When animators are making an object move they often exaggerate the movements because if they drew a perfect circle for a ball the way figure b is the movements don't look natural. So how do we make the bouncing ball look like it's actually bouncing? With a series of different techniques designed to make the ball look more natural.

The very first thing an animator would look at is staging. For contrast we would made the ball black, the background white and we are looking at it bounce from the side. This may seem very obvious to you, but what seems obvious in this simple exercise, becomes crucial later in more complex animations. First you would see the ball as it looks normally. It's okay if this first frame has a perfectly circular ball. In the next picture you would see the ball flattening out a bit, this is called squash. Just like the word implies, the ball is flattening a little bit in anticipation of movement. Anticipation is a technique animators use when an object is about to move. So that the object doesn't just start to bounce on it's own, they add a moment of anticipation so that it looks as if it's moving because of some force that is applied to it. In the next frame you would see what looks like a pancake on the floor. This is the moment of extreme squash. The extreme moments in an animation are the moments of squash right before an object begins it's next series of movements. In the frame as the ball reaches it's highest point you would see it return to its natural shape. Then, on it's way down the ball would begin to stretch as it falls, the stretch again giving a less rigid look to the ball. As the ball hits the ground again you would see that it has squashed a little again in its follow through. The follow through is added by animators so that when an object comes to a stop it doesn't look like the object is coming to a sudden stop.

With these animations techniques you're able to make a ball who's bounce looks a little more natural.