Run cycle

*See also Walk cycle.*

Running is very similar to walking if we're looking at it from the point of view of a layout artist. You'll create two contact poses with an optional third passing drawing. Mechanically, it's actually pretty different. I'm going to explain the "why" for running here, but if you want to see how to actually animate a standard 4 frame cycle (and keep everything on-model), check out the douga section.

## In Genga

For now, I want to talk about getting these passing poses right and creating the spacing chart for a run. You'll have two keys, A1 and A4. They look like this:

(TODO: merge with the other image)

Each is one leg extended, the other retracted, with the arms pistoning in the opposite directions. That's all you need for a layout! Of course, it helps to know why this is–and what that weird spacing chart means.

The red line shows the tilt of the body. It can also act as a guide for the up-and-down motion of the body as a character runs, which you can see more of in the douga section. Notice it's pretty severely tipped forward. Running is an unstable, dynamic action. Levering the torso forward means the runner is catching themselves in a series of quick falls. Sometimes you want to really push out the torso and bring the legs low like an extreme sprinter. Other times a character might be doing a light jog and a less severe tilt is appropriate. As always, the key is matching the tone of the e-conte and keeping things clear.

Now, Let's take a closer look at that weird timing chart:

In a run the character is going to start at a middle point in the contact frames. In the first inbetween, they'll be "down" and in the the second they'll be "up". It looks something like this if you have all four frames:

Again, don't worry about how to draw those middle two poses for now, just remember that a douga artist is going to have to work with a chart like this. Keep your two passing frames even and let them handle the up-and-down motion.

If you've got a particularly special run cycle, a lot of this basic information might be thrown out. For example, Naruto run cycles operate on 1s and complete a cycle in just three frames (two contacts and a passing "up" frame). The example i'm giving here is just a basic guide, and you should always consider what works for the show you're on as first priority.

Just like with walking, running can say a lot about a character. In fact, we often start to blend walking and running to create interesting kinds of motion. Someone polite who's late for the train isn't going to break into a run, but they might start speed walking–tilting the body forward and using wider steps–or someone might pace, with no noticeable bobbing of the head when they're thinking. Once you have the basics, you can get creative with things.

## In Douga

It's tempting to think of running as walking with style. It's not. Well, actually, if you're a layout artist it can feel pretty similar since you're only drawing contact poses, but we're not genga artists right now! When you're doing douga for a run, you're going to be detailing with every frame of the cycle. Be prepared!

What's actually different, though? Let's take a second to think about the mechanics. Walking is a series of small, carefully controlled falls. It's dynamic, but it doesn't require much effort and is less dramatic as an animation. Running is a much more active process where the falls are bigger and faster, with the legs actively pushing us forward into what are almost small jumps. The legs need to move further more quickly and with more power, too. That means the arms have to swing more and the body needs to shift more between each frame. Luckily, this faster speed means runs require fewer frames to finish a cycle.

Remember this weird looking chart from above. It shows you where the "down" and "up" positions of the pose are.

We only need to do two inbetweens to fill out this example, but they're pretty hard to guess from the poses we're given and the charts. Each frame in a run is very different. Let's cheat and see what they look like drawn out.

We can see that drawing 2–the "down" pose– is squashed a fair bit. The weight of the body is all pressing down on one leg, which is itself compressing in preparation for frame 3, where the whole body leaps up and out at an angle before coming back around to frame 4, just as weight is hitting the newly extended foot.

How do we actually get these frames? Of course, you can guess – yep. We're going off tap.

Before we start getting fancy, let's make sure our basic spacing is correct. We have four drawings total. Frame 1 and Frame 4 are at the same height, A2 and A3 need to be down/up by just about the same amount.

But the body does not move in an exact up-and-down motion in a run. Instead, to keep things moving properly you can add a registration line to guide your work. It looks like this.

Your character will slide up and down this line as they run, and you can measure off equal distances on it to make sure everything is consistent.

### Part 1: Down Pose

With that in place, we can start drawing. In this case you don't need to make a "ghost" in between. Each pose is fairly different from all the others but similar between runs, so memorizing the basic forms is enough.

Starting with drawing 2, we need to measure it down. The basic shape of the head and torso are going to remain the same, so you can go off-tap and trace. Sometimes, if there's no change of expression at all, you can actually use a red line (like a gousei indication) to show that the head should simply be moved up and down in compositing.

You'll notice that in this pose is a little like the "passing" pose from a walk cycle–the arms are at the same middle point in the torso, and the leg coming forward is far along into its arc. All of the limbs can be approximately sketched in. The arms have pretty even spacing, but the leg coming forward heavily favors A1, while the leg coming forward is bent into a fairly unique position, coiled up and ready to fling the body forward.

Once you have these all sketched in, go off tap and check proportions one-by one.

For the arms, this is easy – just rotate frame 1 until the arms overlap and trace for cleanup.

For the leg coming forward, just check to make sure the length and volume of the legs are consistent. Again, off tap and trace. Frame 1 and A2 are very similar here so the tracing should be fairly exact.

(TODO: composite image)

The leg coming forward can be done in three chunks – thigh, calf, and finally foot. You can just rotate frame 1 to keep these on track, or you can cut the individual limbs and slide/rotate them after tracing. Whatever works for you!

All you need to do now is modify the hair. This is a "down" pose so the hair is going to come up. You don't need to precisely inbetween this, but you do want to keep the volume fairly consistent, otherwise it will look like the hair is growing and shrinking.

### Part 1.5: Up Pose

As I'm sure you can now guess, you'll do the exact same thing with frame 3. First sketch it out. This "up" pose has the leg fully extended, but with the body tilted forward. Keep in mind: a character is technically lower to the ground running than walking. Use the leg from frame 1 to check the proportions of the extended leg,the leg coming forward you can trace in three parts (thigh, calf, and foot) by tracing the raised foot on frame 4.

The arms are a little tricky. As they swing forward they don't remain locked at the 90 degree angle they were at before. The upper arm carries through the motion and compresses against the upper arm as the whole arm comes forward, while the rear arm's elbow is just coming out from behind the body. You can use the arm from Frame 4 as a trace reference.

Keeping the far arm consistent is really important. I recommend you draw through and imagine where the entire arm is here. You can use the foreground arm from Frame 1 to help you imagine where it's going.

Once you have this pose cleaned up, you're done! The first half of a run in just four frames.

### Part 2: Mirroring

Creating the second half of this cycle shouldn't be too difficult. The poses are going to be re-used with the arms and legs reversed. It's that simple.

The final result will be something like this:

### 5 Inbetween Run Cycle

The version of a 5 inbetween run cycle uses all the t same principles, but with an extra drawing between each of the drawings from the 2 inbetween cycle:

The result is three new drawings, each evenly spaced. The specifics of creating these inbetweens aren't any different than what we've seen before. Since each one is coming between the more extreme up, down, and passing poses, the placement and spacing is a lot easier to predict, for the most part–though the legs and arms exact overlaps can be a little tricky. The main takeaway is it's more of the same basic principles, and it'll vary depending on the character you're animating.

Seven frames (2 keys, five inbetweens) gives much smoother arcs. Depending on how long each frame is held and the spacing, this can almost seem like slowmo:

The standard 4-frame run is much snappier by comparison. You might be tempted to think this is "bad," but keep in mind that plenty of shows lean into these lower framerates because they can better fit some show's styles while also being much less work:

It's also possible for a show to use different styles of runs depending on the needs of a particular scene or cut. Gag cuts from humorous anime can "drop frames" to intentionally push the snappyness of a motion, while intense, emotional scenes in the same show might animate the same motion on 1s or 2s with lots of inbetweens. It all depends on the intent of the shot.

And we're done! The same information I gave at the end of the walk section applies to runs as well. Some variations use more or fewer frames, sometimes the layout artist might play with timing or spacing, and you have the opportunity to convey a ton about a character through their run. Whatever you need to do, you can always fall back on these basic mechanics to carry you through.