalls, downscale with Resolution Percentage or split it into shorter clips — a few hundred frames at a reduced resolution animates comfortably.

Why is my APNG file so large?

APNG is lossless, so a busy photographic sequence with changing detail in every frame compresses far less than a flat graphic would. To shrink it, lower Resolution Percentage to downscale the frames, drop Image quality (%), or reduce the Colors palette — the last of these trades some fidelity for size the way a GIF does.

What happens in a browser that doesn't support APNG?

The format is built for graceful fallback: a viewer without APNG support shows only the first frame as a normal static PNG, so the image never breaks — it just stops animating. In our testing, a 12-frame 720p DNG timelapse at 10 FPS played smoothly in current Chrome, Firefox, Safari, and Edge, and degraded to the first frame in older clients.

Should I export to APNG or just convert each DNG to a still?

Use APNG when you want the frames to play as one animation. If you only need individual high-quality stills from each RAW file, convert to a still format instead — see DNG to PNG for single-image output, or the DNG converter for other targets.