Claim: Prospector captures footage of Panther, Ballarat, Victoria, Australia 2024

In the footage it doesn't look to be cut
im thinking its a blur pareidolia, i had a hard time grabbing screenshots even as as soon as i zoomed in a bit the field blurred out and it was hard to see any difference to the longer grass near fence.
 
hard to tell exactly if this is the same area but this one looks like a cat:

Source: https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=286529647836137
(It looks like the embedded facebook video does not get included when replying?)

Just tried to geolocate the video and I think it is actually just a few meters to the east from where the original video was taken: https://maps.app.goo.gl/bsZgjDGPqLK1yGQf8

I could not get the correct perspective in StreetView since moving more to the left has always some trees blocking the view. However the number of trees, their distance to each other and the form of each tree fits nicely.

cat_01.jpg

If this is actually the location that would mean that is quite likely that both videos show the same cat.

The same four trees just from a different perspective a few more meters down the road. Here the fence is clearly visible:
cat_02.jpg


"Driving" ca 100 meter back to the west on the road shows a lamb standing directly behind the fence which allows a rough estimate of the height of the fence.

cat_03.jpg


Comparing that to a still (actually three stills copied together) from the video of the cat standing in front of the fence shows that the cat is most likely smaller than the lamb. Which would make it a normal sized cat or a very small panther. Well I think it's a cat.

cat_04.jpg
 
But I'm not sure how to tell what the original correct speed is. To my eye, the 2X speed on YT playback of this video still looks a bit slow -- I admit this may be because I think the cat is small and it does not yet look like a small cat in the way it moves... we'd not have to try and guess if the poster of the video had included one play-through in un-adjusted speed!
I just tried it on 2X and I sort of agree. I've seen cats go "zero to sixty" at the sound of a can being opened. But the only thing that looks distinctly off for your common-or-garden-variety moggie is the length of the whole trip, yet it must be said that that's the easiest thing to fake. There are enough instances where the cat is out of sight behind trees, leaves, or grass, so it could well be the same clip of a sprinting cat, repeated several times.
 
But the only thing that looks distinctly off for your common-or-garden-variety moggie is the length of the whole trip,
the silos are almost 1/2 a mile away.
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very sloppy view estimate (green is cat run)
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the silos are almost 1/2 a mile away.
I'm talking about the length of time. If, as we suspect, the video was slowed down by a factor of (maybe) two, that means it's running full out in a straight line for 30 seconds or so. I've never seen a domestic cat do that. We don't see anything that it is chasing, and we don't see anything that is chasing it, and it certainly doesn't appear to be going home for lunch, so why the running?
 
in a straight line for 30 seconds or so. I've never seen a domestic cat do that
my cat got chased by a german shepard once, she was at full book mode at least that long until she got to a tree. (not that she had a choice of course). But he's going faster than 2x for sure.

so why the running?
because a weirdo with a camera is throwing UFOs at you.
 
Also, if it were chasing a mouse or bug its prey wouldn't even be visible.

Domestic cats hunt as a play behavior, as well, not just feeding. So they'll spend an entirely disproportionate chase on a tiny target and then might not even eat it because they filled up on fancy feast before their owner put them out for the afternoon.
 
This might be a feral cat with behaviours more akin to a wild animal, but cats still play even wild ones.

At some point I have to sit down and do some angle estimation and speed determination based on assumed distances, but it's difficult work made more difficult that we still don't have a real time video.

Also domestic/feral cats vary in size a lot and so do Leopards a small female and a large male Leopard can be very different in size.
 
Interestingly, it's always a sighting of a black panther, never of a regular non-melanic leopard, even if only about 11% of leopards are melanic (according to wikipedia). Maybe because many domestic cats are black, while spotted ones (while existing) are very rare?
 
At some point I have to sit down and do some angle estimation and speed determination based on assumed distances, but it's difficult work made more difficult that we still don't have a real time video.
for distance..

well if you use the cat vid taken the month before..he's 180? feet. (assuming photographer is crouched ..based on fence height..spo would likely have to be across street to get the nearer tree branch in?
assuming he would have zoomed more if he could, the april 22 scene is about 150 feet? from near tree to few feet before fence.
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I had the feeling they were sat in a car the angle is lower than the roof mounted google streetview cam.
 
I had the feeling they were sat in a car the angle is lower than the roof mounted google streetview cam.
good point. im low when sitting in my car, still he drove by twice and just happened to see the black cat? i assumed he was metal detecting across the street. but i guess its possible he was just driving by.
 
good point. im low when sitting in my car, still he drove by twice and just happened to see the black cat? i assumed he was metal detecting across the street. but i guess its possible he was just driving by.
Maybe he just knows there's a large black feral cat in this area that he sometimes sees and that the right video can be passed as a Black Panther vid to drive engagement on his FB channel.
 
There seems to be a bit more information to be extracted from the videos.

From the first video it is possible to pretty accurately determine the position of the camera by using the sight lines of the trees to the buildings in the background.

cat_08.jpg


Using that information it is possible to track the position of the cat. Of course with quite some margin of error regarding the distance. The cat was always running orthogonal to the line of sight with a slight hint of running away from the camera at the start of the video.

cat_09.jpg


So even if we account for the distance uncertainty it is obvious that the cat was running towards the location of the second video. Maybe the hunted animal was trying to reach the undergrowth of the shrubs for security. Who knows.

Also important is that the location of the second video is clearly visible from the camera position of the first video and also the perspective of the second video would match.

cat_06.jpg


With that in mind I am pretty sure that both videos actually show a single chain of events. The cat chased some animal towards the shrubs and the guy filming lost track of the cat for a few seconds. Likely because the tree group at "Tree 5" blocked his view. Then he noticed the cat again next to the shrubs and continued filming.

At the latest when the cat was visible in the open in the second video it should have been pretty obvious to the guy that it was actually a normal cat.
 
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