Begin by double clicking on Logitech QuickCamera on the desk top.

Open QuickCapture. This opens a window with an image of the air table. The air table should just fit into the frame. Place the ruler along the edge of the table. Two pieces of tape on the ruler mark off a distance of 0.5 m. This will be used to establish the scale for the video pictures.

Turn on the air pump with the switch underneath the table.

When you click on Record a Video the camera will begin taking pictures. You can stop it by clicking Stop in the same place. You can start the puck from rest by putting its edge under the wire at the border of the table. Or you can start it in motion by giving it a gentle push with your hand. [It doesn't matter if the camera is recording before the motion you wish to analyze (for example, while the puck is held by the wire) or after the motion you wish to analyze (for example, after the puck hits the wire on the opposite side of the table and bounces back). After the whole video is recorded you will be able to select any part of the motion to analyze.]

After you have recorded the puck's motion, close the video window, and open Logger Pro. (Close Tip of the Day.) You will see an empty graph; a window to the left will be a blank table.

From the Insert menu (top of screen) select Movie. A window will open showing a small video picture (or more than one). Click on the picture to open your video; it will be at the first frame. Enlarge it by dragging on the corner of the frame. The icons: mean "play", "stop", "move forward frame by frame," and "move backward frame by frame," respectively. You may play the video once or twice to see what you have.

Set the video at the frame where you wish to start analysis. Then click on the (red) icon at the bottom:

(Enable video analysis)

Click on the (yellow) icon

at the right to set the scale. Drag the cursor from one tape mark on the ruler to the other. Then in the small window enter 0.5 m.

Now take the icon

and place it in the center of the puck in the first frame; click on it to record its coordinates. The puck will then move to the next frame; again click at the center of the puck. Continue until you have recorded all the frames you wish to include in your analysis (i.e. stop before the puck hits a boundary).

Now x, y, and time, as well as the x and y components of velocity, are recorded in the table. Graphs of x vs. t and y vs. t will be shown. By clicking to the left of the graphs you can choose to display graphs of v_x vs. t or v_y vs. t.

To analyze the graph you must drag the cursor from some position on the left of the graph to the right, to select the portion of the graph you wish to analyze. There may be spurious motions at the beginning or end that you can eliminate.

Go to the menu Analyze at the top of the screen. You can select Linear Fit, which gives you the best straight line fit to the data. This will appear as a line on the graph, and as slope (m) and y-intercept (b), in y = mx + b. [Remember, "x" in the Analyze program means the horizontal axis in your graph, which may be "time" in your experiment, and "y" means the vertical axis, which may be x or y, or v_x or v_y.] You can also select other fits to the data, such as a polynomial fit of power 2 or higher.

You can Print a copy of the graphs or the table, one for each member of the lab group.