Adding squash and stretch to the bouncing ball idea blends two basic animation concepts into one animation. The spacing of the ball bounce is the main animation, and we add squash and stretch to create the illusion that the ball is soft and squishy. For a bowling ball, there will be no squash or stretch. For a water balloon, the ball will squash and stretch a lot.
Why Is This Important?
Sometimes animators have to be keeping track of many things at the same time. This exercise combines two ideas happening at the same time. Moving the ball along a curve with speed-up and slow-down spacing, while at the same time squashing and stretching. This requires concentration.
In our future challenges sometimes three or more animated things need to be happening at the same time. This lesson prepares us by requiring two different actions at the same time.