Animate a Bouncing Ball in After Effects

Build a realistic bouncing ball animation using easing and squash and stretch.

Introduction

30 Second Summary

Think about how a basketball bounces. It speeds up as it falls, flattens on impact, and slows at the peak of each arc.

In this project, you will build a 3-second bouncing ball animation from scratch in After Effects. You'll use keyframes and easing to make a simple circle move like it has real weight and physics.

What You'll Build

Hit play and watch your ball drop from the top of the frame, accelerate under gravity, squash flat against a ground line, and rebound with decreasing height until it settles.

By the end of this project, you'll have:

A ball that accelerates as it falls and decelerates as it rises, simulating real gravity through easing curves and the Graph Editor.
Visible squash and stretch deformation on impact that makes the ball feel like it has physical mass and elasticity.
A polished exported video with motion blur and decaying bounces ready to share as a finished piece.
Secret Mission: A responsive ground shadow and horizontal movement that turn the exercise into a complete animated scene.

Are there any prerequisites?

You need Adobe After Effects installed with an active Creative Cloud subscription. No prior animation experience is required.

Before We Start

Before we dive in, take a moment to picture what a realistic bouncing ball looks like and why learning to animate one matters for your motion graphics goals.

Set Up Your Workspace and First Composition

Before you can animate anything, you need a clean canvas with the right settings. A disorganized workspace slows beginners down because they waste time hunting for panels instead of creating.

In this step, you will open After Effects, reset the workspace to a known layout, create your first composition, and draw a ground line for the ball to bounce off.

In this step, get ready to:

Reset the After Effects workspace so every panel is in the right place.
Create a composition with the correct resolution, frame rate, and duration.
Draw a ground line that the ball will bounce against.

Open After Effects and reset your workspace

After Effects ships with several predefined workspaces that arrange panels for different tasks. Resetting to the Default workspace guarantees your screen matches this guide.

Press Cmd+Space (macOS) or the Windows key (Windows) to open your search bar.
Type After Effects and press Return to open it.
In the top menu, click Window, then hover over Workspace and select Default.
Click Window again, hover over Workspace, and select Reset "Default" to restore the default panel arrangement.

Your screen now shows five key panels arranged in their default positions.

What are these five panels?

Project panel (top-left): stores all your files and compositions.
Composition panel (centre): your visual canvas where you see the animation.
Timeline panel (bottom): where animation happens through keyframes and layers.
Tools panel (top bar): contains drawing and selection tools.
Effects and Presets panel: gives you access to built-in effects.

Panels look different or are missing?

If your layout does not match, make sure you selected Default first, then Reset "Default" as a separate action. Selecting the workspace alone does not undo any panel rearranging you may have done previously.

Help me find the workspace reset option in After Effects.

Create a new composition

A composition is the canvas where your animation lives. It defines the resolution, frame rate, and duration of your scene.

Go to Composition in the top menu and select New Composition (or press Cmd+N on macOS, Ctrl+N on Windows).
In the Composition Name field, type Bouncing Ball.
Set Width to 1920 and Height to 1080.
Set Frame Rate to 30.
Set Duration to 0;00;03;00 (3 seconds).
Click the Background Color swatch and choose a dark colour of your choice.
Click OK.

A dark canvas appears in the Composition panel, and your new composition appears in the Project panel on the left.

Why these settings?

1920x1080 is standard HD resolution. 30 frames per second gives smooth motion without creating unnecessarily large files. Three seconds is just enough time for a full bounce sequence.

Don't see the dark canvas?

Make sure you clicked OK in the Composition Settings dialog. If the Composition panel still shows nothing, double-click the Bouncing Ball composition in the Project panel to open it.

My composition isn't showing in the Composition panel after I created it.

Draw the ground line

The ground line gives the ball something to bounce against. You will create it as a shape layer using the Rectangle Tool.

Make sure nothing is selected in the Timeline panel by clicking an empty area below any existing layers.
In the Tools panel at the top, long-press the shape tools icon (or press Q repeatedly) to cycle until you see the Rectangle Tool.
Draw a thin horizontal rectangle across the bottom of the composition to represent the floor.
In the Timeline panel, click on the new shape layer name to select it, then press Return to rename it.
Type Ground and press Return again to confirm.

Why deselect everything first?

If an existing layer is selected when you draw a shape, After Effects adds the new shape to that layer instead of creating a new one. Deselecting first ensures you get a brand new shape layer for the ground.

Rectangle ended up inside another layer?

Undo with Cmd+Z (macOS) or Ctrl+Z (Windows). Click an empty area in the Timeline to deselect all layers, then draw the rectangle again.

Help me fix my shape layer in After Effects.

Take a moment to predict what your workspace looks like right now. How many items are in the Project panel, and how many layers are in the Timeline?

You should see a dark composition with a thin rectangle at the bottom in the Composition panel. The Project panel shows the Bouncing Ball composition, and the Timeline panel shows a single layer named Ground.

Your canvas is ready and the stage is set. Next up, you will create the ball itself and make it move for the first time.

Create the Ball and Make It Move

Your canvas is set up with a composition and a ground line. Now you need an object to animate.

In this step, you will draw a ball, place it at the top of the frame, and tell After Effects to move it to the ground. This is where you meet keyframes for the first time. You will also see what "bad" motion looks like before you know how to fix it.

In this step, get ready to:

Draw a circle shape layer and position it near the top of the frame.
Set two Position keyframes to create movement from top to bottom.
Preview the animation and observe why constant-speed motion looks unnatural.

Draw the ball with the Ellipse Tool

After Effects uses shape layers to create vector graphics directly on your canvas. You will draw a circle that becomes the ball for your animation.

Click on an empty area of the Timeline panel to deselect the Ground layer. If any layer is selected when you draw, the shape gets added inside that layer instead of creating its own.
In the Tools panel at the top, long-press the shape tools icon (it may show a rectangle from the last step). Select the Ellipse Tool from the dropdown. You can also press Q repeatedly to cycle through the shape tools until you see the Ellipse.
Hold Shift and drag in the Composition panel to draw a perfect circle. Aim for about 100 pixels in diameter (roughly the size of a small coin on screen).
Drag the circle so it sits near the top-centre of the frame. Leave space above it so you can see it fall.
In the Timeline, select the new shape layer and press Return to rename it. Type Ball and press Return again to confirm.
Click the Fill colour swatch in the tool options bar at the top of the screen. Choose a bright colour (like orange or red) so the ball stands out against your dark background.

You should now see a bright circle near the top of your Composition panel. The Timeline shows two layers: Ball above Ground.

Don't see a separate Ball layer?

If your circle appeared inside the Ground layer (you see it nested underneath rather than as its own layer), you had Ground selected when you drew. Press Cmd+Z to undo, click an empty area in the Timeline to deselect everything, then draw again.

If the circle looks stretched or oval-shaped, you forgot to hold Shift. Undo and redraw while holding Shift the entire time you drag.

help me fix my shape layer in After Effects

Set Position keyframes to create movement

A keyframe marks a specific value at a specific moment in time. When you set two keyframes with different values, After Effects calculates all the frames in between automatically. This is called interpolation.

Select the Ball layer in the Timeline.
Press P on your keyboard to reveal the Position property. This is one of the five Transform properties every layer has.
Make sure the playhead (the blue marker in the Timeline) is at frame 0. You can drag it all the way to the left or press Home.
Click the stopwatch icon next to Position. A small diamond appears at frame 0 in the Timeline. This is your first keyframe. It records the ball's current position (top-centre of the frame).
Move the playhead forward to frame 15. At 30fps, this is exactly half a second into your animation.
In the Composition panel, drag the ball straight down until it sits just above the Ground layer. After Effects automatically creates a second keyframe at frame 15.

You should see two diamond-shaped keyframe indicators in the Timeline on the Position row. One at frame 0, one at frame 15.

What are keyframes?

A keyframe says "at this moment in time, this property has this value." You set the start and end positions. After Effects fills in every frame between them.

The stopwatch enables keyframing for that property. Once it is active, After Effects records a new keyframe whenever you change the value at a different time.

No diamond appearing when you move the ball?

Make sure you clicked the stopwatch first (at frame 0). If the stopwatch is not active, After Effects does not record keyframes. You will know it is active when the stopwatch icon turns blue.

Also confirm you moved the playhead to frame 15 before dragging the ball. If the playhead is still at frame 0, dragging the ball just updates the existing keyframe rather than creating a new one.

help me set up keyframes in After Effects

Preview the animation

You have two keyframes telling After Effects where the ball should be at two moments in time. Before you press play, think about what you expect to see.

What do you think will happen?

Imagine a real ball falling from the top of a frame to the ground. How does it move? Does it travel at a constant speed, or does it change speed along the way? Keep your prediction in mind when you hit play.

Press the spacebar to preview your animation.

The ball moves from top to bottom at a perfectly constant speed. It looks like a circle sliding on a rail, not a ball falling through the air.

Why does it look so robotic?

By default, After Effects uses linear interpolation between keyframes. Linear means the ball covers exactly the same distance every single frame. Nothing in the real world moves like this.

A real ball accelerates as gravity pulls it down. It starts slow and gets faster as it approaches the ground. That acceleration is what makes motion feel physical. Without it, animation looks mechanical.

This robotic, constant-speed motion is exactly the problem you will solve in the next step.

Your ball moves, but it does not look real. Next, you will learn how easing and the Graph Editor transform this mechanical slide into a convincing gravity drop.

Make the Motion Feel Real with Easing

Your ball moves from top to bottom, but it slides at a constant, mechanical speed. Nothing in the real world moves like that.

Gravity accelerates falling objects, pulling them faster the longer they fall and slowing them as they rise. In this step, you will use easing and the Graph Editor to simulate that physics. This is where After Effects transforms from a slide-show tool into an animation tool.

In this step, get ready to:

Apply Easy Ease In to simulate gravity on the first drop.
Build a multi-bounce sequence with decreasing heights.
Set easing on peak keyframes so the motion has natural rhythm.

Apply Easy Ease In to simulate gravity

Right now, your ball's two keyframes use linear interpolation. That means After Effects moves the ball at the same speed for the entire journey. You need the ball to start slow at the top and arrive fast at the bottom, like a real falling object.

In the Timeline panel, click on the second Position keyframe (the diamond at frame 15 where the ball hits the ground).
Press Shift+F9 to apply Easy Ease In.
Press spacebar to preview the animation.

The ball now starts slowly at the top and accelerates as it approaches the ground. The motion already looks more natural.

What is Easy Ease In?

Easy Ease In tells After Effects the object should accelerate into this keyframe. The ball starts slow at the top and arrives fast at the bottom, simulating how gravity pulls objects faster the longer they fall.

Think of it as describing how the ball arrives at its destination, not how it leaves.

Don't see any change in the preview?

Make sure you selected the second keyframe (frame 15), not the first one (frame 0). Click directly on the diamond icon in the Timeline to select it. A selected keyframe turns solid.

If you accidentally applied easing to the first keyframe, select it and press Cmd+Click on the keyframe to reset it to linear.

Help me fix the easing on my bouncing ball keyframe.

Now open the Graph Editor to see what is happening mathematically.

Click the Graph Editor button (the curve icon) at the top of the Timeline panel.
Look at the curve that appears. The steeper the curve, the faster the ball moves at that moment in time.
Drag the Bezier handle on the second keyframe to the left to make the curve steeper at the end. This creates a more dramatic gravity effect.
Press spacebar to preview again.

The ball falls even faster now as it approaches the ground. The Graph Editor lets you fine-tune exactly how the speed changes over time.

What does the Graph Editor show?

The Graph Editor displays a visual curve representing your ball's speed over time. A flat line means constant speed (linear). A ramping curve means the ball is accelerating.

With Easy Ease In applied, you will see the curve ramp upward toward frame 15, confirming the ball speeds up as it falls. Dragging the Bezier handle lets you control how aggressive that acceleration is.

Build the full bounce sequence

A single drop is not a bounce. Real balls rebound multiple times, each bounce lower than the last as energy is lost. You will add four more keyframes to create this decay.

Click the Graph Editor button again to close it and return to the normal layer view.
Move the playhead to frame 25.
In the Composition panel, drag the ball upward to a peak about 2/3 of the original drop height. A new keyframe appears automatically.
Move the playhead to frame 35.
Drag the ball back down to just above the Ground layer.
Move the playhead to frame 42.
Drag the ball up to a small peak, about 1/3 of the original drop height.
Move the playhead to frame 50.

Drag the ball back down to just above the Ground layer.
Press spacebar to preview the full sequence.

You should see the ball drop, bounce up, drop again, bounce to a lower peak, and drop a final time. The bounces get shorter each time. The motion still feels a bit stiff because the new keyframes are all linear.

Why do the bounces decrease in height?

Every time the ball hits the ground, it loses energy to the impact. Each rebound reaches a lower peak than the last. This is what makes the animation feel physically plausible rather than like an infinite loop.

Ball not creating new keyframes when you drag?

The Position stopwatch must already be active (blue) for After Effects to auto-create keyframes. If you see no diamond appear when you move the ball, check that the stopwatch next to Position is lit. You turned it on in the previous step, so it should still be active.

Also make sure the Ball layer is selected in the Timeline before dragging in the Composition panel.

Help me troubleshoot keyframe creation in After Effects.

Apply easing to the peak keyframes

The bounce sequence now has the right shape, but the speed is wrong. Every keyframe is linear, so the ball moves at the same pace everywhere. In real life, a ball hangs for a moment at the top of each arc, then snaps back down. You will fix this by easing only the peak keyframes.

In the Timeline, click on the Position keyframe at frame 25 (the first peak).
Hold Cmd and click the keyframe at frame 42 (the second peak) to add it to your selection.
Press F9 to apply Easy Ease to both peak keyframes.

Why keep the ground-hit keyframes linear?

The keyframes at frames 35 and 50 (where the ball hits the ground) stay linear on purpose. A sharp, instant change of direction at the floor preserves the feeling of a hard impact. Easing those frames would make the ball seem to melt into the ground instead of bouncing off it.

The pattern is: fast at the floor (linear), slow at the peaks (eased). This creates the natural rhythm of a real bounce.

Before you preview, predict what the motion will look like now that the peaks have easing but the ground hits stay sharp. Will the ball pause at the top of each arc?

Press spacebar to preview the full animation.

The ball now accelerates as it falls and decelerates as it rises, like a real ball affected by gravity. The motion has rhythm instead of constant speed. The bounces get smaller over time.

Your ball finally moves like it has weight. Next up, you will add squash and stretch so it also looks like it has physical material that deforms on impact.

Add Squash and Stretch for Weight

Your ball now accelerates as it falls and slows at each peak, just like a real object under gravity. But watch closely. It still looks like a rigid circle sliding through space.

Real objects deform on impact. A tennis ball flattens when it hits the court, then elongates as it rebounds. This principle is called squash and stretch, and it is what gives animated objects a sense of mass and material. Without it, your ball feels weightless no matter how good the easing is.

In this step, get ready to:

Unlink the Scale property so you can squash width and height independently.
Add squash and stretch keyframes at the first ground impact.
Apply Easy Ease and repeat the pattern for all remaining bounces with decreasing intensity.

Unlink Scale and create your first Scale keyframe

By default, After Effects locks the width and height of Scale together so objects resize uniformly. You need to break that link so the ball can squash flat on one axis while expanding on the other.

Select the Ball layer in the Timeline panel.
Press S on your keyboard to reveal the Scale property.
Click the Constrain Proportions icon (the chain-link icon between the width and height values) to unlink them.
You should now see two separate percentage values instead of one.
Move the playhead to frame 15 (your first ground-hit keyframe).
Click the stopwatch icon next to Scale to enable keyframing and create your first Scale keyframe.

Why unlink width and height?

Squash and stretch requires opposite changes on each axis. When the ball hits the ground, it should get wider (more than 100% width) and shorter (less than 100% height) simultaneously. With proportions linked, both values move together and you cannot create this deformation.

Set squash and stretch values for the first bounce

Each ground impact needs four Scale keyframes that define the deformation cycle: normal shape before impact, squash on contact, stretch on rebound, then back to normal.

With the playhead on frame 15 (the ground hit), set the Scale width to 120% and the Scale height to 80%.
Move the playhead back to frame 13 (2 frames before the hit).
Set both Scale values to 100% width and 100% height.
Move the playhead forward to frame 17 (2 frames after the hit).
Set the Scale width to 85% and the Scale height to 115%. This is the stretch as the ball rebounds upward.
Move the playhead to frame 20 (a few frames later).
Set Scale back to 100% width and 100% height.

Press the spacebar to preview your animation.

You should see the ball flatten on impact and stretch as it leaves the ground on the first bounce. The second and third bounces still look rigid because they do not have Scale keyframes yet.

What do these values represent?

Frame 13 (100%/100%): the ball is its normal round shape just before contact.
Frame 15 (120%/80%): the ball squashes flat on the ground. It gets wider and shorter, like a water balloon hitting a table.
Frame 17 (85%/115%): the ball stretches tall and narrow as it rebounds. Fast-moving objects elongate in their direction of travel.
Frame 20 (100%/100%): the ball returns to its resting shape in mid-air.

Ball looks the same on impact?

Make sure the Constrain Proportions chain-link icon is unlinked. If it is still linked, both values change together and you will not see any deformation.

Also confirm your playhead is on the correct frame. Click the timecode display at the top of the Timeline and type the frame number directly to jump precisely.

Why isn't my ball squashing when I preview the animation?

Apply Easy Ease and repeat for remaining bounces

Without easing, the squash and stretch transitions snap abruptly between shapes. Easy Ease smooths the deformation so it feels organic.

Click on the first Scale keyframe (frame 13), then Shift-click the last one (frame 20) to select all four Scale keyframes.
Press F9 to apply Easy Ease to all selected keyframes.

Now repeat the squash/stretch pattern for your remaining ground-hit keyframes at frames 35 and 50, with decreasing intensity each time.

For the second bounce (ground hit at frame 35), use approximately 110% width / 90% height for squash, and 92% width / 108% height for stretch.
For the third bounce (ground hit at frame 50), use approximately 105% width / 95% height for squash, and 96% width / 104% height for stretch.
Keep the same structure for each bounce: 100%/100% a couple of frames before the hit, squash values on the hit frame, stretch values a couple of frames after, and 100%/100% a few frames later.
Select all new Scale keyframes and press F9 to apply Easy Ease.

Why decrease the intensity?

Each bounce is smaller because the ball loses energy. Less energy means less force on impact, which means less deformation. Decreasing your squash/stretch values on each successive bounce reinforces the illusion of energy loss.

Before you preview, predict what you expect to see. Will the deformation look the same on every bounce, or different?

Press the spacebar to preview the full animation.

The ball now deforms naturally on each impact. It squashes flat when it hits the ground and stretches tall as it rebounds, with the effect fading on each successive bounce.

Squash makes the ball float above the ground?

When the ball squashes, it may appear to hover because the anchor point is at the centre by default. The squash expands equally upward and downward from the centre, lifting the bottom edge off the floor. You will fix this in the next step when you adjust the anchor point during polish.

Help me fix my ball floating above the ground when it squashes.

Your ball now has physical weight. Next up, you will polish the animation by fixing the anchor point, adding motion blur, and exporting a finished video file.

Polish and Export

Your ball now has personality. It accelerates under gravity, decelerates at each peak, and squashes on impact like a real physical object.

There is one remaining problem. If you look closely at the squash frames, the ball might float above or sink below the Ground layer. That happens because the default anchor point sits at the centre of the circle, so squashing pushes geometry in both directions. A quick anchor point fix, motion blur for speed, and a final export will turn your working animation into a polished video file.

In this step, get ready to:

Fix the ball's anchor point so squash deforms downward from its base.
Enable motion blur to add a sense of speed during fast movement.
Export a finished video file through the Render Queue.

Fix the anchor point for proper squash

By default, After Effects places a shape layer's anchor point at its centre. When the ball squashes, it deforms equally up and down from that centre point. That means the bottom of the ball lifts off the ground during impact frames, breaking the illusion of contact.

Select the Ball layer in the Timeline.
Press A on your keyboard to reveal the Anchor Point property.
Drag the anchor point value downward (increase the Y value) until it sits at the bottom edge of the circle. You can also hold Cmd and double-click the Pan Behind (Anchor Point) Tool in the toolbar, then manually reposition it to the ball's base in the Composition panel.
Press the spacebar to preview. Watch the ground-hit frames closely.

The ball now squashes downward from its base, staying flush with the Ground layer on every impact frame.

Why move the anchor point to the bottom?

The anchor point is the fixed reference from which all transforms (scale, rotation, position) are calculated. Moving it to the bottom means "squash" compresses the ball downward into the floor rather than floating it above.

This is a standard technique in character animation. Feet stay planted, hips absorb the compression.

Ball still floating during squash?

If adjusting the anchor point shifted your ball's position in the frame, you may need to nudge the Position values to re-align it with the Ground layer. Select the Ball layer, press P to reveal Position, and adjust the Y value until the ball sits correctly on the ground at impact frames.

Help me fix my ball's anchor point so it squashes correctly at the ground

Enable motion blur

Real objects moving quickly appear blurred to the human eye. Without motion blur, fast-moving frames look unnaturally sharp and crisp. After Effects can simulate this per-layer.

In the Timeline panel, find the Motion Blur column (the overlapping circles icon in the layer switches area).
Click the Motion Blur switch on the Ball layer to enable it for that layer.
Enable the master Motion Blur switch at the top of the Timeline panel (the matching overlapping circles icon in the Composition switches row). This turns on the blur calculation for your preview.
Press the spacebar to preview the animation.

The ball now shows subtle blur during its fastest moments (just before and after ground contact). This adds to the sense of speed and weight.

Why two switches for motion blur?

The per-layer switch marks which layers should receive blur. The master switch at the top controls whether After Effects actually calculates and displays it. This two-level system lets you toggle the expensive blur calculation on and off for previewing without losing your per-layer settings.

Not seeing any blur in the preview?

Make sure both switches are enabled. The per-layer switch on the Ball layer AND the master switch at the top of the Timeline must both be active. If only one is on, blur will not render.

Also check that your preview resolution is set to Full (the dropdown at the bottom of the Composition panel). Lower resolutions may not display blur clearly.

Help me get motion blur working in my preview

Export your animation via the Render Queue

Your animation is polished and ready to become a standalone video file. The Render Queue is After Effects' built-in export system that processes your composition into a playable video.

Go to Composition in the top menu bar, then click Add to Render Queue.
The Render Queue panel opens at the bottom of the screen with your composition listed.
Click the blue underlined text next to Output Module.
In the Output Module Settings dialog, set Format to QuickTime, then click OK.
Click the blue underlined text next to Output To.
Choose a save location on your Mac (such as your Desktop) and give the file a name, then click Save.
Click the Render button on the right side of the Render Queue panel.

What does the Render Queue do?

The Render Queue processes every frame of your composition and writes them into a single video file. QuickTime is a reliable container format that plays natively on macOS. For a 3-second animation at 30fps, this renders 90 frames total.

After Effects displays a progress bar during rendering. When it finishes, you see a green checkmark next to your composition in the Render Queue.

Before you open your exported file, take a moment to predict what you expect to see. Does your mental model match what the video will show?

Navigate to the save location you chose and double-click your exported video file to play it.

You see a polished bouncing ball with natural gravity, squash and stretch on impact, decreasing bounce heights, and motion blur during fast movement. The animation feels physically convincing.

Render failed or file won't play?

If the render fails, check that you have enough disk space at your chosen save location. Also confirm the Output Module is set to QuickTime (not a codec your system does not support).

If the file exports but won't play, try opening it directly in QuickTime Player rather than double-clicking (right-click the file, choose Open With > QuickTime Player).

Help me troubleshoot my After Effects render

Secret mission

Add a Shadow and Horizontal Movement

Your ball bounces in place, but real balls travel forward. In this extension, you'll separate the X and Y position dimensions, add horizontal momentum with friction, and create a ground shadow that responds to the ball's height. The result looks like a finished animation piece rather than a technical exercise.

Clean Up Your Resources

This project runs entirely locally using your existing Adobe Creative Cloud subscription. No additional paid resources were created and there are no ongoing costs beyond your subscription.

Resources you used:

After Effects project file (.aep) saved locally on your Mac.
Rendered QuickTime video file saved locally on your Mac.

Keep everything running

No action needed. Choose this if you want to keep experimenting with your bouncing ball animation or try new variations.

Your After Effects project file (.aep) is saved and can be reopened anytime.
Your rendered video file is ready to share or reference.
You can reopen the project in After Effects to tweak timing, add more bounces, or experiment with new effects.

Pause - I'll come back to this later

Close After Effects to free up memory. Your project file stays saved on disk for whenever you return.

Save your project if you have unsaved changes (Cmd+S).
Quit After Effects (Cmd+Q) to reclaim system memory.
Your .aep file and rendered video remain on your Mac until you choose to delete them.

Delete - I don't want to use this again

Remove all project files from your Mac. This cannot be undone.

Quit After Effects if it is still open (Cmd+Q).
Delete your After Effects project file (.aep) by dragging it from Finder to the Trash.
Delete your rendered QuickTime video file by dragging it from Finder to the Trash.
Empty the Trash to permanently remove the files (Finder > Empty Trash).

Nice Work!

You just built a polished bouncing ball animation entirely from scratch in After Effects. The motion feels physical and alive because you understand the principles behind it.

You've learned how to:

Built a shape layer animation with keyframes and discovered why linear motion looks robotic compared to properly eased motion.
Used Easy Ease and the Graph Editor to simulate real gravity, making a ball accelerate as it falls and decelerate as it rises.
Added squash and stretch to give the ball physical weight and elasticity, enabled motion blur, and exported a finished video file.
Secret Mission: Separated position dimensions for independent axis control, added horizontal movement with friction deceleration, and created a responsive ground shadow that scales and fades with the ball's height.

Ready to quiz yourself?