Fade In Fade Out Animation

When you call the fadeIn and fadeOut methods back to back like you’re doing, the code is run instantaneously, so you’ll only see animation from the last method called. UIView block based animation provides a completion handler, which seems to be exactly what you’re looking for. So your code might looks something like this:

-(IBAction)startFade:(id)sender {

    [_label setAlpha:0.0f];        

    //fade in
    [UIView animateWithDuration:2.0f animations:^{

        [_label setAlpha:1.0f];

    } completion:^(BOOL finished) {

        //fade out
        [UIView animateWithDuration:2.0f animations:^{

            [_label setAlpha:0.0f];

        } completion:nil];

    }];
}

Swift:

@IBAction func startFade(_ sender: AnyObject) {

    label.alpha = 0.0

    // fade in
    UIView.animate(withDuration: 2.0, animations: { 
        label.alpha = 1.0
    }) { (finished) in
        // fade out
        UIView.animate(withDuration: 2.0, animations: {
            label.alpha = 0.0
        })
    }
}