Preston Blair's animation career started early in the 1930s and lasted over 30 years from Mickey Mouse to the Flinstones. For computer animators he is more remembered for his publications including Animation, published by Walter T Foster from 1948 onwards. This contained the basic knowledge required to draw animated cartoons for a dollar. A well-used cover for the 1966 edition is shown below.
It contained a wealth of key frame examples of various characters in movement.
The man walking towards you, shown below, appeared in the early BBC Tomorrow's World programme on computer animation in 1971.
The key frames for a variety of animals walking, talking etc were shown over 40 pages of the book.
This gave computer animators the challenge of producing acceptable computer versions of these animations.
Below is the man walking key frames from Preston Blair. The first animation shows the walk running at 10 evenly spaced frames. The second show how the same walk can produce alternative walks by varying the number of inbetween frames between the key frames.