Block out and basic movement

Once I've uploaded my reference video into the scene, I was ready to begin animating at last. I had about 2 weeks to get it done, there was no time to waste.

First of all, I needed to block out my characters. I positioned the guy in the spot where he'd be standing in the final animation - his motion was secondary compared to the horse, so I chose to not bother much with him for the time being. Looking at the reference and consulting my storyboard, I've moved the horse roughly the way he'd move across the scene. I decided to completely ditch the world control, using only the limb controls. That way I never had to deal with any sort of feet sliding.

Even though it made for some ugly leg shapes at the start, I decided to plant the legs on the ground for as long as it matched the feet in the reference during the slowdown. There is no cycle, I simply used the leg positions from the reference footage. If a hoof was on the ground in the reference, so it did in my animation, regardless how much it would stretch the leg. Although looking awful for a very long time, it ensured proper timing on the legs - something that might be the most complex element to get right in a horse run cycle.

At that stage, the ending was a lot different compared to what I ended up going with, but it wouldn't be until some time later until I made that decision.