This task consists of me having to animate a repeating cycle of walking in order to properly convey motion. I started of with making a 2D animation in Photoshop to learn the ropes of what I was dealing with here.
To understand how I would manipulate these drawings into creating an illusion of movement I first needed a reference as to how walking works in the first place. I chose to reference from this 5 frame guide. Because of this I made the cycle a second long and set the frame rate to 10fps to make it look smooth.
I started off basic and created an animation using a basic stick figure.
After I understood how the cycle looked I went more in depth, using the reference to help me portray depth and being able to tell which arm and leg are on what side of the body.
Next I moved onto the 3D walk cycle project.
The 3D model I used for this project was a premade one which came with many controllers and well made joints. Controllers were of a surplus quantity and ranged from eye controllers to many parts of the arms and the legs.
I started with trying to create a sad walk but unfortunately it did not work out properly and despite trying to create more character with movement it little arm movement, therefore I did not think it properly conveyed a walking cycle.
I decided to go for a walk cycle which once again matched with my reference image, it
created a exaggerated arm and leg motion which I felt captured character properly.
I found this project to be a lot more difficult then it's bouncing ball predecessor because a lot more work had to go into synchronizing every movement in the the body as an oppose to the top and bottom part of a sphere but I still learnt a skill which would become valuable in places such as the Unity game engine where I'd have to design cycling animations such as idling for characters. I'd definately try not sync upper and lower movement better in a longer time frame.
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