Walk and Run Cycle

Hello! students, Design aptitude tests like the NID DAT (National Institute of Design) and UCEED (Undergraduate Common Entrance Examination for Design) often focus on questions about animation and movement cycles. These can include concepts like walk and run cycles and biped walk and run cycles. They check how well you grasp human anatomy and movement, plus how you illustrate these ideas clearly. Read this article to get an understanding on the topic and what type of questions can be asked in the exam.

This Story also Contains

1. Understanding Walk and Run Cycles
2. Differences Between Walk and Run Cycles
3. Sample Questions:

Here, let’s tackle one important topic that often comes up in the NID-DAT Exam.

1. Human: Walk, Run & Jump Cycles

2. Animal: Walk Cycles

3. Birds: Flight Cycles

Understanding Walk and Run Cycles

1a. Walk Cycle

A walk cycle in animation design is a sequence of frames or drawings that shows a character taking one full step and then repeating it to create the illusion of walking. In simple terms, it’s a looped animation that captures how the body moves when walking — including the movement of the legs, arms, head, and overall body balance.

Usually, a walk cycle has four main phases: contact, recoil, passing, and high point.

Here’s a helpful way to remember the walk cycle: C_R_P_H

Step 01 (Contact): heel of the front foot hits the ground.

Step 02 (Recoil): While the back foot is flat, the front foot is just about to pass it.

Step 03 (Passing): The front foot moves ahead. The back foot starts lifting off the ground.

Step 04 (High Point): At this point, the body is at its tallest. The back foot is off the ground, while the front foot fully touches down.

Usually, a regular walk cycle has eight frames. These four steps repeat back & forth with both legs.

How it works

Some lines are made to confine it. If you notice properly you can see that Head of the person gets low and high in every other step with respect to leg movement. To acknowledge it better, a simple trick is to know that if both your feet are on ground you are at normal height but it starts to vary as soon as you lift your leg up and how much you spread it forward.

Characteristics to identify:

• The important characteristic is to see how the body rises and falls slightly with each step.

• It is also important to see how human arms swing opposite to the legs while walking (right arm forward when the left leg is forward, and vice versa).

• The head also moves slightly up and down during the movement.

1b . Run Cycle

A run cycle is a sequence of frames or illustrations that shows how a character moves while running, creating the illusion of fast-paced movement. The run cycle includes more noticeable and distinct movements and has phases which are: contact, down, passing, and up.

It's like a walk cycle but faster and with more dynamic movement the body leans forward more, there’s more bounce, and both feet can be off the ground at the same time. It helps make the character look energetic and lively.

1. Contact: The foot that is leading the movement makes the contact with the ground.

2. Down: The body lowers slightly as the leading foot absorbs the impact coming from the ground.

3. Passing: As the body starts to lift, the trailing foot passes the leading foot during the movement.

4. Up: The body reaches its highest point with both feet off the ground (flight phase).

The principle of understanding the run cycle is the same as the walk cycle but there are few things to keep in mind like, the more you start increasing the speed your legs lifted up because it just touches and the legs are spread widely to cover more area and it starts from lower to higher in a motion.

*A run cycle typically requires fewer frames than a walk cycle due to the faster pace, often four to six frames and sequence could be remembered as C_D_P_U.

Characteristics to identify:

• Movements are more exaggerated and dynamic compared to a walk cycle.

• The body leans forward to show momentum.

• The flight phase shows the character completely off the ground.

• Arms swing more vigorously to balance the faster leg movements.

You may also check:

• 12 Principles of Animation
• Mirror and Water Images for Design Entrances Exams
• Visualization Analogy
  

Differences Between Walk and Run Cycles

1c. Jump Cycles

Picture a child trying to jump high and grab some mangoes from a tree. If we look at this in slow motion we can see the action. A jump cycle is a series of frames showing a character or animal as they jump—from crouch to landing.

How does a person jump?

In the above, you can see how a person moves when it jumps. Initially, it looks a little like running where it pushes down on the ground hard and that flings it up and forward into the air. As it reaches the top of the jump, gravity pulls the person back to the ground. When it lands, the body adjusts to keep the person balanced in order to not fall.

There are seven steps to perform a jump:

1. Crouch: The character gets lower by bending their knees in order to store the energy for the jump.

2. Takeoff: The character then pushes off the ground with its legs and shoots up.

3. Flight: They’re in the air, usually reaching their highest point.

4. Peak: This is the top of the jump, where they stretch out fully.

5. Descent: They start to come down, often tucking in a bit to get ready for landing.

6. Landing: They hit the ground and bend their knees to lessen the impact.

7. Recovery: They go back to standing tall, ready to move again.

What should we look for?

• Smooth Transitions: Each part should blend nicely into the next one.

• Weight Shift: The way a character’s weight moves helps show their balance while jumping.

• Exaggeration: Making movements a bit bigger can help highlight the energy & dynamics of jumping.

A walk cycle in animals is a sequence of frames that depict an animal taking steps in a repetitive loop, creating the illusion of walking. The specifics of the walk cycle can vary greatly between different types of animals. Unlike human walk cycles, animal walk cycles vary based on the animal’s anatomy and movement patterns.

All the Phases: Contact, Recoil, Passing and High Point are same as human, but there are few things to keep in mind, which makes it different.

Steps in Animal Walk Cycle:

• Phases: Walk cycle often includes a sequence where one foot is lifted, another is placed on the ground, and the remaining two provide support.

• Leg Movement: Diagonal pairs of legs move in sync (left front and right hind leg move together).

• Body Movement: The body moves up and down slightly, with a gentle sway from side to side.

Flight of Birds

A sequence of frames depicting the movement of a bird’s wings at the time of flight from the downstroke to the upstroke is known as the flight cycle.

Steps Involved in Flight Cycle

1. Downstroke: In downstroke, the wings move downward and forward to generate lift and propulsion.

2. Bottom of Downstroke: At the bottom of downstroke, the wings reach the lowest point in the stroke.

3. Upstroke: For the upstroke, the wings move upward and backward, reducing resistance and therefore, preparing for the next downstroke.

4. Top of Upstroke: At the top of the Upstroke, wings reach the highest point in the stroke.

5. Glide (optional): Some birds have a gliding phase where the wings are extended and relatively motionless, allowing the bird to fly without flapping the wings.

To understand in a better and easier way, let’s suppose you have a hand fan and you move it left or right to get air that you are directing it towards yourself. Similarly a bird moves its wings up and down where it is trying to push air downwards in order to move forward.

Characteristics to identify:

• Wing Flexibility: It is important to identify the characteristics that show the bending and flexing movements of the wings more particularly at the joints.

• Feather Movement: Spreading of the feathers or overlapping during different phases of the wing stroke can be illustrated to understand better.

• Body Movement: Demonstration of how the bird’s body will rise and fall slightly with each wing movement. Also looking at how the feathers in the tail help with the steering and balance of the movement of the bird.

Key Points:

1. Repetition: Animators can increase production efficiency by repeating a limited collection of drawings or keyframes rather than animating every step from scratch.
2. Timing and Spacing: The pace and style of the walk or run are communicated by varying the timing of frame transitions and the spacing between frames.
3. Pose and Silhouette: To ensure that the action reads properly to spectators, each phase—contact, passing, recoil, etc.—helps preserve a distinct silhouette.
4. Weight and Balance: A character's weight shifting provides realism; for example, in order to balance the body, the hips and shoulders frequently move in different directions.
5. Personality and Emotion: Through changes in stride length, arm swing, and posture, a walk or run cycle can express a character's personality and mood in addition to mechanics.

Sample Questions:

Q-01. What will be the most probable pose at position 3, to complete the sequence below?

Q-02. Which option will replace the question mark as the frog jumps in an animation sequence?