My roommate awoke to a green orb and he took a picture!

Originally posted by nothingwrong
reply to post by evilod

 

Were both pics taken with the same camera?

If the camera were different (I think they were) then how do you now they both have the same focal length? (Zoom factor)

How do you know they were taken from the same position.

How do you know that blob in the first pic is the door handle?

I love your work, and it is done well, but unfortunately meaningless until the above questions are answered.

Sorry. I honestly like what you have done, but there are too many unknowns for it to prove anything yet.

Good points. Yes, this definitely hinges on the assumption that the perspectives of each photo are fairly closely aligned based on the OP knowing the side of the bed his roommate slept on and trying to recreate his roommate's most probable vantage point. Also, I don't know for sure as I'm not an expert on it, but I would imagine most cell phone cameras have pretty similar focal lengths, close enough for this purpose anyway. Again, assuming neither photo was zoomed. I mean, there's not much to go off of the photo in question, I'm just working with what is there, and what little is there seems to fit pretty well without really having to stretch the imagination too much.

reply to post by evilod


right .. ..

so why the tails if the door was stationary ??

Looks like a glow worm to me... They have about the same colour. That would be the Occam's Razor explanation. Glowworms fly rather slowly but have a fluent way of flying which could explain the seemingly gentle turns.

Originally posted by Panic2k11
reply to post by swan001

 

Well in that case I would expect a constant luminosity across the strand but here we have a segmented segment, like a beaded string it does not conform to what would happen if motion blur was the only cause for the "orb" trail in the image...

It means the "orb" was pulsating.

Well I'm back, sorry for my absence last night. My former roomate was suposed to come by, but he cancelled at the last minute due to a forgotten dinner date. He did however, come by tonight and just left.
I want to take a moment to thank Druid42 for the direction and encouragement in getting this done, Veghead for the encouragement, Thepeopleunited for the totally awesome endorsement, evilod for the super fantastic work on putting the two photos together and trying to make sense of it. There are more of you to thank, you know who you are.

Evilod, we wondered too about someone outside with a laser pointer. It is possible, but my apartment is on the second floor and there's no balcony outside the window that you correctly assume is to the right of the photo. The roomie says that the curtains were closed and they're so thick that no light can pass thru. Tonight, he indicated something new to me, and that was this: He says that he could see the trails in the photo just as it is. What you see in the pic is what he saw. So, that's a bit of new news. Thepeopleunited, he said that it was in the doorway, but I guess he could be wrong. It may have been hard to discern between the doorway and the space immediately to the right where as evilod placed it with his overlay.

Now comes the hard part for me...
God I hate this part...
He says that he uploaded the pic to facebook. Shortly after (I know, I know) he reset the phone. So, he then downloaded the pic from his facebook album back to his phone. We just copied the picture from his phone to my PC, no exif data was intact.

I know, I know, complete fail at this point. I am so flippin sorry that I can't provide an original, he assured me that he would look over every folder on his phone and SD card to make sure that he doesn't have it. Much like myself, he wasn't aware of the importance of preserving the original - Plus as he mentioned tonight, he never thought that his pic and story would be put on ATS for scrutiny.

At this point I have let you all down and I am truly sorry. Please accept my apologies but it appears that there will be no exif data to be had. I was so hopeful that tonight would turn out differently but it is what it is.
Call it fake, call it a farce, I can't blame anyone at this point for whatever criticism they wish to dish out.

I guess I get a big at this point.

For anyone that still wishes to pick the photo apart, it was taken with a Samsung Galaxy S1, not a Moto Razor. My test photos were taken with a Samsung Galaxy Proclaim. Whatever it was, it was a one-time occurance. I can't see anything like it in the room with the lights off, no reflections, nothing. Can't reproduce it, so the story ends.

Thank you all for the time you spent here, it's been real.

Close the thread, talk amongst yourselves, enjoy life. I'm going to get some dinner...

Sageturkey

Sorry again all, here's a quick vid tour that will hopefully shed a bit more light on things. Wow you can even hear the disappointment in my voice. I still believe the photo was real and taken just as he said it was - and am still bewildered as to what it could have been. The beads and the fact that I'm on the second floor still have me convinced that it wasn't someone outside with a laser pointer, who the heck knows...
I just wish you guys new me personally, I'm as sincere as the day is long. I don't want to pull the wool over anyone's eyes, just sharing something that I found to be quite perplexing.

Take Care!

reply to post by sageturkey

Hi Sage I feel for you dude. You have vehemently so hard to help
your thread & I think you have given it all your best. I can't imagine how
disappointing it was for you to not be able to retrieve the original photo
& I possibly would have screwed up meself. I'm just learning from recent post
about the exif (?)...don't know a bloody thing about it except it's a must
& kind of like finger print.

Thanks for all your hard work & it was a great story!

Cheers
Ektar

I also feel for you.

However, you've salvaged your credibility, and saved face with the ATS community. Life is about learning lessons, not about the fails. You did your best, and that's all we ask. Next time, you'll know better.

Hope to see you around the boards in the future, and you have potential as a solid contributor.

Originally posted by Komodo
reply to post by evilod

 

right .. ..

so why the tails if the door was stationary ??

Maybe the camera wasn't 100% stationary, I don't know. What do you think it was?

reply to post by sageturkey

Hi sageturkey, don't feel so bad. The exif info only shows that a pic has not been through some graphics program. Even if you had gotten the original you would still get the skeptics saying that it was faked some other way. It's the nature of the beast.

reply to post by daskakik

I appreciate your statement in regards to EXIF. I had no clue why
it was so important, only that a person might be reamed if not
available. Thank You!

Cheers
Ektar

reply to post by Ektar

Well it was quick and dirty. I should have said that a lack of exif is a sure sign of manipulation but exif information can be used, by those who know, to figure out the camera settings and figure out what was going on during the shot.

The thing is that there are exif editors which let you change the info in a pic, so exif info is not necessarily proof.

reply to post by daskakik


I go with my intuition in regards to people and I'd say I'm somewhere in the 90% range of being correct, being completely honest. The thing that struck me was that you're a 4 year veteran and never started a thread. I'm not sure if you can delete threads as the only internet access I have is my (not so smart) phone and my internet is slowed down often (only 2 GB of data per month), so loading pages is a hassle.
Before this thread, I didn't even know what EXIF data was or what it meant exactly, so it's understandable to not have preserved it. I'm as dissapointed as everyone here I'm sure, but you did give it your best and ran into a brick wall. Stay vigilant, and keep that camera ready. The proof is in the pudding, er, photo?

You seem to be an honest Joe sageturkey. I never doubted your story or thought it was a hoax. I also appreciate how you tried so hard to offer concrete evidence. In all, I'd say this was a very good study.

Thanks, MSB