ok, here is the question.
i want to animate a ball that bounces and stretches during flight.
i want to use a simple plane and a UVsphere with simple materials.
i have tried to create keyframes and use scale to stretch the sphere but when the anim is played back it doesn’t work.
I haven’t done any animation in blender to date, all my previous work was done in animation master which allowed the scaling, stretching and collision detection on objects.
I’m sure blender must have these facilities, but where ?.
a simple guide, or a link to a simple bouncing ball tutorial would be nice, but i have looked.
I have tried lattice deformation on the ball with the same non result, so i must be doing something wrong.
also when i create a keyframe, it seems there are lots of options to create it. What do they all mean ?.
sorry for what might not make sense !!.
It’s probably due to you not recording the right values…
The idea with all the options with the IKEY is to save LOCATION, ROTATION and SIZE are the main ones.
You are scaling, so you need to click SIZE in the IKEY menu… that’s what I’m thinking right now… theeth’s tutorial will teach you about moving and rotating a cube.
sorry for what might not make sense !!.
I like that sentance 
At this point, Blender does not have simple collision detection. Likewise, there is no easily available gravity to make the ball fall. Also, there is no stretch operation that maintains overall volume while scaling an object along a single axis. In Blender, you have to do it by hand and eye, setting keyframes.
Note: All of this can be done through scripting, but I suspect that is not what you’re looking for.
You could make a lattice the parent of the bouncing ball
Scale the lattice to deform the ball, recording its location, size & rotation.
This works in a fairly believable way.
Also, I seem to also remember a thread about recording game play, which would have gravity and other effects. For the game engine you need to use Blender Publisher.
Here’s a ball like thing I made a Loooong time ago with lattice deformation:
http://home.dejazzd.com/tombern/Personal/Jeffs/NeatThing.avi
DivX required.