Timing for Animation, 40th Anniversary Edition, 3rd Edition

Timing of Inanimate Objects

An inanimate object which has weight and is being acted upon by known forces moves in a predictable way. As a simple example, consider an object falling from rest under the influence of gravity. Disregarding air resistance, all objects fall with the same acceleration, which is about 9.8 meters per second per second. In practice, of course, the buoyancy of the air makes a leaf behave very differently from a lump of lead when dropped. However, assuming that an object is dropped which has an average weight, then the distance it falls in a time, “t,” with an acceleration, “f,” is given by the formula:

$$\begin{array}{lll}\text{Distance}\hfill & =\hfill & \frac{1}{2}{\text{ft}}^2\hfill \\ =\hfill & ;4.9{\text{t}}^2\text{meters}\hfill \end{array}$$

By substituting some numerical values for “t” distances fallen are as follows:

after $\frac{1}{8}$