Starship Asterisk*

I'm reasonably sure that what the image shows is a hair on the lens of the camera. Did anybody else notice that the "explosion" near the light post has almost the exact same color as the bright could above it (a white, pink, purple mix). It looks like there's a follicle at the point of the "explosion" that is reflecting light from the cloud. Seems a lot more likely than a meteor with no damage, a LINEAR lighting bolt, or an exploding lamp sending debris into orbit

The wings are semi-transparent and are moving at many hundreds of beats a second. It is very obvious how you can see through them. The "reflected" light is not 100% reflected back at the camera or the sensor because the wings move in three dimensions. The light is scattered all over the place

This photo tends to support your assessment:



The 'explosion' does tend to look like the familiar cross shape you get when imaging out of focus insects:

My guess is that a contrail (as others described) is juxtaposed with an explosive failure of the street light. Two separate events in the same photo, that just happen to line up.

I agree with smith@canada.com that the flash may have been the death of the light. Perhaps the streak is an artifact generated inside the camera. That speculation could be tested.

How far will a laser travel in space, how fast , and what will stop it. Now, how about a type of beam we know nothing about on this planet, yet. It arrives, we try to explain within the confines of our own limited intelegence.

I think everyone's approaching this phenomenon in the wrong order. We should think as empirical scientists on this one. I am no photographer, so I don't necessarily have the skills to replicate some of the experiment, but those of you who are familiar with Photography, why don't you take some pictures to rule out possbilities.
I've heard it's a possibility that it can be a strand of hair, well take a photo and see if that's what it seems to be.
As for some of the theories posted, they can most easily be ruled out. The meteor theory is pretty much laughable, given the fact that if any of those theorists actually saw a streaking meteor, such as I have in Arizona, or have seen pictures of one, the flashes would be brigher and much more easily noticable. In fact, the photographer doesn't mention any of that.
As for a hoax, I suppose we can rule that out for now, why is it that when no sufficient theories are posted, we suddenly have a hoax?
Of the most reasonable theories posted, either the light burning out, a bug flying across the screen or a contrail, why not try to replicate the experiment. I've seen photos of contrails before, and they are not straight lines with clear deliniations, you can often times see the haze as the edges blend into the surrounding atmosphere.
I still suppose stranger phenomenon can account for the images, perhaps ball lightening striking the light post, and discharing a flash.
As for the black streak, my initial reaction reaction as I've posted a few times already is probably an artifact induced from the photographer's position, and the shape of the lamppost.
That said, it's best to keep an open mind, and again, try to replicate the photograph. OR at least, try to find some photographic proof of similar phenomenon.

[quote="Anonymous"]More bee pictures:




Are those Australian bees?
Sure looks like the image!! The gold glow matches the position on the abdomen. I think we've identified the culprit.

The hydrogen bulb exploding theory explains the light post. (Supernova)

If the sun is setting on the right side, the bright reflection from the thunderstorm on the right is your clue. I believe that there must have been a super cell thunderstorm somewhere to the left of photo that was even brighter than the one seen on the right. This storm was reflecting light through an airplane's contrail-creating the shodow. This would explain the angle of the streak and the position was purely coincidence with the light post.

The shadow would grow larger as it neared the horizon such as in eclipses.

I really like the flying insect theory, except for one thing: If the flash from the camera was able to illuminate the "flash" on the insect, shouldn't the insect's body be captured more in focus? It seems the insect would be about as deep into the picture as the bushes in the foreground, and there's enough depth of field to capture them in focus. If it is a flying insect, I say it has to be a firefly, providing it's own illumination.

Rumbledog wrote:I really like the flying insect theory, except for one thing: If the flash from the camera was able to illuminate the "flash" on the insect, shouldn't the insect's body be captured more in focus? It seems the insect would be about as deep into the picture as the bushes in the foreground, and there's enough depth of field to capture them in focus. If it is a flying insect, I say it has to be a firefly, providing it's own illumination.

Others in the thread have figured that out, and think it is closer than that. I think it is just about 4 or 5 feet out, others have though it as close as 18 inches. The flash is the illumination. That's why the streak is dark, it is the bee obscuring the background during the 1/20th of a second before the flash goes off. It has been well discussed that the flash is at the end of the exposure, thus the bee is heading downward to the right. The bottom of the abdomen is toward the camera, if the bee is the one in the previous posts with the bright yellow ventral side of the abdomen.

Hello All,
I haven't read all of these posts (there are 56 pages now!), so I apologize in advance if someone has already posted something along these lines.

I do a fair bit of image processing for a living; while I know nothing of what falling meteors look like on digital film, I do know how to process images to show trends, etc. We are fortunate in this case, because we have virtually identical images, one with the 'oddity' and two without.

Below, I shall present images which are the result of OBJECTIVE mathematical operations performed on the set of three images (from the first post in this thread). These mathematical operations are performed on the entire image set, so there is no human hand that's tinkering in the works. Furthermore, anyone with Adobe Photoshop can reproduce most of these results with the 'apply image' feature (and using addition, subtraction, and difference blending modes); advanced image analysis was performed in MATLAB and C++.

First off, here are image enhancements from a basic difference analysis algorithm; this algorithm adds and subtracts the three provided images in such a way as to only show the differences common to the three. You can think of this as a process that uses information from the two 'clean' images (no 'oddity') to construct background information; the background information is then subtracted ina statistical fashion from the image with the 'oddity' to reveal underlying features that are not contained in the clean images.
Here's a low quality result of the entire image field: http://home.comcast.net/~bigtesla99/output_1_low.jpg
and a higher quality result of the region of interest:
http://home.comcast.net/~bigtesla99/output_1_hi-ROI.jpg

The features in the above images represent data that is not common to all three original images; thus, the 'oddity' is substantially enhanced because it is only in one image.

If this seems too abstract for some of you, here's an overlay of the enhancements with the original scene (low and high quality, as before):
http://home.comcast.net/~bigtesla99/output_2_low.jpg
http://home.comcast.net/~bigtesla99/output_2_hi-ROI.jpg

I ran some other more esoteric filters on a smaller region of interest around the 'flash', and here's a side-by-side comparison of the results:
http://home.comcast.net/~bigtesla99/str ... posite.jpg
Given the general tone of the posts in this thread, I don't feel the need to elaborate on the math involved unless asked; just think of these enhancements as different methods of looking at the data contained in *all three* of the original images.

-------------
RESULTS OF ANALYSIS:
As you can see, the alleged 'flash' and 'smoke' halo have been greatly enhanced, in some cases by very basic mathematical processes (again, I want to stress that all math was applied to the *entire* image fields; there was **no** subjective hand-tweaking or localized treatment, a.k.a. 'photoshopping'). We are very fortunate that the 'before' and 'after' images were provided, because this degree of enhancement would not be [objectively] possible with only the one 'oddity' image. (the two extra images were similar enough to reinforce the overall signal-to-noise ratio of the features in question; enhancement was accomplished with no 'a priori' knowledge)

Of particular interest is the shape of the alleged smoke halo. It appears to be nicely symmetric about the tangent of the alleged 'contrail'. This is NOT consistent with shrapnel of an exploding lamp bulb for obvious reasons (explosions are rarely this symmetric), and the impulse, shape, and concavity of the alleged smoke is NOT consistent with an iris lens flare (what happens when you point a camera at a bright light); such lens flares always have original symmetry about the light source (well-known fact) and the alleged smoke halo clearly does not.

Also, I could claim with a moderate confidence level that the epicenter of the flash is not at the point where the lamp would normally project light; rather, it appears to be slightly to the right in these images, which could translate to be upwards of a two or three feet to the right of the lamp (in real space). If the flash was caused by a lamp explosion, I would expect the flash to be fairly centered on the lamp; also, I would expect extensive charring & damage to be visible on the lamp upon inspection, and not much damage was noted (? unclear about this from previous posts).

Given these results, I believe the 'flying insect' theory can be readily dismissed for several reasons:
-the odds of getting such a symmetric portrait of an insect amid flight are astoundingly small
-the alleged smoke halo was very well resolved by the camera (i.e. its edges were quite sharp in comparison to the SNR of the entire image field); this is not consistent with a flying insect traversing the image, which was taken with a 1/20th second exposure; experienced photographers would unanimously agree that 1/20 exposures aren't nearly short enough to resolve the major features or wing movement of a flying insect in motion
-the aforementioned focal issues, which I believe to be accurately stated...


Given the span of the 'smoke' halo in relation to surrounding features, I have conservatively estimated the halo to be 30 feet long (assuming it is roughly in the plane of the lamp). Given this, I believe that any 'lamp electrical discharge' theories are not valid, because such a streamer would require many millions of volts. Also, if the halo was a result of glowing ambers flying away from an electrical discharge of ~120/240V (or whatever the Aussies use in their lamps), then the symmetry of the halo would not be observed.

--------------
BOTTOM LINE
It is my informed opinion that the 'oddity' and associated 'contrail' **cannot** be attributed to an exploding lamp, a lense flare, an electrical discharge from the lamp (including the rather conspiratorial theories of directed energy weapons), or a flying insect.

I cannot determine if the 'oddity' is consistent with lighting or other environmental factors without speculation, because the observed symmetry of the 'smoke halo' would generally rule out lightning as a cause (improbabilistic).

Using an array of proprietary, in-house filters, I cannot rule out digital tampering of the image; there are some suspicious noise distributions that could be associated with either tampering or a poor CCD chip in the camera. Given the several visible dead pixels in all three images (one is readily visible in the water of the foreground), the abundance of inhomogenous color noise associated with such entry-level digital SLR CCD's, and the alleged trustworthiness of the photographer, I believe it is entirely reasonable that the camera would be the culprit here... not a human hand. But mathematically, I cannot make this assertion.

Given the scenery in all three images, I cannot find any endogenous content that could cause both the flash and the contrail simultaneously (w/i the 1/20th second of the exposure). If any such content exists, it is either unresolvable or escaping my thorough search.

It is my humble opinion that the contrail, flash, and smoke halo are consistent with a falling object of substantial mass and velocity. My reasoning is:
-the contrail is a confined, darkened region of marked linearity; this is consistent with a trail of partially-combusted debris from a very hot falling object
-the flash is not centered on the lamp, which is consistent with the falling object striking the lamp housing at some point and undergoing fragmentation; the fragmentation would substantially increase the oxidative processes at work for a brief instant after the strike (as the reactive surface area is increased along fracture surfaces by several orders of magnitude), creating a 'flash' originating at a very short distance from the strike
-after fragmentation, oxidation would rapidly extinguish as both the temperature and velocity of the falling object fragments rapidly decrease; this could create smoke trails consistent with the 'smoke halo'
-regarding the symmetry of the smoke halo, I believe it to be consistent with the well-established annular shape of ballistic fragmentation; this shape has been well-observed in the field of forensic ballistics, among others, where a ballistic object undergoes unconstrained disintegration upon a hard impact (usually done in ballistics gel with fragmentation rounds)
-assuming that the alleged smoke halo is indeed smoke, the wind in the scene (I've tracked it moving back and to the left, using the surface of the water in the foreground) would very quickly dissolve such a weak smoke concentration and rapidly disrupt any symmetry (in the timescale of the span between exposures); given this and the SNR of the images, I believe it is entirely reasonable that the events of the 'oddity' occurred entirely in the duration of time of the one exposure; if the oddity were indeed a falling object which traversed the contrail to strike the lamp, even the most conservative of relative distance measurements would clock the object's speed at well over the speed of sound, again consistent with a ballistic falling object

Nevertheless, I am still troubled by the contrail (darkened line). Something is strange about its variable density and SNR... I'm still thinking this one over. However, I do not believe that it is a ray shadow from an occluded light source; such shadows are only observed when the relative humidity is high enough for sufficient scattering of light in the air. Given the clarity of the foreground, this does not appear to be the case.

-----
... this turned out to be a massive post; I apologize in retrospect, and as well for any typos. If anyone has read it all up to this point, I'd appreciate your feedback. My goal here was to uncover new evidence via the image enhancements... I'd enjoy hearing what the APOD crowd thinks about these.

I'd also be curious to hear the evidence supporting the rapid dismissal of the falling meteorite theory.

there is a crack in everything~L. Cohen

Big Tesla 99, your forgetting the flash at the end of the 1/20th second. That exposes the bee for less than 1/1000th of a second.

Why can't the bee be symmetrical? They sure don't fly with alternate wing strokes! She's just ventral side toward the camera. See the pictures of the "flying crosses" a few pages back. Those are all symmetrical.

Nutcase...

Just admit it you so called experts; you have no clue what it is.
Let's say that some of you blame it on a fly ...and quite some people agree with that theory, what does it give? Proof? No, it will always be a mystery, sorry to disappoint you.

You know what the photographer should do with the RAW file if he has one; sell it on Ebay. He will meet the same wanna be experts, but at least they are willing to pay for it!!

Ed in Oregon wrote:

Anonymous wrote:More bee pictures:




Are those Australian bees?
Sure looks like the image!! The gold glow matches the position on the abdomen. I think we've identified the culprit.

This is a species of Megachile, which are found in Australia. But there are many other insects that have similar markings. In this case, the color comes from collected pollen.

High humidity in Darwin is every day as seen here http://www.weatherzone.com.au/observati ... type=metar
The light in question was photographed and inserted in the Northern Territory news Two days after. someone may have a copy of it. Heavens above will give the inclination of the sun on the day. The area is a working wharf and many boats move past every afternoon particularly small leasure craft. angle to the lamp from photographer is SSE and sun sets to WSW if you need more I am happy to help

Here's a low quality result of the entire image field: http://home.comcast.net/~bigtesla99/output_1_low.jpg
and a higher quality result of the region of interest:
http://home.comcast.net/~bigtesla99/output_1_hi-ROI.jpg

Can you explain why the trail is lighter rather than darker as one would expect to be consistent with the other differences? I think others have posted difference pictures that are better.

Of particular interest is the shape of the alleged smoke halo. It appears to be nicely symmetric about the tangent of the alleged 'contrail'.

Actually, no, if I understand what kind of symmetry you're alleging. It becomes clear that the symmetry is not there if you simply rotate the image so that the trajectory is either vertical or horizontal, thus:

Given these results, I believe the 'flying insect' theory can be readily dismissed for several reasons:
-the odds of getting such a symmetric portrait of an insect amid flight are astoundingly small

Note, again, that the alleged symmetry is actually not there.

in comparison to the SNR of the entire image field

Signal to Noise ratio? I find it humorous you thought your previous discussion was esoteric, yet you use an undefined acronym here. Force of habit, I suppose.

experienced photographers would unanimously agree that 1/20 exposures aren't nearly short enough to resolve the major features or wing movement of a flying insect in motion

Well, that would depend upon the photographer and also on the insect. I think 1/20 second would be ample to get this sort of resoltion on Megaloprepus, for example, but it has a wingspan the size of a hand, so its wingbeats are very slow. But that's beside the point. EXIF data in the picture reveal that the flash on the camera was used. The alleged wings in the picture are captured by the strobe of the flash, which normally lasts less than 1/1000 second, plenty fast enough to stop even the fastest of insect wings.

It is my humble opinion that the contrail, flash, and smoke halo are consistent with a falling object of substantial mass and velocity.

It seems that if that were the case, there would be some lingering effect still visible 15 seconds later. If anything occurred at the distance close to the lamp, the scale is large enough that dispersion in 15 seconds is unlikely. Regarding smoke, I was curious about local wind conditions, so I emailed the photographer and got this reply: "This is the time of year that the build up to the Wet Season is upon us. Makes for some interesting cloud formations. From what I recall it was very calm and humid. As you can see from the pictures there is very little ripple in the water." If this is true, then any smoke would seem to linger for quite a while.

assuming that the alleged smoke halo is indeed smoke, the wind in the scene (I've tracked it moving back and to the left, using the surface of the water in the foreground)

I would like to see more explanation of this analysis.

Anonymous wrote:

fireking wrote:I've seen shadow lines very similar to the one in the picture.

This gives me an idea.

The light, when inspected, was not working. This time of the evening (just after 6PM) is when automatic lights often come on - we can apparently see other lights on in the picture.

When lights burn out at startup, they often flash, briefly and brightly. I can't make out the design of the light, but, is it possible that the photographer captured a light bulb burning out -- and the line is the shadow of the light housing? Depending on the design of the housing, a burnout flash could illuminate everything around it, except for the column of air/mist shadowed by the housing.

smith @ canada.com

Well done " eliminate the impossible..that which remains however improbable is the truth"
So my antimatter proton event is out of the question

If we assume that a 2 cm bee crossed in front of the camera traveling at 40 km/hr, in 1/19 sec. it would travel 60 cm. If it crossed the camera at a far enough distance and perpendicular to the line of sight we can make some calculations as to how many pixels it would show on the image.

I used the coordinates (1153,1079) and (1176,1027) which solves for a distance of 57 pixels for the bee's wings. For small angles only this will give a conversion factor of about 28 px/cm. For small angles, the contrail could be up to 1700 px (~60 cm). Obviously the photo is not using small angles so I need the angles of the field of view to solve. A rough estimate using the narrow angles assumption and the coordinates (181,398) and (1174,1058) for the contrail gives a distance of 42 cm (1192 px). Since we don't know what the size of the insect was, this approximate result shows that a relatively large insect could have flown in front of the camera at a fairly rapid speed (If it was small like a mosquito (0.2 cm) the contrail would have been at maximum approximately 119 px). In this case for a 2 cm bee it would be flying at roughly 70% of its maximum estimated speed. Of course it could be a slightly larger insect flying slower or a slightly smaller insect flying faster.

The Australian Courier-Mail reported unidentified flying objects in the sky at 8:30pm on December 6th over Darwin. Here's a link to the story:

http://www.thecouriermail.news.com.au/c ... 21,00.html


I don't know much about ball lightning. Does this fit the description? If so, would that be relevant?

Could it be relevant that 80 whales beached themselves in Tasmania Australia on November 28th? Maybe this indicates an event with acoustic side effects.

The UFO was described as being shaped like three connected ball-shaped spheres that flashed blue, green and red from as many as six different light sources.

What other shapes of spheres are there?

i like the idea of the contrail shadow. i too have seen them. the problem with that theory and this photo is the apparent location of the light source, ie: the sun. it appears not to be directly behind the "shadow" as has been the case for every contrail shadow i have ever seen.

scott

spelger wrote:i like the idea of the contrail shadow. i too have seen them. the problem with that theory and this photo is the apparent location of the light source, ie: the sun. it appears not to be directly behind the "shadow" as has been the case for every contrail shadow i have ever seen.

scott

Almost, but not quite. The observer, the sun, and the contrail all have to be in the same plane. The sun could be in front or behind or straight above. I agree, though, that it is in the wrong place in this example.

I took this photo March 11 over Seattle. Its a contrail that was directly overhead, blocking the sun, so it was pretty pronounced.



And another:



(The jet is not the one that created the contrail)

Fairly interesting photo, but there's obvious spreading of the contrail the
further from the contrail it is..