Walk cycles - treadmill or translate

[Slugger]

if practicing, do both, a good walk/run cycle is quite a challanging thing to do and can take a lifetime to master

imho a inplace cycle is good for fast movement(running for ex), the good thing about a FK cycle translated wiht a root node is the good control of arcs of legs arms etc,

a full "contact" cycle travelling is of course more time consuming to do, but if you do it for a while you get it done fairly quickly, the drawback is the use of IK where needed(feets), totally sucks in terms of arc control(its possible to switch btw IK/FK in most packages but those usually mess things up, at least I do when trying those... and besides its one more thing to worry about)

also choosing btw the two of course is sometimes a time factor issue, if you're asked to do TV-series quility you might not be able to do "your best" simpy because there's not time enough, then resort to do the bits that shows the most, hip/spine/shoulders/legs/arms/hands and do those well(whatever the method), good timing, overlapping & arcs

cheers,

k.

[MolemanSD7]

something else to keep in mind in this is simply the root/hip positioning. In a treadmill, it usually stays relatively stationary. In translating the cycle, you have to sync the forward speed with the foot steps. So, you usually figure out the forward pacing of the walk that you walk (meaning animate the root forward first, disregarding the legs) and then you move the legs to match. If its stationary, you can focus more on the poses you'll use instead of ensuring everything lines up. They both have very different approaches, so its good to become acquainted with each.

[musashidan]

Practicing using the treadmill method is excellent when you first begin walkcycles.You can concentrate frame by frame from contact to contact without becoming distracted by the character moving across the screen.In fact,i would highly advise using this method as it forces you to see exactly how your arcs and lines of action are working meticulously.
Once you have it down pretty good then animating a walk across the viewport will be straightforward.
traditional sneaks however,are best practiced in translation as the hips will be moving back and forth like crazy.

[bobzilla]

I'm NO animator, but I've experimented a little with a center hips type of an expression so as you animate you can actually walk your character. It also has a separate hip controller so the walk isn't robotic and stiff and has the ability for up and down and side to side movement independent of the centering functionality.

But, most REAL animators don't use it because it's a semi-automatic feature which animators usually don't like. Sometimes I find it useful as a beginner.

[indipops]

Well i started out using the walk forward approach, but when asked to do a walk cycle for feedback but an animator he asked me to produce it on the post as it was easier for him to watch and give crits, as he could then play it on a loop and anaylse it perfectly, without it having the distraction of restarting from the beginning of the walk to the end of a walk on the walk forward approach.

But i think both are useful practices

Hope this helps,

I

[capnkirk]

Neither way is better, but it is easier to start with a walk cycle in place rather than a tranlating walk. Start with the walk cycle to learn the mechanics of walking and the different styles of walking. When you feel you are ready animate the walking and translating together.

A walk or run cycle which is later translated around usually can't compare to actually putting the time into tranlating the character and key framing everything. It just comes down to how much time you have, what the quality of the job demands, and which technique you feel more comfortable with.

[jipe]

You can get the best of both worlds by point-constraining cameras (front, side, angle, whatever you want) to the forward translate* of the hips, and then animating the cycle forward in space. That way you're animating in space rather than on the spot, but it's much easier to see what's going on.

*Make sure it's only the one axis; don't constrain the cameras to the up/down or side-to-side translates!

[bobzilla]

I was thinking of that, too, Jim. Camera constraining.

With the little CA I've done, I always thought is was almost a waste to do an on the spot cycle, because I had such trouble trying to translate it through space afterwards.

I'm using C4D, where I know it's possible in R11, but in earlier versions it's a bit of a pain. For me, at least.

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