UFO Photographed Accidentally, by Ed Annunziata, Creator of Ecco the Dolphin

originally posted by: vlawde

originally posted by: JamesChessman

originally posted by: vlawde
Regarding the Ecco PC game, is there a good place to download it? I googled but it looks like most sites that had it are gone, and I'm afraid of downloading something from an iffy site

Actually yes, I do know where it's supposed to be available to download.

Its old home did close down (cavernsofhope.com), but Caverns of Hope now lives in discord.

This link should bring you to Caverns of Hope on discord:
discordapp.com...

Then if you look at the left-side menu, the 4th option down, is "files-download." And if you click that, then Ecco PC downloads are just a few items down, from the top of the screen.

There are a few downloads for Ecco PC but apparently you should just download the last version listed, as the most advanced version: "Ecco PC Fixed and Enhanced Version 1.2 FLAC."

Let me know if you get it downloaded and running.

Thanks but I'm not finding it. Your link wants me to sign up, which I don;t want to do. I found Caverns of Hope on twitter and got to their page, the only option I found was ecco the shattered ring.zip

I'm sorry, that discord Caverns of Hope is the place that I know of, to download it. Previously there was cavernsofhope.com, for many years, until the site shut down, and it basically was reborn on discord.

I understand not wanting to sign up for a million things, but this one is OK, to sign up. It's free, and there's no financial aspect to anything, so there's no ads, or spam, or junk mail, etc. You just need to use an email address to sign up, and then it's just a quiet, free website, full of nerds who love Ecco the Dolphin lol.

Alternately if you really don't want to do that, a close second choice would be just downloading the Sega CD version of Ecco the Dolphin, its ROM should be available everywhere (though I never got my Mac to emulate Sega CD, which needs the emulator to load the Sega CD BIOS, which never worked for me).

Sega CD Ecco is 16-bit so it won't look the same as Ecco PC, which is 32-bit, but it will have the same music, and Sega CD is probably my favorite version of Ecco.

originally posted by: ArMaP

originally posted by: JamesChessman
I also considered taking some window pics in my car but honestly that wouldn’t go anywhere lol.

I would have done it, if I had a car.

And that one photographer, early in the thread, said that water drops on glass would not be in focus, while the camera is on distant / infinite setting. Yet water drops are a popular explanation in this thread, regardless of that photographer’s input.

Have you heard about pinhole cameras? Having a very small aperture, pinhole cameras have a huge depth of field (theoretically infinite), and the photos taken with then show almost everything in focus. You can see some very good photos here.
The above is just to point that, because depth of field depends on the lens used, it's possible for a camera to take a photo with everything in focus from, say, one metre up to infinite.
As the image posted on Twitter doesn't appear to have any EXIF data we don't know the characteristics of the camera, so we can only speculate about that.

I don't really know much about pinhole cameras but if that's how they work, then that is very interesting. And it's obviously not the way that our eyeballs work, or how nearly all cameras work, which can only focus on near or far, but not both at once.

Unfortunately we don't know his camera type, though I expect it was just a smartphone, because there was at least one other photo that he mentioned his phone IIRC.

Also unfortunately I don't think he's going to respond to my messages on Twitter. He might not even receive my messages but if he does, then it's easy to imagine NOT responding to some stranger, messaging about UFO's, because what a weird conversation is that, lol.

Plus, the guy is probably quite busy just creating videogames that make millions of dollars, plus trying to balance it with some family time, nature-hiking etc.

So that may exhaust the topic but I did post it because I thought the photo was quite possibly showing alien craft in the sky.

Oh well...

Also I was thinking of this when I was driving, the last couple days, and of course my windows are slightly murky and full of small marks... And raindrops go out of focus, to my eyes, and to my phone camera, when focusing on the distance... but I just can't imagine this being helpful to the conversation, because people could always argue that Mr. Annunziata had the cleanest car windows in the world, and that he was using a pinhole camera, for example. So I don't think posting photos of my own car windows would really contribute anything...

originally posted by: JamesChessman
I don't really know much about pinhole cameras but if that's how they work, then that is very interesting. And it's obviously not the way that our eyeballs work, or how nearly all cameras work, which can only focus on near or far, but not both at once.

I mentioned pinhole cameras just to show that depth of field depends on lens construction.

I'm not really a photographer, only a amateur beginner, but my elder sister is a professional photographer and I learned a lot from her.

Unfortunately we don't know his camera type, though I expect it was just a smartphone, because there was at least one other photo that he mentioned his phone IIRC.

You are probably right, I noticed now that his Twitter post says "Twitter for iPhone".

Also unfortunately I don't think he's going to respond to my messages on Twitter. He might not even receive my messages but if he does, then it's easy to imagine NOT responding to some stranger, messaging about UFO's, because what a weird conversation is that, lol.

I agree, his comment appears to have been more of a joke than anything else, I don't think he is interested in UFOs.

Plus, the guy is probably quite busy just creating videogames that make millions of dollars, plus trying to balance it with some family time, nature-hiking etc.

An interesting fact: I have sent emails to scientists, museums and one of the authors of a FEMA manual, and almost all of them answered me, most likely because the subject was related to their work. If the topic doesn't mean a thing to someone I doubt they will answer a message from some unknown person.

So that may exhaust the topic but I did post it because I thought the photo was quite possibly showing alien craft in the sky.

Oh well...

You did what everyone should do: if we find something interesting we should show it to other people.

Also I was thinking of this when I was driving, the last couple days, and of course my windows are slightly murky and full of small marks... And raindrops go out of focus, to my eyes, and to my phone camera, when focusing on the distance... but I just can't imagine this being helpful to the conversation, because people could always argue that Mr. Annunziata had the cleanest car windows in the world, and that he was using a pinhole camera, for example. So I don't think posting photos of my own car windows would really contribute anything...

My thought of taking photos inside a car (if I had one) was to try to reproduce the reflection (or something similar), not to try to reproduce the "UFOs", as that would be harder to reproduce without a camera with the same characteristics of the one used in the original photo.

I wonder if he took any other pictures that day to explain the dried water spot. It could've been a dried speck of anything that fell on the lens...a sneeze, an aerosol of some sort.

a reply to: ArMaP

I mentioned pinhole cameras just to show that depth of field depends on lens construction.

^Yes, it's very interesting, it's just a total anomaly compared to cameras in general, and how our eyes work (i.e. focusing on either near or far, but not both at once).

I noticed now that his Twitter post says "Twitter for iPhone".

^Thank you. I didn't notice that before, as I was ignoring the clutter on the page, but yes it says right below the photo that it was taken from iPhone, apparently.

I agree, his comment appears to have been more of a joke than anything else, I don't think he is interested in UFOs.

^Actually the guy IS interested in UFO's, by all indications. And his wind turbine / UFO post seems more serious than a joke imo.

--He posted the wind turbine / UFO pic himself, publicly, and commented on the UFO's, which is actually the reason why I came across it in the 1st place;

--His videogames prominently feature alien spacecraft and alien life, in a relatively serious way;

--Here's one of his posts from Feb. that unironically links to a serious news article: "194 UFO sightings reported in Wash. state last year."



His post: twitter.com...

The UFO article he linked to: komonews.com...

a reply to: ArMaP

An interesting fact: I have sent emails to scientists, museums and one of the authors of a FEMA manual, and almost all of them answered me, most likely because the subject was related to their work. If the topic doesn't mean a thing to someone I doubt they will answer a message from some unknown person.

Well the guy is interested in UFO's, as I just showed in my previous post. So I'm not going to interpret it that way, if I don't hear from him.

However, he also clearly does have a full life with his successful career of decades, and family, etc. He also might receive a lot of mail and messages, and he might not read / respond to a lot of them.

I'm not even familiar with Twitter myself -- I hear about it, but I've never used it -- so it's also possible that he doesn't have his settings to receive messages from strangers or something like that.

You did what everyone should do: if we find something interesting we should show it to other people.

Ha thanks.

My thought of taking photos inside a car (if I had one) was to try to reproduce the reflection (or something similar), not to try to reproduce the "UFOs", as that would be harder to reproduce without a camera with the same characteristics of the one used in the original photo.

^Yes, I understood that you were referring to the reflection "lines" of color in the sky, not the actual UFO's themselves.

But there was at least one person who was referring to the UFO's as reflections of buttons or lights in the car.

originally posted by: Schmoe11
I wonder if he took any other pictures that day to explain the dried water spot. It could've been a dried speck of anything that fell on the lens...a sneeze, an aerosol of some sort.

Honestly I think this post is showing the debunker mentality more than anything.

The mentality seems to be... arguing / pushing for every possible mundane idea, no matter how completely unlikely it is.

Because even the most unlikely mundane explanation can then be argued as more likely than “little green men” which are effectively assumed to not exist.

Therefore every mundane thought is considered as more meaningful than... the consideration of something actually meaningful in the photo.

So your post above is effectively saying that SNEEZES and MUCOUS, etc. is more meaningful to think about, than considering that the two photographed UFO’s actually might be something important.

I’m just saying, lol.

It’s a mentality of pushing mundane, meaningless explanations, and the thing is, you’ll never run out of mundane ideas. There are infinite mundane ideas to push lol.

...

In terms of Mr. Annunziata’s photo, the fact that it’s now established as an iPhone photo, really makes it nearly impossible for the ufo to be a water drop, or something else, on the lens.

Mainly because the iPhone lense is so small that it’s nearly impossible to get something on it, without covering a huge amount of it, or the whole thing.

iPhone lens (from my own experience) is typically either clean or it’s completely covered in a blur, if I accidentally brush my hand by it, before I wipe it clean again.

originally posted by: JamesChessman

originally posted by: Schmoe11
I wonder if he took any other pictures that day to explain the dried water spot. It could've been a dried speck of anything that fell on the lens...a sneeze, an aerosol of some sort.

Honestly I think this post is showing the debunker mentality more than anything.

The mentality seems to be... arguing / pushing for every possible mundane idea, no matter how completely unlikely it is.

Because even the most unlikely mundane explanation can then be argued as more likely than “little green men” which are effectively assumed to not exist.

Therefore every mundane thought is considered as more meaningful than... the consideration of something actually meaningful in the photo.

So your post above is effectively saying that SNEEZES and MUCOUS, etc. is more meaningful to think about, than considering that the two photographed UFO’s actually might be something important.

I’m just saying, lol.

It’s a mentality of pushing mundane, meaningless explanations, and the thing is, you’ll never run out of mundane ideas. There are infinite mundane ideas to push lol.

...

In terms of Mr. Annunziata’s photo, the fact that it’s now established as an iPhone photo, really makes it nearly impossible for the ufo to be a water drop, or something else, on the lens.

Mainly because the iPhone lense is so small that it’s nearly impossible to get something on it, without covering a huge amount of it, or the whole thing.

iPhone lens (from my own experience) is typically either clean or it’s completely covered in a blur, if I accidentally brush my hand by it, before I wipe it clean again.

Not at all what I'm getting at. I'm a firm believer in ET, they have to exist somewhere in the vastness. I dont see what's wrong with eliminating all possibilities, which was the point of my post.

As a photographer the problem is most UFO pictures are taken with cameras made for taking pictures of Bigfoot. Strange but true most Bigfoot pictures are taken with cameras made for UFO's

It's really that simple always carry both cameras.

And it's April 1st

originally posted by: Schmoe11

originally posted by: JamesChessman

originally posted by: Schmoe11
I wonder if he took any other pictures that day to explain the dried water spot. It could've been a dried speck of anything that fell on the lens...a sneeze, an aerosol of some sort.

Honestly I think this post is showing the debunker mentality more than anything.

The mentality seems to be... arguing / pushing for every possible mundane idea, no matter how completely unlikely it is.

Because even the most unlikely mundane explanation can then be argued as more likely than “little green men” which are effectively assumed to not exist.

Therefore every mundane thought is considered as more meaningful than... the consideration of something actually meaningful in the photo.

So your post above is effectively saying that SNEEZES and MUCOUS, etc. is more meaningful to think about, than considering that the two photographed UFO’s actually might be something important.

I’m just saying, lol.

It’s a mentality of pushing mundane, meaningless explanations, and the thing is, you’ll never run out of mundane ideas. There are infinite mundane ideas to push lol.

...

In terms of Mr. Annunziata’s photo, the fact that it’s now established as an iPhone photo, really makes it nearly impossible for the ufo to be a water drop, or something else, on the lens.

Mainly because the iPhone lense is so small that it’s nearly impossible to get something on it, without covering a huge amount of it, or the whole thing.

iPhone lens (from my own experience) is typically either clean or it’s completely covered in a blur, if I accidentally brush my hand by it, before I wipe it clean again.

Not at all what I'm getting at. I'm a firm believer in ET, they have to exist somewhere in the vastness. I dont see what's wrong with eliminating all possibilities, which was the point of my post.

Well then I apologize if I took your post wrong, I was kind of incredulous that you suggested mucous on his lens lol.

But yes it makes sense to rule things out. Thankfully the iPhone lens is so small that it's almost impossible to get something on it, without covering the whole thing. Which means we can probably rule out lens debris...

originally posted by: JamesChessman
In terms of Mr. Annunziata’s photo, the fact that it’s now established as an iPhone photo, really makes it nearly impossible for the ufo to be a water drop, or something else, on the lens.

It was not established that the photo was taken with iPhone, what we know is that it was posted from an iPhone.

Obviously, that makes most likely that it was taken with the same iPhone, but it's not established, as it's also possible that the photo was taken with a different camera, uploaded to the iPhone and posted from there.

But also, along those lines, I do think the thread generally does show that debunker mentality, i.e. suggesting every mundane explanation that people can think of, even though most such ideas are a real stretch. Regardless, the whole thread becomes discussion of all these endless mundane ideas lol.

I'm not criticizing ruling things out, which is important, but on the other hand: Just look at all these unlikely, mundane explanations the thread is full of. Sure reflections should be ruled out -- and I did ask Mr. Annunziata if he was in a car or outside -- but that would seem the main one, to rule out.

Water drops (on car window) seems impossible to show up clearly, as close-up detail, when the camera's focused on infinite, but that idea has been suggested by many people, regardless the camera-focusing problem, inherent in that idea. (Thankfully this is pretty crystal-clear now that we noticed that he used an iPhone, which certainly does focus that typical way, and so it should really rule out this idea.)

Before I made the thread, I had expected lens flare to be the main debunker argument, but perhaps people have passed on that explanation, since there's really no discernible light source in the pic, to cause lens flare. But still, at least one person did claim it was lens flare (from the light bouncing off one small object, in the pic).

Oh and people have suggested the UFO were reflections of car interior lights or buttons, but that's a hard one to really take seriously bc it really doesn't look like that lol.

...

However I do think people have a good point, in trying to figure out the "lines" of color in the sky (which people think is indicating reflections in glass).

I think it's honestly just something with the sunlight. And hopefully he'll respond whether he was inside a car or not.

I think it's some weird trick of the light, probably combined with his phone's color-processing, somehow.

One idea I had is that, considering the form-factor of an iPhone, which is basically a flat rectangle... Maybe the lines of light are somehow a bit of shadow effect, from the corner of the phone, blocking out just a tiny bit of light.

But I mean really, who knows, lol. We're discussing why the sunlight seems to be streaking a certain way, it's probably a rather impossible question.

It's also important that in the natural color photo, the lines of light, are barely even noticeable. So the color-exaggerated versions are almost making the lines look much more solid than they really are, in the original photo.

It's still interesting, what exactly it's from, but imo the original pic doesn't look dramatically mysterious about the shades of blue in the sky:

Or actually, how about the lines of light in the sky, are actually the old remains of contrails from airplanes. I think this is actually the best explanation, and it would explain why the color-exaggerations make the lines look more solid. Because they're actually real objects, i.e. they're fading lines of exhaust.

I only thought of this after my last post, but I think that this is it.

The old contrails look weird because they're fading and getting blasted with sunlight in the photo. Which creates a slight shadow effect in the old, fading exhaust.

originally posted by: ArMaP

originally posted by: JamesChessman
In terms of Mr. Annunziata’s photo, the fact that it’s now established as an iPhone photo, really makes it nearly impossible for the ufo to be a water drop, or something else, on the lens.

It was not established that the photo was taken with iPhone, what we know is that it was posted from an iPhone.

Obviously, that makes most likely that it was taken with the same iPhone, but it's not established, as it's also possible that the photo was taken with a different camera, uploaded to the iPhone and posted from there.

You're right. When I posted about that, I was thinking that it was as "established" as anything, that he took the pic with his iPhone.

Which is most likely true, but not 100% certain.

Your post prompted me to ask him that, too -- if he just took the photo with his iPhone on normal settings?

Surprisingly he did respond to me, earlier today, in response to my message sent to him on Monday, linking my video about his photo. He just thanked me and said that he'd probably post about it in his Twitter feed lol.

I only sent him the questions afterward, so we can wait and see if he answers my questions of car status and camera status.

originally posted by: JamesChessman

originally posted by: ArMaP

originally posted by: JamesChessman
In terms of Mr. Annunziata’s photo, the fact that it’s now established as an iPhone photo, really makes it nearly impossible for the ufo to be a water drop, or something else, on the lens.

It was not established that the photo was taken with iPhone, what we know is that it was posted from an iPhone.

Obviously, that makes most likely that it was taken with the same iPhone, but it's not established, as it's also possible that the photo was taken with a different camera, uploaded to the iPhone and posted from there.

You're right. When I posted about that, I was thinking that it was as "established" as anything, that he took the pic with his iPhone.

Which is most likely true, but not 100% certain.

Your post prompted me to ask him that, too -- if he just took the photo with his iPhone on normal settings?

Surprisingly he did respond to me, earlier today, in response to my message sent to him on Monday, linking my video about his photo. He just thanked me and said that he'd probably post about it in his Twitter feed lol.

I only sent him the questions afterward, so we can wait and see if he answers my questions of car status and camera status.

I don't have Twitter and have no desire to, so can you ask him if he took any more pictures that day with the same camera?

originally posted by: Phage
a reply to: JamesChessman

What do you think those lines are?

Electromagnetic interference from the UFO maybe?

I saw the lines as well, Phage and although they appear to be behind the telephone wires, that could be an illusion. My thinking is that the bright sunlight hitting the nubs/caps on the two windmills, where the blades connect, could be the reason for the relections in the lens. If we notice, there are dark spots on the nubs, as there is on the 'ufos'.

I am not good at working angles and such, so just speculation as it stands.

In my previous post I didn’t really finish listing off the thread’s mundane explanations suggested.

We’ve also got the suggestion that the photo was a photoshop / collage;

The photo is a fabricated reference to NASA’s “Echo” program, which I had never heard of (and most people have never heard of);

It’s a guerilla marketing campaign for the “Ecco” games (which are thankfully NOT an explanation, since the games have been dead for over 20 years);

I think there was also the vague suggestion of the guy seeking fame over the photo, which doesn’t really fit the circumstances at all (he just posted the pic almost a year ago, and didn’t make a big deal out of it).

And there were probably more mundane explanations that I didn’t think of, off the dome.

...

My point is that while it’s important to rule things out, many of these ideas are just extremely unlikely. Like I don’t think NASA’s “Echo” program is really worth considering in any relation to the photo, nor guerilla marketing ideas, or the notion of seeking fortune & fame, etc.

...Its like, at some point, people are just making up crazy explanations lol.

originally posted by: JamesChessman
...Its like, at some point, people are just making up crazy explanations lol.

Some may even say they are extraterrestrial spaceships.

originally posted by: JamesChessman
However I do think people have a good point, in trying to figure out the "lines" of color in the sky (which people think is indicating reflections in glass).

That's what they are. Reflections of something inside the car. A mechanism of some kind with two rivets or snaps on it that line up perfectly with the angles and edges of the mechanism.

It's also important that in the natural color photo, the lines of light, are barely even noticeable. So the color-exaggerated versions are almost making the lines look much more solid than they really are, in the original photo.

Just like a refection would do! But in the enhancement I did, all I did was increase the contrast. I didn't do anything with the color. If it was just lines of clouds or something there wouldn't be all the various matching angles and parallel features.

People got sidetracked with the idea of water drops, which was simply inaccurate.

a reply to: JamesChessman

Its a white dot on a picture
how is that a ufo/alien of any interest whatsoever!
ladies and gentlemen its 2020 and ufology is still reduced to blurry dots on a random background!