Praying for Mantis Love by Rachel Healy

i have been working on some walk cycles, as the male will be the hardest with all his legs. i looked on youtube at praying mantises walking and also in my books at people walk cycles and dog/horse walk cycles. i have decided the best way to go about making a realistic but simplistic mantis walk cycle is to do the front legs like a persons but with an extra joint, i didnt look at horses or dogs front legs because i wanted the mantis walk to look really bug like and not like a four-legged mammal walk. when looking at the youtube footage a real praying mantis looks like his front legs are walking "normally" and his back legs are stretching as far as they go then just pinging forward so i have tried to capture this in my walk cycles.

the first one i tried out was very bug like but it appeared to be stomping and i wanted it to be more scuttley, as the male's character is fairly nervous and timid. so the next one i tried was more what i wanted and i achieved this by making the legs not go as far apart (smaller steps).

the next walk was for the part in the film where they tire from all the running and have to rest. i looked in my books for a tired walk but came across a depressed walk which seems to me to be very similar, i just wont put the head down as much and i will make them pant a bit. i struggled quite a lot with the daughter's walk cycles too because you can't see her legs so the animation is all to do with the cloak moving. i tried making her leave the floor but it turned out like a jump, so i have base movement on a squash and stretch type sliding motion( like an upright caterpillar). the bottom of the cloak is also difficult to determine whether and or when it should lift up and how much and which side etc etc. but i think what the walk cycles i eventually figured out seem to work quite well. the mother is mainly coming after the daughter in an aggressive way so i decided to do her walk cycle toward the camera at a high hat angle.