YEAR 6 at St.Mary’s have been learning about Arthur Caley (1824 – 1889) aka “Colonel Routh Goshen”.
“He was billed as the tallest man in the world at 7 ft, 11 inches and 28 stone. His true origins were kept secret from the public during his performance years in the United States and were obscured by the many apocryphal biographies that were created to publicise him. His actual origins came out slowly after his death. His birth name was Arthur James Caley and he was born on the Isle of Man in 1824. After his retirement in the 1880s, he settled in Middlebush, New Jersey and gained the nickname the Middlebush Giant.” wikipedia
Today, both Year 6 classes tried to recreate the Manx Giant, through the medium of a news report about the discovery of some ancient movie footage (OK - so Caley’s death predates the general availability of movie cameras!) showing a giant-sized person interacting with others on a stage.
The sequence was introduced by a newsreader in a present day studio, followed by a ‘live’ report from reporters in a New York street, followed by shots of the great man on suitably grainy footage.
Of course all this was done with the help of a green screen and computer software - in this case Apple’s Final Cut X available on the Computer Bus.
Despite being a professional program, FCX is very easy to use allowing excellent results to be produced by pros and Year 6 alike.
For the archive footage, use of multiple layers of green screen footage (some of which were resized to achieve a convincing height difference between the ‘giant’ and other Year 6s, then the addition of stylising filters and a modest speed increase, a VERY convincing result was achieved.
The series of visits to St.Mary’s by Bus continues after half term.
