57. Quadrupedal lamedog

Wanting to solidify my understanding of the four legged cycle I stripped all the ingredients down to their basics. The Model I've needed up using is a very abstract dog (or an ant). I went ahead and animated it straight without any prep, just maiming for a discovery animation to happen as an experiment. Usually I have a concept/theme and then I work from key positions through key frames to accents and then I add any necessary in-betweens. This time as a visual memory exercise I animated straight through, the only desire to create a walk cycle. I ended up with a lopsided step and the back left leg has a stronger step indicating weakness or limp in the right. It reflects in the body and a crawl by the front limbs. So I've inadvertently animated a lame abstract canine.

56. Quadrupedal soft hominid

Firm yesterday. Soft today. I wanted to achieve and practise a fluid soft walk. The figure is almost stroking the ground as it glued through. In order to mix things up a bit and to prevent myself from becoming stale I chose a hominid figure. It could be a small monkey (I've avoided tails at this point; though they do add to the balance to some creatures other use it for communication purposes and it would detract from the main propulsion which I'm attempting to solidify).

The hind legs are raised high and the propulsion comes from it's hips. The front limbs are used for balancing as the entire chest bends down to take on the weight distribution. The front and hind paws are softly placed on the ground. Leading with the wrist at the front, and with the toes at the back, allowing for push off to happen with back of the foot-paw. 

55. Quadrupedal parade pooch

Expanding on the strut from last week I concentrated on the regalia of the character. I've used a canine model. The legs are stiffened and the action and movement has become more mechanic. Concentration is given on the feet being raised high in vertical lines and then dropped down as the body has moved forward. It increases the elegance which strut provides creating a 'horse-like' movement. 

The somewhat militaristic feel comes with the movement of the hips, and shoulders. As in military march the leg movement are stiff with either straight or bent knees but originating from the hip whilst the arms are swayed front and back from the shoulders. The same parade march is achieved with our canine figure here. The head has to be pointed high in order to give that ceremonial feel, otherwise it would be posturing.

54. Quadrupedal strut

Yesterday I've applied the softness of a abstract walk to a more realistic one. This time I wanted to firm things up a bit. For the figure I've used the similar form of a skeletal dog.

I've attempted to give a ceremonial strut that wouldn't look out of place in dog-shows. To represent this I've raised the 'elbow' joints on the up movement of the front legs. To counteract this the hind legs swing backwards giving the momentum grace. As the lifted front leg lingers in the air the paw is gracefully positioned and then softly placed onto the ground. The spine stretches but remains regally straight through the walk, reminiscing a military walk in a humanoid. The head has a small figure eight with a forward direction as the body propels it. 

53. Quadrupedal soft walk

After the softness of yesterday I've applied the lessons learnt to a more complex realistic walk. I used a form of dog from the first animation and translated the soft movement through. 

The triple joints allow for smooth transition between ground level, as the third acts as toes/wrist. The head remains poised and due to the shoulder/ body twist during the walk the spine has one curvy ways throughout the walk. The whole expression gives this canine a light stroll in the park look, whilst remaining attentive to the entirety surroundings (as opposed to burying the nose in the smell trail). 

52. Quadrupedal soft pokewalk

Now that I've gotten more familiar with the physics of the four legged locomotion I'm having a non-reference play. To keep it simple and to concentrate on the forward propulsion I'm using a cartoony pokemon like character. 

The soft features and stumpy feet take away the complex triple joint manipulations of the four legged variety and use the physics of a realistic four legged walk into an abstract animal shape. The figure is bear/sloth like and the weight is somewhat equally distributed between the from and hind legs. Head is bobbing only slightly and has a distinct directional neck stretch (with addition of a sprawl and a shell this could become an amphibian) applies the figures shoulders are swaying with it's weight giving it some character and purposeful walk.

51. Quadrupedal human walk

Continuing on the quadrupedal study I decided to get down on all fours and try to see how our four legged cousins walk. 

This is very much a mammalian walk. I used a human figure and applied the dynamics of the four-legged locomotion from yesterday. Following that I've adjusted the position based on my own experience in order to understand the musculature and skeletal structure which powers such walk. In order to keep the momentum tip-toe walking is necessary and that accounts for the development of paws, hives etc. Similar is true with frontal limbs as an additional point of articulation allows for higher precision during the step. It is a kind of devolution to retrace the walking steps backwards and work on it from the understanding of a humanoid. Most of the back movement is in the waves of the spine and lower abdominal contraction in order to bring the hind legs closer. this accounts for strong and powerful hind legs in most quadrupeds. (there is some difference with reptilian sprawl but that will come later).