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The Katoomba, Australia Yowie Video

June 24, 2006

On August 3rd we initiated an investigation of the alleged Yowie video found posted in various areas of the internet.

After requesting a synopsis of the events surrounding the video...we got a rambling, but detailed, email from the videographer. One of the more startling revelations was that his company worked for Lucas Film's final Star Wars Film "Revenge of the Sith".  This film has the most Wookiees (That's what Chewbacca is) in any scene of any Star Wars Movie...and you guessed it...it was filmed in Australia.

So the gentleman works in the film industry which after the Sonoma Video set bells and whistles off. The thing is this guy was being talkative unlike "Mark Nelson". And unlike Mark Nelson we confirmed that this videographer was real and we confirmed some things about him....so he IS real. So despite some coincidences we pressed on leaving us undaunted.

Correspondence August 4, 2006

"As for the two witnesses, I have spoken to the woman and she (I believe she's a nurse) will probably be happy to speak to you. Haven't spoken to
the male in the video since he moved to another town a few weeks ago. He's a friend of my wife from the city. My wife did not witness the incident as
she was at the house ordering dinner over the phone from a local Indian restaurant. ...and I cannot explain the sighting other that what I already
have mentioned so if it was a person pulling a prank, they were going to be almost frostbitten because when we returned to the house, we were all
suffering chill-blains from the fast acclimatization to the heated interior of the house from outside. It was so cold that the others
eventually left me to return to the house before i went in myself."

"Now if I had wanted to fake a creature sighting, I have no doubt that it could be done with very little planning or effort at all. When I returned
from my weekend away with friends, I looked at some of the bigfoot sites online and probably yours as well. The first thing I noted was that new
members were advised against posting videos of new sightings. I though about emailing someone but chose to search online to see if anyone else had
filmed anything. Everything I found looked to be scripted. ..... It was not my intention to circulate the video until people began to pester me on a minute by minute
basis. It's interesting to see that of the people responding to the thread, half were convinced and half were skeptical."
 

"As for our impressions on the night? We were genuinely startled and I believe that this was mostly due to the height of the critter (as tall as we
were). When we went indoors, I wrapped the camera in a jacket to acclimatize it to the warm interior of the house and looked at the video
after dinner."

And Finally:

"Feel free to write back though as you seem to have a more legitimate reason to want to
enquire about the video. I don't mind replying to you even if your enquiry
is short or long."

 

Location Map and laser path indicators in which direction the creature allegedly fled.

 Now there was some reluctance on the part of the Videographer to put us in contact with anyone else other than him. There were a few promises that he would put us in touch with the female subject in the film but has of yet not done such.

But as you will soon see, the videographer becomes angered when we try to extrapolate more precise information and ask for supportive evidence.

Correspondence August 13, 2006

"This is finally becoming tedious.  I don't have to prove anything myself.  I also remind you that it was yourselves that contacted me.  If I was charging a fee for my time or for distribution of the footage, I could understand a desire to apply more rigid scrutiny.  But that is not the case.  Personally, I'm not overly consumed with the video footage taken although it's indeed a curiosity.  I've showed it to people I work with and to a few friend who seem to think it's interesting but that it doesn't show anything specific to identifiable.......Any time that I have left for myself is devoted to private projects and to my wife. I¹d say that I have devoted a few hours to assisting you with the aforementioned investigation. An investigation which I might add comes close to interfering with my private life, friends, friends of my wife, business associates and....due to contact at my place of work last week, my employer." (First time he mentions this....that a staff investigator shot an email out to confirm he still works there.) "It's 4:30am and I have to be up for work by 7am... so you can see the inconvenience that even responding at length to your emails entails. I'll probably be cursing this letter as I force myself to drink a half gallon of coffee in order to stay awake for the journey to and from work tomorrow."

So much for the comment he made on the fourth stating....

"I don't mind replying to you even if your enquiry
is short or long."

All we were asking was for at least some corroboration. And we were in no hurry.

So Squatch-D goes to work to rattle the cage a bit:

"....posting such on a site such as Youtube.com (actually I was incorrect about this he posted it on Google Video) and leaving an email address for which to contact one with, is supportive of the issue that you wanted to be contacted for such. Thus we did, and when we do a job at Squatchdetective.com, which is entirely devoted to the Bigfoot (Yowie) mystery, not cryptozoology per se, we go above and beyond the call of duty to attain the most accurate, informed and authoritative investigation."

"Surely you would not want the film....labeled by the field of cryptozoology, or the Bigfoot research field labeled as a hoax. 

"More recently, videos have been posted by certain production studios to play a "stump the experts" game. We in the field have to be wary of any sort of hoax or trick now. "

His Responses:

As to the production studio's playing hoaxes:

"It would be fairly easy to do these days since so many people have access to professional software.I might add though that the company I work for is a digital company, not a modeling / sculpture studio."
 

Mentioning his wife's activities for that evening:

"She was indoors at the time preparing for dinner with her girlfriend."

In direct contradiction to his initial statement: "My wife did not witness the incident as
she was at the house ordering dinner over the phone from a local Indian restaurant"

But we will give him the benefit of the doubt on that one.

And Yet another E-Mail he states the following :

"In fact, I did not know of any Bigfoot related webpage's until searching online the night, I had already posted the video link on the laser forum."

In direct contradiction to his initial statement: " I looked at some of the Bigfoot sites online and probably yours as well....Due to the high volume of garbage online, I chose to pass and instead posted the video to people I knew on the laser website..."

That was the break I was looking for.

The Forensic Interview Analysis

First of the subject posts the video in place that can be seen by all. He investigates at some point Bigfoot and Crypto Websites and is paying close attention including answering criticism of his film, particularly at Cryptomundo.com.

He wants attention....but then states he does not want it.

His story has one slight inconsistency (the wife preparing dinner and or ordering food) A subsequent investigation showed that there are two Indian Restaurants in Katoomba. 

The subject states Katoomba is a small town very little traffic...yet a web search shows it to be bustling in the tourism industry, housing bistros and pubs and even is big enough to have TWO Indian restaurants.

Then he makes a contradictory statement again stating, "Personally, I'm not overly consumed with the video footage taken although it's indeed a curiosity. I've showed it to people I work with and to a few friend who seem to think it's interesting but that it doesn't show anything specific to identifiable."

Then why did he defend himself on Cryptomundo.com? Why play it down now?

Strength of the denial is an indicator that you are on the right track. Whereas when pressed for information he became belligerent, but when faced with recent hoaxes in the field, he states how easy that could be done, and concludes that the film is inconclusive. The opposite should have happened.

He should have been submissive with the evidence and belligerent with the allusion to a possible hoax.

I must admit the subject is quite convincing, but the narrative's are usually thrown of track with information not relevant to the investigation.

A common tactic used by interviewee's especially the smart ones, is to throw the interviewer off by giving him the reasons up front why he should be under suspicion.

Always present was the offer to have the female subject in the film either contact us or have us contact her once he got the contact info. Well it didn't seem to happen and we have patiently sat by and left him alone to do such for over two weeks.

Well maybe she doesn't want to get involved and that's understandable, but there was no follow up to it.

Bottom line is that witnesses want validation. He apparently and admittedly wants none.

He has a "close up encounter" and plays it down...this film if authentic would be better that the Patterson Film!

In Conclusion, I am under a suspicion that there is more to the story than being told.

The Film Analysis

The film shows a creature in very close proximity to the camera man. In retrospect it opens it's mouth appearing like its going to vocalize but never does. The other non-Bigfoot like action it takes is the direct turning of the head, signifying it has a neck similar to that of a human.

The camera man stated the animal took off into the brush, however, I had several problems with this. First it looked like the it made a bee-line in the around the tree and back into the direction from where tha camera man came.

Remarkably while enhancing the video, and slowing it down, a single light (not the laser as it is yellow and stationary), was observed in the film. By the map provided by the camera man, by all means from the position of the light, the creature should have taken off more towards the center of the screen or to the right, not to the left as demonstrated.

The light is most like a stationary street light as it remained stationary in the video.  If the creature ran off into the brush as the witness stated it would have veered of into the right side of the screen not the left as shown in the video.

The corresponding map as what we see in our investigation.

Let's now go on to the soundtrack where in some of the documentation the subject stated  there was one solitary car, and now nearby traffic. If you listen to the sound track closely, I think there's more than just one car passing by, and the first one was pretty close.

Finally the most disturbing fact about this case is that the subject works for a Fox Studios Subsidiary and we all know as previously stated about our friend Chewbacca, or Chewie as his friends call him.

Well I'll let you the readers sum it up.....here's the comparison.

I would say a dead on match!

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