(For the following few paragraphs, see illustrations below.)
ORDER IN WHICH AN ANIMATOR MAKES THE SEQUENCE OF POSITIONS FOR A WALK.
In scheming out the positions for a walk, the artist first draws one of the extreme outstretched positions (A). (It is supposed that we are drawing a figure that is going from left to right.) Then on another sheet of paper the following outstretched position (B), but placed one step in advance. These drawings are now placed over the tracing glass of the drawing-board. All the following drawings of this walk are to be traced over this glass, and they will be kept in register by the two pegs in the board. As now placed, the two drawings (A and B) cover the distance of two steps. A foot that is about to fall on the ground and one that is about to leave it meet at a central point. Here a mark is made to indicate a footprint. A similar mark for a footprint is made on each side to indicate the limits of the two steps.
Illustrating how alternating series of positions are the same in outline, differing only with respect to whether the near or the far limb is moving forward.
A sheet of paper is next placed over the two drawings (A and B), and on the central footprint the middle position (C) of the legs is drawn. In this the right limb is nearly straight and supporting the body, while the other limb, the left, is bent at the knee and has the foot raised to clear the ground. The next stage will be to make the first in-between position (D) between the first extreme and the middle position. It is made on a fresh sheet of paper placed over those containing the positions just mentioned. The attitude of the right limb in this new position would be that in which it is about to plant its foot on the ground and the left limb is depicted as if ready to swing into the position that it has in the middle one (C).
Then with the middle position (C) and the last extreme one (B) over the glass, on another sheet of paper, the next in-between one (E) is drawn. This shows the right foot leaving the ground and the left leg somewhat forward ready to plant its heel on the ground. We have now secured five phases or positions of a walking movement.
The two extremes (A and B) spoken of as the outstretched ones have the same contours but differ in that in one the right limb is forward, and the left is directed obliquely backward, while in the other it is the left limb that projects forward and the right has an obliquity backward.
Now, if we make tracings, copying the outlines only, of the three other positions (C, D, and E), but reversing the particular aspects of the right and the left limbs, we shall have obtained enough drawings to complete two steps of a walk.