I’m reading the excellent book, The Animator’s Survival Kit. It is written for 2d artists, but the information is easily adapted to 3d. Here’s one of my first attempts. Constructive criticism and comments welcome.
“Zip - a - dee- do - da”
Edit: I used the Blender Cookie FlexRig, in case anyone didn’t already recognize it.
Not a bad start. The biggest issue that I’m seeing is that you’ve got an almost mechanical snap at the ankle and wrist right around your contact pose. It makes the legs look like he’s stomping (though without the back flexing that would accompany such force). I’d suggest looking at polishing the curves in the graph editor so you ease in to that contact pose a bit more. And even though your character isn’t stomping, a little subtle flex in the torso/back can help give a sense of weight to his steps.
I can’t really add anything else. I really like the animation, but there isn’t enough movement in the torso to account for the stomping. I particularly like fluidity of the arm movement.
Wonderful animation. TASK is an excellent book. Your character looks alive, so it is animation.
My crits:
His movement is simalar to those chicken walkers from Return of the Jedi. One of it’s biggest problem is that the knees snaps too fast in the down motion. And also he need more bounce. Big movements translates to more bounce, but you are almost force to keep his knees bent most of the time, which also amplifies the chicken walker feeling.
An equally brilliant book is Animation Crash Course by Eric Goldberg. In there this motion could be further enhanced by having two states: a sad state in the down position (but keep it subtle) and the proud/ happy poses that you have in your animation in the up position. It will give your animation more texture.
Thanks for the crits! I will have another go at the areas pointed out. I’m also itching to try some of the other cycles in the book. Animation is fun! 
Instead of making a cycle, how about duplicating the action a few times then adjusting the curves so it does not look like it is repeating. I think the walk looks fine. its kinda a march, its exaggerated. whats wrong with that?
Yes, I’ve thought of that. At this stage I need to see the single cycle repeated to get a feel for what is going on in the movement and timing. If this was for an actual production, I would certainly make every step unique.
I thought I would post a scan of the page I am using for reference, just for educational purposes.
I was playing around with torso movement and twist last night. Unfortunately, that alters IK foot placement and foot roll timing. I’ll have more time to work with the rig this weekend…
The important thing is that TASK lessons are not just theory but directly applicable with great results. You’ll just have to put some elbow grease into it.
Here is the updated “happy march.” I reworked the torso and did extensive cleaning of the curves.
At this time I’m not too concerned about things like facial animations. Right now it’s just about the basics of body language.
And now for a bit of fun… I tried this “angry” walk cycle in The Animator’s Survival Kit. Frankly, it looked very weird to me drawn out in 2D, so I just HAD to try it! :evilgrin:
Heh heh… the angry walk makes me giggle. As for the happy march, I think that this is a pretty substantial improvement. Great work! The only think I’d note is that the heel lift near the passing pose is a bit mechanical; it kind of pops up and stays there until the rest of the foot is lifted. You may want to smooth that one out a little bit.
Wheeee!
Thanks, Fweeb!
Toontje, those images will be very useful. Thanks! Are they from Animation Crash Course? Looks like another book to put on my summer reading list.
Yes, from Animation Crash Course, written by Disney lead animator Eric Goldberg.
I think of how big a step first, how many feet in between the subjects feet, one, one and a half, two, three,… Then how fast = frames. 24 fps one step may be 12 frames so I will move the foot ahead and leave the space of maybe two of models feet in between(eyeball method). Left right left right… then return to the start and pick up left foot in between key frames and make new key frames. Then the right foot. Then rock the body head and arms or what ever. Then i go to the graph editor and delete keys that look like the curve will stay the same without them( extra keys) and scale and move so the curves just look smooth and there is no jerks in the movement. Also I will exaggerate some movements there, also break up the rhythm if it needs it. yep yep yep
Here is another TASK based walk cycle animation starring Yugstyx, the sneaky alien. 
On a sneak, I’m not sure that the heel needs to ever touch the ground. Also, I’d suggest thinking about the motivation for the sneak… typically a sneaking character is going to have a lot of focus on a goal (a doorway to escape to, another character to sneak up on and surprise, etc.). To maintain that focus, the character will likely want to reduce extraneous movement on the head (quick test, try reading this post while moving your head towards and away from your computer monitor… pretty tough, ain’t it?).
Very good points, Fweeb. I too had thought of the heel touch. The head movement seemed even more exaggerated in the book, so I thought I had toned it down a bit. Of course, our alien friend does have a thin neck. 
Overall, this cycle is pretty close to the reference material in The Animator’s Survival Kit. I would hazard a guess, though, that what worked for 2D animators needs to be re-thought when translating to 3D. Hmmm, I wonder what a silhouette rendering of this sneak cycle would look like from an suitable angle?
One thing that i suggest is posting it without motion blur… makes it easier to critique… also throw up a frame counter… and in addition to a 3rd person camera, have a front / side / top views so we can really critique whats going on.
Thanks doublebishop! There is (should be) a frame counter in the lower left corner. I guess it needs to be a bit bigger. I’ll also start posting a pass without motion blur.
For the sneak walk cycle, here is my reference image:
And here is an updated sneak from an orthographic perspective. I modified the foot roll to keep the heel from landing. I also reduced the neck movement somewhat from the previous attempt. This is a GLSL render with a near silhouette of the character. I thought that might be useful for less distraction from the animation itself.
