Why Animators First Study the Mechanics of Walking Before Illustrating a Character’s Identifying Gait

Filmmaker Andy M. Saladino of the Royal Ocean Film Society takes a look at how illustrators animate unusual movement by first understanding the mechanics of real movement, particularly since the character’s gait is a big part the character’s personality. Saladino used a compilation of film and animated clips to illustrate this point. He also referred to the expertise of legendary animator Richard Williams to explain more about this concept.

The interesting thing is, if you’re going to animate crazy things, you have to be able to understand real things or how real actions work.