How to: Rotate an image in 3D with CSS animation

HTML Page

Start by creating an image in your html page and giving it a class. For this demo we will use the class “imageSpin”

<!doctype html> 
<html lang="en">
<head>
 <meta charset="utf-8">
 <meta http-equiv="x-ua-compatible" content="ie=edge">
 <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1">
 <title>Rotate Image in 3D</title>
 <link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css">
</head>
<body>
<img src="areVisualLogoMark.png" alt="ARE Visual Logo Mark" class="imageSpin">
</body>
</html>

CSS Page

How the Animation will Work

The animation will utilize the CSS “rotateY” property. There will be two keyframes one where the image rotation is set to “0deg” and the other where it is set to “360deg”. The tweening between the “from” and “to” points will create the animation.

Creating the Animation

Start by creating the keyframe animation and naming it. For this demo I will be calling the demo spin.

@keyframes spin {
}

Now create the starting “from” value and the “to” value.

@keyframes spin {
 from{
 transform: rotateY(0deg);
 }
 to{
 transform: rotateY(360deg);
 }
}

Now we have to call the animation. To do this we select it by calling the class we gave our image. Next we need to set the “animation-name” that we defined earlier. After that we set the “animation-timing-function”, this is the CSS equivalent of easing. For this demo I am going to use “linear” value so the speed of the animation is consistent for the whole duration. Next we will define the “animation-iteration-count.” This is how many times the animation will repeat. For this demo we will set it to “infinite” so it will keep repeating. The last property we will set is “animation-duration” this is how long the animation will take to complete. For this we will use 5 seconds.

Adding browser specificity

CSS animations are still not completely universal. This step may not be needed but generally it is good practice. To make sure our animation renders correctly across browsers we want to add properties specific for each browser. To do this add the following code.

@keyframes spin {
 from{
 transform: rotateY(0deg);
 moz-transform: rotateY(0deg); //Firefox
 ms-transform: rotateY(0deg); //Microsoft Browsers
 }
 to{
 transform: rotateY(360deg);
 moz-transform: rotateY(360deg); //Firefox
 ms-transform: rotateY(360deg); //Microsoft Browsers
 }
}
@-webkit-keyframes spin{
 from{-webkit-transform: rotateY(0deg);}
 to{-webkit-transform: rotateY(360deg);}
}
.imageSpin{
 animation-name: spin;
 animation-timing-function: linear;
 animation-iteration-count: infinite;
 animation-duration: 5s;
 -webkit-animation-name: spin;
 -webkit-animation-timing-function: linear;
 -webkit-animation-iteration-count: infinite;
 -webkit-animation-duration: 5s;
}

Download Demo

Andrew R Emery