PROJECTILE MOTION SIMPLY EXPLAINED WITH EXAMPLES VISUALLY.

 

So, you are a visual learner and want to learn about projectile motion intuitively huh ?

The projectile motion of an object has 2 components.

1) The velocity component parallel to the ground, aka

real part of the velocity aka 

initial velocity x cos(angle of throw)

Denoted as

Vo x cos(thetha)

(Initial velocity in some books is denoted as u, in others as Vo. 

I will be using Vo. ) 

2) Then there is a perpendicular component to this velocity aka the imaginary part of the velocity . 

Written as

Initial velocity x sin(angle of throw) 

Denoted as 

Vo x sin(thetha)

An analogy to this would be a single branch of a tree splitting into 2 branches.

Or taking an axe and cutting a log of wood into 2 parts.Is it necessary that these daughter parts should be of equal size w.r.t each other ? But surely bringing them together will create the whole right ?

Similarly (real part)^2 + (imaginary part)^2 = (whole thing)^2.

So squaring and bringing together the real and imaginary parts via addition will give you the whole thing.

Now coming back to projectile motion,

 

 

 

Range actually = (2 x real part of initial velocity x imaginary part of initial velocity) / acceleration due to gravity.