Applied Animation - Maya Tasks - Walk cycle

In this exercise we had to put in the key poses of a walk cycle and and animate the 3D character called Moom. To do this I used a reference image imposed onto a flat plane by assigning a new material to that plane called a lambert, in the attribute settings I was able to add a file to the colour attribute and this file was the image of a walk cycle - side on. This reference imagery helped me to move the limbs of the character into each pose and I was then able to key frame in these movements.
I found this task to be very fiddly and the way the character moves - although I am happy that it moves - to be very unpredictable, as the character appears to be leaning to one side at the shoulder and I do not know how that has occurred.