Animal run cycles - YEY! Oh my, all the fun we can have when we give something four legs. Working out a dog run cycle has been a challenge and a half, but I have learned so much today it has definitely been worth all the brain strain.
Started off by researching roughly how a dog's leg works, and what sort of basic shapes and movements I would need to tackle my own run cycle. I've been using a wee supplement from ImagineFX on Anatomy, which I highly recommend everyone and anyone getting if you are interested in exactly how and why humans and animals move and look the way they do. It's so in depth and explained everything to me perfectly. I stole some of their drawings as notes and pinned them up behind my lightbox for reference, then got under way.
I've also enlisted the help of an old college buddy of mine, and second year animator Tara, who is a genius when it comes to animal cycles and, to be fair, animal art in general. I went to her for advice on this dog cycle and twenty minutes later she's roughed out and line tested a seven frame cycle for me as a guide!
Legend.
So with my guide and anatomy notes I got to work and created this:
Which you can see has only two of it's four legs in place. Then I added the final two legs, cleaned-up a wee bit and got this:
Not bad for a first attempt, don't you think? Well, at the very least I have impressed myself. I can see what needs changed and obviously there's still a lot to be added, but for a generic attempt at a four-legged run cycle I am very happy with today's work.
This run cycle is also going to be used for clean-up tests when it's finished. I'm hoping to try and work out exactly how I want it done, and ensure I get the look that I want with my final frames. All in good time though, I still need to add ears to this wee furball yet. That's going to be all the fun.
x L
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