Original subtitles

- [Instructor] Let's go ahead with our walk cycle blocking.

Before we go ahead,

we need to check our frame rate.

Since I'm using the same file as the run cycle,

my frame rate is still 30 frame per seconds.

As explained in the previous video,

it's pretty common for feature film

to use a 24 frame per second frame rate.

And since I'm used to animate for video game,

I tend to use 30 frame per seconds.

I will stick to 30 frame per second,

but it doesn't really matter

if you want to switch to 24 frame per seconds.

A walk cycle can be on 18, 24, 26, 30,

whatever number of frame you want,

depending on the style of walk cycle you are doing.

For vanilla walk cycle,

we generally use 24 frames, based at 24 frame per second.

Basically, a cycle of one second.

So I will stick to those 24 frame for a cycle,

but I will keep my 30 frame per second frame rate.

So it will be a little less than one second cycle.

And if I feel like I need to change the length

of the walk cycle to have a good feedback,

I will do it later on.

So don't get stuck with numbers.

You can change the number of frame at reel

depending on the visual feedback.

So to mark the end of the cycle,

I will duplicate all the keys from frame zero

and move them on frame 24.

I will place the playhead on frame 23,

and I will press Control + End,

so that our animation plays from frame zero to frame 23.

So the first thing I will do

is re-enable all my controllers,

I will select them all and I will press Control + C

to copy the current pose,

go to frame 12 and press Control + Shift + V

to mirror the pose.

Since our character is symmetrical,

we can mirror it halfway through the cycle on frame 12,

and since we are at the blocking stage,

I will select all my keys, press T,

and switch to constant

so that I don't have any interpolation on my controllers.

The next pose we are going to build is the down pose.

Looking at the reference,

it's the moment where the torso root is at its lowest point.

The front foot has already starting moving backward,

but it's not centered beneath the center of gravity.

The back foot just left or is leaving the ground.

This depends on your work cycle style

or the reference you are using.

The front arm start swinging backward

while the back arm is starting swinging forward.

The hips are pushed by the contacting legs,

while the shoulder are tilting the opposite way.

Let's start posing our character.

I will move to frame three

and insert a keyframe on all controllers.

We will basically build the key pose

every three frames.

As for the first pose, I will start with the feet,

so I will cancel the rotation on the toes

and the heel controller on the front foot,

and I will move it backward.

Since it's contacting the ground,

I'm moving it straight on the y-axis.

I will lower the center of gravity

using the torso controller

and as I'm putting weight onto the left leg,

I will shift the center of gravity toward the left leg.

I will push the back leg further away backward,

and I will rotate the heel controller.

This way, the heel will reach its highest point

before the foot leave the ground,

keeping the leg slightly bent.

Finally, I will slightly push the center of gravity forward.

I will tilt and rotate the hips toward the supporting leg

and I will also slightly twisted them.

We can now build our contact pose with the chest controller

by making it leaning a bit toward the supporting foot.

I will also slightly twist the chest

to follow the arm motion.

I will slightly rotate the shoulder backward

and then rotate the arm backward,

and I will slightly rotate the forearm

and hand forward to build a follow through motion

or dragging motion.

I will do the same on the other arm.

I will slightly move the shoulder forward,

and then I will rotate the arm forward a bit

and the forearm and hand backward,

so the arm is a bit extended.

My character pose feels a bit out of balance,

so I will tweak the position of the center of gravity

and I will also tweak the arm position

on the very first pose we built

because I felt that the arm was a bit too, on the outside.

Since I've refined the pose,

I need to re-mirror it on frame 12

and reduplicate it on frame 24

or at least paste the new pose.

From there, I will jump between frames zero

and frame three using the up and down arrow,

and see, or merge, the center of gravity of the character

is moving.

It will reach its extreme side to side pose

onto the next one.

So I need to find a good in between here.

The second thing I've been watching

was the position of the front hand.

In the front view, when I was comparing the poses,

it seems that the hand wasn't moving in space.

So I've slightly rotated the forearm backward.

And we can now work on the next pose.

Next pose is the passing pose.

It's the moment where the supporting foot

is right under the center of gravity.

The opposite leg is catching up,

both arm are almost aligned with the torso,

the hips are no longer twisted,

but this is the time where the leg pushed the most on them

and they are raising the most.

The chest is no longer twisting neither

and depending on your reference,

it might be almost horizontal

or slightly tilting toward the supporting leg too.

Building a soft contour posing.

Note that we will have to slightly move the person leg,

the one that not contacting the ground to the side.

Let's now work on our character

so I will jump onto frame six,

I will move the left foot backward, along the y-axis,

under the center of gravity of my character

and then on frame six in the action editor,

I will key all the controllers.

This is the time where the center of gravity

reach it's extreme on the side, toward the supporting leg

and also moment where the character

starts pushing on the supporting leg so we can raise

the center of gravity.

Now I will position the right leg just before the left leg

and raise it a bit.

We also need to rotate the heel upward

and as explained before, from the front view,

I will slightly move it to the left

and rotate it to the left.

One super important thing to mention

whenever you are building a walk cycle.

Humans and mammals, in general, are lazy.

So we are raising our foot as less as possible,

meaning, that during the passing pose

where the foot reach its highest point,

keep it close to the ground.

A beginner mistake is to raise the foot, way to high.

Now, jumping onto the hips controller,

this is the moment where the leg pushed the most

onto the hip, so we need to raise it to the side

and regarding the twisting, we can almost cancel it.

I will do the same with the chest.

I will almost cancel any twisting

and I will, very slightly, make it tilt

toward the pushing leg

so I'm canceling its rotation and slightly tilting it.

Regarding the arms, it's pretty straightforward.

You can slightly move the shoulder backward or forward

depending on the motion of the arm,

mainly move the arm controller

and slightly catch-up with the forearm,

and make the hand drag a bit.

You can use the reference provided to,

to refine your pose.

I'm not yet posing the fingers,

and as you have may noticed,

I haven't posed neither the neck or the head.

This is because we will work on this animation a bit,

as we did regarding the run cycle.

We are blocking the main pose,

trying to make them as accurate as possible,

and during the polishing stage,

we will bring a bit of up and down on the chest and the head

and a bit of rotation in the head and the fingers.

The raised foot need a little more work,

we need to raise the heel away more

and also, slightly rotate the toes toward the ground

as they are dragging.

After reviewing my poses and the references,

I've decided to rotate more the foots on the outside.

On some reference and depending on the character

you are animating,

the foots can be slightly rotated to the side

even when hitting the ground.

Rotating the foot on the outside or the inside

will define your character profile.

It could be extremely open for a cowboy, for example,

or tilting toward the inside for a shy kid or a shy girl,

for example.

For the sake of this course,

I will keep it straight.

And we can jump on the final pose.

Let's have a look to the latest pose we need to block.

It's the up pose or pushing pose.

The supporting leg is slightly on the back,

and it's heel starts to raise.

The other foot is slightly forward,

and it has starting rotating

so that the heel can get in contact in the next pose.

The arms are swinging the opposite direction

compared to the legs

and almost reach their extreme poses that they will reach

in the next pose.

The hands are moving the faster in space

between the passing and the pushing pose.

The hips are still pushed by the supporting leg,

but they have start shifting toward the other one.

They are as usual,

slightly twisting toward the different feet.

The chest is twisting in the opposite way

and is slightly raised toward the front arm.

As the leg push, the center of gravity

is moving toward the opposite foot.

Let's build this final pose and see how it look.

I will jump on from nine and insert a key frame

on all controller.

We can push the center of gravity up,

and start moving it on the opposite side of the pushing leg.

I will move the pushing leg backward along the y-axis

and then I will raise the heel using the heel controller.

I'm raising the heels

so that I have a subtle bending in the leg.

I will then select the other foot and move it forward.

I will then rotate it backward using the heel controller

and relax a bit, the toes, by rotating them a bit forward.

I will keep them slightly rotated toward the ground

so that we can feel that they are dragging the feet.

I will slightly rotate the foot controller

toward the outside and from the front view,

I will slightly push it on the inside

toward the contacting pose.

Since I rotated a bit the foot,

I need to align the knee by moving the pole targets

slightly to the outside.

I will slightly reduce the tilting of the hips

and then I will slightly twist them

so that they are align with the feet.

I will slightly tilt the chest

so that it's slightly upward toward the front arm,

the left one, and twist it toward the front arm too,

then I would rotate the front arm forward

and slightly twist it so that it almost match the pose

on frame 12.

This is why I'm comparing both poses.

As explained previously,

the arms almost reach their extreme pose during the pushing

and reach their extreme during the contact pose.

So the shoulder and elbow are easing into frame 12.

The forearm is catching up

and the hand is likely dragging backward.

As usual, you can use the image reference to guide you.

As seen during the run cycle chapter,

a good blocking is important,

but it doesn't mean that we won't be able

to modify the animation during the polishing stage.

It can be harder to spot the problem during the blocking,

and it's sometimes pop to the eye

whenever switching to spline or playing the whole animation.

So just make the best looking you can

and then copy each pose by selecting all the controller,

press Control + C to copy the pose,

jump 12 frame later and press Control + Shift + V

and repeat the process for each poses.

Once you are done with this,

you can finally play your animation

and see your walk cycle blocked.

I advise you to watch it for a moment,

rotate around the character

and also switch between autographic and perspective view.

In my case,

I feel like there's something a little off.

My character is pushed too much forward.

So instead of reworking each poses one by one,

I will select the torso controller

and I will switch to the graph editor

and isolate the y location curve.

Remember what we have seen

in the very last lesson of the run cycle chapter?

We can offset a whole curve from a transform channel

to modify the animation.

I've hidden all the curve, but the y curve

and I will press G and Y to constraint it

on the y-axis in the graph editor

and move it up so that it will push

the torso controller off my character slightly backward.

And now he looks way more balanced.

In the next video,

we will be able to jump into splining

and polishing the different features of our character.