I for one am not suggesting it is a hoax at this point. I think it leans closer to real than fake. But, the more supporting data there is, the more probable it is real. I think people are covering the obvious and easily verified points.

ok, i took screenshots from the code i was talking about:

this is the code from the picture that someone around here analyzed:
img259.imageshack.us...



and this is the picture from 0000000
img407.imageshack.us...



the marked string is the point where i guess it tells us the name of the used camera or chiptyp (for cellphone)

my cellphone never did that as far as i can remember (well it's not what i would call new...)

you happy now?

It looks like it was possibly taken by one of the guys in the Radio towers.
No matter how you play with this image, the object seems to be displayed as you'd expect such object to react according to the rest of the pictures data.
It's real.But that doesn't mean its extra-terrestrial.

JFIF compression for jpeg v.62, looks like Accusoft code

3:J>36F7,-@WAFLNRSR2>ZaZP`JQRO
&&O5

standard compression code string when importing digital pictures to the PC.

Can be from Cannon Powershot Olympus Sony or even camera phone.

Basically that string WAFLNRSR2 is part of the software and not created by the camera source.


[edit on 24-1-2007 by robertfenix]

I did an online search for the header information you supplied to see if I could narrow down the camera type & it seems that that string doesn't determine the camera model or chip type.
The results came back with several photos with that string but with several different camera manufacturers & models.

As mentioned I'm not trained at this sort of forensic image analysis, however I'm learning fast. I found this article on how to decipher the codes in a JPEG image file header:

www.obrador.com...

Going to start reading and comparing against the source photo by opening in Notepad. Anyone care to join me?

Can you point us to where you found this info? Because I also found several photos using Google with this same string in the header. It did not seem to me that this was cause by software, see this file for example (search for WAFLNRSR2 on the page.)

dd-b.net...

i also did a search for that string...and also found several pictures with that string.

so it's not the name of the cam, but i'm currently doing some research on that. i'll report back when i'm done and then i'll tell you guys what i found (if i find something)

i just want to mention a couple of things.

first, as far as the object not being centered, perhaps the person taking the photo was just holding the camera with one hand and snapping random photos because they were busy trying to do their job. imagine yourself trying to drive on a free way and take a picture of a plane. you most likely just aim and click.

so with that being said, im leaning towards it being a droplet of water. i originally mentioned it could be on the lense but it also could be on a window as well. from a plane, control tower, terminal, workshop etc.

another thing that makes me think it is a rain drop/condensation is that it is darker on the bottom possibly meaning a reflection of the ground. just look at a droplet on a glass of water and look where and what it is relfecting.

and another point, the object is darker on the bottom but in the interview with the taxi man he states it is dark gray on TOP and hazy on the bottom.

listen again

How did the abovetopsecret.com text come to arrive in the photo?
The reason i ask is that obviously it has been added to the photograph, now was this done by the person submitting the photo or was it by ATS themselves.
Doing a forensic analysis will be fruitless I would imagine as somehow this was added later using a image manipulation tool & thus saved with the image application header.
If it was added by ATS then they would have the original file but it seems to me this was added by the person submitting the photo.
Why would someone do that? It takes away some of the credibilty from the photo IMO.

The photo shown in this thread is showing a foggy day and even though the clouds were low that day when that sighting occurred, not one witness who has come forward to the public to describe what they saw up there that day mentioned anything about looking at this object in the sky through fog or that it was even foggy out there at the time of the sighting which occurred at 4:30 PM.
In fact, none of the news reports on TV or in the newspapers about this incident said anything about it being a foggy at the airport at the time of this sighting.

My thoughts exactly. You edit the image, you change the data in the photo making analysis on the photo pointless.

Good thing I saved off the original before ATS made that edit, eh?

i still have the clean one (the watermark was added manualy by a mod/admin at a later time...the pic was uploaded onto the ATS server)

here's the clean one:
img249.imageshack.us...


i did the research on the clean one. but i could find nothing that outed the picture as a hoax. the waflnrsr2 thing is on many picures on the net. that has nothing to do with any software.

you were faster then i was

Based on the JPEG header spec, I believe the string a characters in question are just hex values for data describing the image. May or may not be meaningful in the data table.

that would mean, that many pictures on the net would have exactly the same description. i doubt that this would make much sens.

Not to hijack the thread or take things off subject, but I just found a similar photo to the object in the alleged O'hare image:

www.ywwong.com...

Direct link to photo:

www.ywwong.com...

EXIF data checks out, much better shot. Looks AMAZINGLY like the same object, no?

www.accusoft.com...(file%20formats)46.html

JPEG-JFIF

Intended Use:

Interchange of .JPG files between applications on different platforms.

that string is the Cbase Machine code represented in ASCII text standard in almost all digital images that use Accusoft compression for image portability between platforms ie camera and pc

[edit on 24-1-2007 by robertfenix]

AgainstSecrecy

Not what I meant. It is data values (numbers) in a table. It is a Quantization table used in constructing the image. It starts at the FF DB pair.

www.obrador.com...

ÿØÿà JFIF



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2005:09:09 19:46:03 2005:09:09 19:46:03

no fake. it's from a nikon e995...nice cam.