Strange streak discussion: 2004 Dec 7 APOD

[tx rig diver]

All I have is the photo and my monitor, and a couple of minutes, no programs to analyze the photo or nothing else. I do have a few thoughts about it though.

lets look at some conditions for the light pole its self to be the origination point, and make some assumptions. assumption; this is a unenhanced snapshot, not time delay, no over exposure.

The camera shutter speed is 1/20th of a second. light travels at 186,000 miles a second. in 1/20th of a second light would travel 9300 miles. so the snapshot caught an event in something less then 1/20th of a second because we can see the light at the termination of the shadow. 1/20th of a second before and after the event there is no visual evidence of this event. For the camera to have caught the shadow, contrail or whatever and the light it seems hard to believe that the light pole/fixture was the origination point. if it is the origination point then in 1/20th of a second, or a fraction there of, you catch both the smoke/shadow trail of the event and the flash of light (chemical reaction) that produced the light but not the object/projectile that created the trail. I spent 10 years in the US Navy as a fire control technician working on gun and missile systems, 4 of those years were aboard the USS New Jersy. I took many photographs of those mighty 16" gun shooting and never once caught the projectile leaving the barrel and the muzzle velocity of a 16", 50 cal. round is no where even remotely close to 9300 miles a second. I've captured smoke trails from the round leaving the barrel but not the flash from the muzzle or the projectile it's self. So I'm thinking that to have caught the flash (if the light pole is the origination point) of whatever chemical reaction happened that launched the projectile and the trail, or shadow of that projectile then what ever left the light pole, what ever the projectile was that caused the trail and the chemical reaction that caused the light at the pole, the projectile it's self had to be traveling faster then at least 9300 miles a second. I think it's also funny that the shadow or trail is in a perfectly straight line, theres no evidence of an arc. by finding out what direction the photo is looking, and maybe coming up with a good guess of which direction the trail is approaching the light pole from, we can already deduce at what angle it's coming from, we would be able to tell some more about this photo. Atmospheric conditions would also be helpful. Also I don't think it hit near the pole, I think it's in the distance. There street lights out all over the place just because this one is out doesn't really mean that this event caused the light to go out.

something that is self propelled, a missile or a rocket that is still in a boost phase or other powered flight other then a turbofan or jet engine would leave a smoke trail but it seems something a lot more robust than what we see in this photo. A jet engine may leave a slight smoke trail, but I find it difficult to believe the smoke trail from a jet engine could cast a shadow like this. I doubt it would be a contrail at this low altitude flying in a straight line. A bullet or other ballistic projectile wouldn't leave a smoke trail. I saw a shooting star, a meteor, once leave a smoke trail but the original meteor never impacted, I actually saw it detonate quite high in the atmosphere and seconds later heard the explosion but by the time I heard the explosion there was no visual evidence of what had caused it.

[Dr. Evil]

Sorry, it's all my fault. I was aiming for the camera man from my secret space station on the moon. That where i fired my ultra-laser at him. Obviousley I missed. I calibrated my "ultra-laser" so this won't happen again. Sorry for the confusion.

[Guest]

The most difficult part of the bug theory is that the bug doesn't look the same through the whole picture. You have to realize the shutter was open for the entire 1/20th of a second. The bug should look the same no matter where he is in his trajectory. The flash could have changed his appearance but according to this the flash lasted way less than 1/20th of a second and occurred only at the very last moment the shutter was open. This is not very efficient if you are a camera maker.

What do you mean it doesn't look the same throughout the picture? It does look the same except for at one endpoint where the camera's flash went off. Note that the flash on a camera typically lasts less than 1/1000 second. Also, unless you select a camera option to fire the flash at the end of the exposure, it usually occurs at the beginning. So in this picture, the insect would be flying up.

[Guest]

If it is a photograph taken with a NON-Digitial camera...

It has been known that sometimes film is creased, ie a defect in that piece of film. The result is a line which can be found on the negative.

If it is digital, I know not.

Just like with film, a ditital picture is processed from the raw data (like film) to the resulting picture file (like JPEG) and you can have artifacts. This seems the most-reasonable explanation, and I gave some detail here http://asterisk.apod.com/vie ... =1884#1884 but have yet to see any real comments on it.

This guy puts it well...

Still profoundly interesting that the easiest and most likely explanations are tossed out and the incredible wild and crazy ideas are entertained.

The most likely or easiest explanations: It is either an unusual artifact created by the camera (just like the orbs and double exposures, etc) or a PhotoShop job.

This guy also seems to have a reasonable idea...

Is it really so mysterious? We've seen magic shadows before
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap010219.html

Perfectly straight streak, emanating from a source of light, the streak is gone as soon as the flash (light source) is gone.
There's a wisp of smoke at the bottom of that pole... So there was an electrical short, eventually the light on that pole blew up, and the flash cast a shadow toward the photographer.
no?

And as to those thinking the camera flash caused this, why on earth would someone use a flash for this picture...there is no way it would illuminate the subject of the pictures (landscape, pier, sky).

Regards,
Craig Latzke

[Guest]

And as to those thinking the camera flash caused this, why on earth would someone use a flash for this picture...there is no way it would illuminate the subject of the pictures (landscape, pier, sky).

Regards,
Craig Latzke

Craig,

The EXIF data from the images clearly shows that the flash was used. It doesn't matter why the photographer did it, he probably doesn't even know how to use a digital camera in the first place. The point is that the flash did go off.

[Guest]

Check out these three analyses of the original images:
http://ccouch.home.insightbb.com/meteorite.htm

Image 1 shows the before, during, and after shots.
Image 2 shows a threshold setting applied equally to all 3 images. Clearly the lamp post indicated by the pink arrow is brighter in the middle frame.
Image 3 shows another lamp post, the one nearest the fireball, also clearly brighter.

This implies the fireball is somewhere near the lamp post in image 3 and is providing illumination for the lamp posts in question. Therefore the fireball is NOT an insect near the camera lens being lit up by the camera flash.

You have not discounted the insect theory here. Under the insect theory, the wing of the insect is between the camera and the light post. Light from the camera flash is reflecting off the insect's wing. This makes the light post appear lighter even though the insect is nowhere near the lightpole.

Even if it's not an insect, the extra lightness could be from something else (smoke?) between the light post and the camera.

[Matt]

After looking over this image for a while, it occured to me that this could not have been a meteorite.

This is why:

The flash is located at the end of the contrail and not throughout. A meteorite would be travelling at over 18,000mph (30,000 km/h). That is also 27,340 feet/sec (8333 m/sec). An object of this velocity travelling throught the atmosphere would be burning up until the remaining mass reaches the ground (the reason for the "shooting star" idea). Now, this photo shows a bright flash at the end of the contrail, however, the photographer states that he was using a shutter speed of 1/20 sec. The film will capture everything that happens in that time frame. In this case, that includes the path of this object (assuming it is a meteorite) over 1,367 feet (about 416 meters) which would result in a bright streak, not a dark contrail. Now, without the flash, I'd say that it could be, but with it, I think it's highly unlikeley.

MS
Professional Photographer /
Amature Astrophotographer.

[biznobar@aol.com]

I agree with Smith@Canada.com. The light failing as it comes on and casting a shadow of it's housing is the simplest explaination. Occam's razor, methinks, would rule out the coincidental alignment of two separate events like contrails lining up with a bulb going out, or a meteor landing behind the light going out or a lightning strike that does no damage but makes the light go out. It seems like the light going out is the source not the result of the faint and very straight dark streak or shadow.

[Themycles]

Ok, Occam's Razor right.

It is not a light pole. It is a ship mast. Just because someone went and examined the light poles doesn't mean that it is a light pole. Color quantization has shown that the light in the flash is the same color as the sun. Someone posted that uncontested earlier. It is not lightning or a bulb blowing up or a metorite or reflected light from the flash. Does anybody remember prisms from high school science class? White light in colors out. See anything in the picture that could cause a prismatic effect? Water? Anybody remember ultraviolet and infrared? Colors very near the visible spectrum? The dark streak with saturation increased becomes violet. Try it. Ok, so, remember the guy's cat and it's quantum tail posted earlier. This was attributed uncontested to the fact that the cat's tail was not in one place during the entire frame exposure. Remember that. The picture was taken before sunset, so the sun was above the horizon.

The sun, reflected off the water. The water also created a partial prismatic effect causing an ultraviolet reflection, interpreted by the ccd in the camera as a dark (almost violet) streak. This all happened in less than the time it took for the shutter to open and close, causing the appearance that the flash occured in front of the ship mast. An amazing thing to capture, but explainable.

[Guest]

To add to my earler comments doubting the fly theory. (straight line, dark trail, ...) does anyone think a bug flying in such a straight line is going to be flying sideways so that you'll see a top (or bottom) view from the cameras viewpoint? Doubt it.

This is the first objection to the bug theory that has any substance, as far as I'm concerned. However, it is, perhaps easily explained by considering that the insect is not actually flying in a straight line. Perhaps it is circling around the camera, for example. I'm not seriously suggesting this, just using it as an example of how to orient the curvature of the flight path so that it's not very apparent in the picture.

[biznobar@aol.com]

Not sure how you figure that to be a ship's mast. Where is the ship? The high res picture shows no boat attached at the bottom of the pole. Since we are willing to accept that this photo has not been doctored for the sake of this discussion, I think we should also accept that the photographer is not lying to us when he says he inspected the pole that he photographed.

[Guest]

My Cannon 300D fires its flash at the beginning of the exposure.

Your 300D can flash either at the beginning or at the end. You adjust that with a custom function. Anyway, the bug picture was not taken with a 300D.

[Brian]

I don't think it's a light pole either. It's not equidistant from the other pole in the background, like the foreground light poles are. and it doesn't appear to have the same structure on top. The photographer could easily have thought it was the light pole that's just to the left of the one with the flash. It'd be easy to make the mistake since he had to look from a totally different perspective at the scene.

[Fred Gerkens]

With no real scientific basis, if it was a meteorite, and the glass wasn't broken but the light was out, any chance the object moving that fast very near to the lightpost created a strong enough field to blow the filament but not break the glass?

[Guest]

I'm guessing it's a near-field reflection.
Was the picture taken through a window?

[SFC Thompson]

I've seen similar phenomena twice; both times on clear days.
Once in Texas and the other time in Arizona.
They appeared to be shadows, they followed the angle of the Sun, although there was no apparent source.

I don't know what might have caused them, but it's comforting to have a little mystery in life.

SFC John M. Thompson
DISA PAC Alaska field Office
Elmendorf AFB, AK

[twocents]

To add to my earler comments doubting the fly theory. (straight line, dark trail, ...) does anyone think a bug flying in such a straight line is going to be flying sideways so that you'll see a top (or bottom) view from the cameras viewpoint? Doubt it.

This is the first objection to the bug theory that has any substance, as far as I'm concerned. However, it is, perhaps easily explained by considering that the insect is not actually flying in a straight line. Perhaps it is circling around the camera, for example. I'm not seriously suggesting this, just using it as an example of how to orient the curvature of the flight path so that it's not very apparent in the picture.

Sure, I thought of that, but even that scenario is fairly unlikely. To leave a dodged (underexposed) line that's perfectly straight through the frame, the "bug" had to have been "circling" in a plane that's precisely aligned through the center of the CCD array. Even then, such a straight path is just not a likely natural occurance.

Also, since the lens is focused at infinity, for the bug to be that large and close, it would likely be much more out of focus than it is, and would probably not be remotely recognizable as a "bug", but much more of an amorphous bright obstruction through which very little detail could be seen.

[creebrave]

i think it could be a micro meteorite. space dust if you will. possibly broken up over the atmosphere and dust size particles raining down onto earth. this was just a lucky shot, like finding the ancient fish. a lucky cast.

[CurtC]

When I first saw the pic, I too thought it looked like a contrail shadow, but the angle from the sun, and the flash at the end rule out that explanation IMHO.

Here's one I haven't been able to rule out: a meteorite, rather large and dark, streaked across the image, then impacted the water surface on the other side of the light pole. The meteorite would have to be travelling very fast - it goes at least several hundred feet in the 1/20 second exposure time - leading to a speed of several thousand miles per hour, well above the speed of sound (but not fast enough to ionize the air). It would have to be large because it leaves a streaked image, and it's far away. The flash in the water is a fireball due to the extremely large kinetic energy of the meteorite suddenly being dissipated. A large splash happened right after the exposure, but was gone by the time the next picture was taken 15 seconds later.

The problem I have with this scenario is that I didn't think meteorites fell at that kind of speed in the lower atmosphere - I thought they would already have been slowed to terminal velocity by the time they reach the ground.

[Guest]

Color quantization has shown that the light in the flash is the same color as the sun.

I don't know that I trust that kind of information to be reliable when the source is a JPEG. Regardless:

Would an arc (think weilding) or small electrical fire produce the same color light?

Craig Latzke

[phule]

Also, since the lens is focused at infinity, for the bug to be that large and close, it would likely be much more out of focus than it is, and would probably not be remotely recognizable as a "bug", but much more of an amorphous bright obstruction through which very little detail could be seen.

The Depth of Field of the G-series camera is quite huge due to the small sensor and 7.2mm lens. I don't think the bug would be as far out of focus as you have proposed here.

[bob]

hi all

[Guest]

wut we all doin

[Guest]

I didn't see my post show up, so I'll try again.

Sure, I thought of that, but even that scenario is fairly unlikely. To leave a dodged (underexposed) line that's perfectly straight through the frame, the "bug" had to have been "circling" in a plane that's precisely aligned through the center of the CCD array. Even then, such a straight path is just not a likely natural occurance.

The line is NOT perfectly straight. It curves downwared.

Also, since the lens is focused at infinity, for the bug to be that large and close, it would likely be much more out of focus than it is, and would probably not be remotely recognizable as a "bug", but much more of an amorphous bright obstruction through which very little detail could be seen.

The lens was stopped down to f/5.6 I believe, and the camera has a relatively small sensor 1/1.8 " (7.18 x 5.32 mm), so the depth of field should be ample to capture that much detail.

By the way, on this camera, the flash can be set to either first curtain or second curtain sync.

[bob]

hi spencer