Crop Circles- Infra Red Anomalies

I've found some interesting stuff on a crop circle research site and i thought i should share

Several years ago Colin Andrews pointed to an interesting anomaly in crop circles: the appearance of crop circles atop watersheds or aquifers and the subsequent displacement of large volumes of water. This observation led to the suggestion of microwave energy as a prime motivating force behind the creation of crop circles. Tests were subsequently done in Japan where stalks were placed in microwave ovens and baked to achieve similar physical effects found on the fields. Unfortunately, after about thirty seconds, the plants blew up and caught fire. This led me to believe that the reason why there was so much watershed displacement in the first place was that the water was literally being sucked out of the ground to counteract the burning affect of the microwave. After all, how could you explain that the ground inside a new, genuine formation is bone dry while the night despite heavy rain overnight? And that when cut, the bottom of the affected plant stems smells of a cooked, malty odour? This is where I came in with the idea of using infra red film to help prove or disprove this theory. I had worked with infra red film years ago in college, mostly as an art form, but I was aware of the film's scientific capacity to capture heat in plants. In a nutshell, infra red film penetrates just below the surface of objects to retrieve heat-sensitive information. Consequently it is not too distracted by surfaces warmed by sunlight (the tarmac of a road surface, for example, will always show as black regardless of its surface temperature because the medium itself is lifeless). Its trademark is the bright red colour denoting the high chlorophyll heat dissipation present in foliage. It is a very contrasty film, so bright sunlight tends to wash out some of the results, so it is hard to scan properly onto a computer, so I apologize for the discrepancy of the quality of pictures here. Most annoying of all, it is very expensive to shoot.

By no means a conclusive discovery, these results nevertheless set up two interesting possibilities for future observation. Shot from the air, genuine formations show disturbance of the watershed within 48-hours of creation which, after a couple of weeks, gradualy revert to normal. Hoaxed formations, on the other hand, reveal nothing unusual, regardless of the time period. On the ground, the difference was also obvious....continue

You can read the full research on the links below.

www.cropcirclesecrets.org...
www.cropcirclesecrets.org...

I don't know if you guys saw this crop circle documentary, but in any case, here it is.
(not related to the above quotes)

New swirled order (crop circle documentary 2009)

So is he saying that the plants in a finished crop circle are resting at hundreds of degrees Celsius? It appears that Freddy Silva needs to do some basic research on the limitations of infrared film and modes of photonic emission.

Then why the crops show signs of heat in the pictures and the hoaxed ones not?

I am not familiar with infrared imaging and didn't quite understand what he is saying in those links. That's why i posted this, so people around here can make me and others understand! (i know there are smart people around here )
If someone on ATS is more knowledgeable in this matter, please post!

The type of infrared photography he is doing is only capable of detecting infrared light emitted by objects which are at hundreds of degrees Celsius. Infrared film cannot detect the wavelengths of infrared light emitted by objects at low (ambient) temperatures and the glass in the lens of a camera is opaque to light at these wavelengths.

A very specialized device called a thermal imager is required to detect and image infrared light at wavelengths emitted by objects at ambient temperatures. Therefore temperature is not a factor in his image data.

The infrared light that he is photographing is reflected sunlight and to a much lesser extent fluorescence. Fluorescence is basically light hitting something causing it to emit light at a different wavelength (chemistry in plants has some fluorescent properties).

So basically he is misinterpreting the data. He is assuming that the infrared light in his images is an indication of the temperature of the crop circle but it is not.

I'll post more tomorrow but I'm on my way to bed. Hope this helps.

Ok, I just read his article again and I'm seeing a lot of technical issues.

Firstly, using a microwave oven to simulate what might have happened to the plants in the field is completely pointless because microwaves at different frequencies and power levels will have significantly different effects and there is no way to tell what frequency and power level the plants in the field were supposedly exposed to. Microwave ovens transmit microwaves at a very specific wavelength which causes water molecules to resonate and thus heat up. Also, there is no way to vary the power level that microwave ovens transmit. This is why a microwave oven sounds like it is cycling over short periods when you turn down the power setting. The power level is not being adjusted. Instead the microwave oven cycles the power completely off and on over several second intervals to achieve a long term reduction in power output.

So, so far, not all infrared light is the same and not all microwaves are the same. but Mr. Silva thinks they are so he is using oranges to demonstrate apples. The effects of these energies at different wavelengths have significantly different implications. In fact microwaves and infrared waves are the same type of energy and only differ significantly in their effects because they resonate at such different wavelengths.

Next Mr. Silva states that the tarmac on a road will look dark even when sunlight is hitting it despite its temperature because it is lifeless and the foliage will be bright. Well he is correct that the tarmac will appear dark but not because it is lifeless. Instead, just like with visible light, tarmac in the near infrared (NIR) band (where his camera is sensitive) is not very reflective. Plants however are much more reflective in NIR and thus show up brightly.

Now if he was actually imaging the part of the infrared spectrum that is radiated by cool objects (thus measuring their temperature) like he claims Mr Silva would be quite surprised to see that the tarmac is glowing much brighter than the foliage. That is because the tarmac is absorbing infrared light instead of reflecting it and thus heating up. Here is an image I just took with my thermal imager and you can see that the tarmac is much warmer than the foliage.
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/files/8ee42a01f3257192.jpg[/atsimg]

I would go on but at this point you can see that Mr Silva doesn't have a single iota of knowledge about any aspect of what he is talking about, thus the rest of his article is not worth spending effort on.

Thank you very much for the explanation on this matter!
You have even put your thermal imager on the line!
You deserve respect and you got it!
Thanks again for the clarification!

You are welcome. It is great that people take the effort to post these things on ATS so it can be peer reviewed.

I can't help but think Mr. Silva knows that he is pushing false data because as he is directly involved in developing the testing techniques there should almost certainly be recognition that big technical holes exist. For instance the fact that no specific temperature measurement can be acquired with his technique would have been a big indicator for him. At some point he must have been sitting there and wondered "Hmm, how much of a temperature difference is there" and then a couple of inquires would have determined that there is no way to tell because there was no temperature data in the first place. That event taking place is pure speculation on my behalf, but I can't imagine him (or even more unlikely one of his cohorts) missing that. He is unfortunately doing the noble cause of crop circle research an injustice.

I see that he is offering lectures. Now that is a lecture I would love to attend. There would have to be some sorting out of a few things.

Freddy Silva being one of the experts in the crop circle phenomenon i thought that he knows what he is saying. He began researching the crop circle phenomenon in the 90'.

In the video below, at around 07:15 , he is saying that the soil (not the plants) has been heated at about 5 thousand degrees, and the plants seem to be fine!
I know that what he is saying it's impossible! I think that this could be true only if something beyond our understanding are creating them.
Of course, people can make crops also.



Below it's an interview with him (the interview is 35 minutes long )
www.consciousmedianetwork.com...

To bad he can't came here and clarify things!

I'm between FACTS & FICTION !


[edit on 28-7-2009 by SpaceSilence]

reply to post by dainoyfb


Thanks for the great explanations and an example of a real thermal image to show the guy is clueless.

I'm not really into crop circles but i watched the documentary for entertainment purposes.

The part I liked was just after 32 minutes in the video, they talk about the message we sent into space in 1974, then they show the "crop circle" that is a reply to our message!!!

This is pure genius! The maker of that crop circle gets a lot of credit in my book for such a brilliantly creative idea! Of course there are many very beautiful crop circles and that video shows a lot of the more spectacular circles. There really is some great artistry involved, regardless of who you think made them. There is similarly a lot of very bad science in many parts of that video which there's no need to get into, but suffice it to say that the example dainoyfb gave us shows that we can't trust a lot of claims that we hear on this subject.

Good thread as much for dainoyfb exposing the truth about infrared, as for the OP! S+F