Phony Pictures

March 14, 2010 By Stephen Ellis


Last week, I posted a photo of what a group identified as a photo of a living gorilla-type animal ostensibly taken on the surface of the planet Mars by the NASA Rover. In my opinion that photo was as legitimate as a three-dollar bill. The previous week, I posted a photo of a 3,000 year old cave drawing in India. To me that was a legitimate, primitive drawing of a man in a space suit, a UFO and a worm hole. Whether it was something the artist actually saw or something he/she imagined, we will never know. It is, however, strongly indicative that we may have been visited before.

No UFO photos have been posted recently because there are so many of them that I wanted to wait until I could get something “special”. This week, it popped-up. I can’t attest to the veracity of the photo, but it is absolutely amazing. You can see it at http://www.ufocasebook.com/2010/buenosaires122609.html

One of the major problems with UFOs is that they are most often seen at night, and night photography is difficult, at best. The few that have been caught on camera during the daylight are usually blurred because the object is moving at rapid speeds. This particular photo is being touted as the best UFO photo in history.

At first glance, the UFO could be some sort of a toy thrown up into the air, although two things make that seem unlikely: If it was a toy…it was thrown exceptionally high. If was something that was projected into the air by some sort of mechanism, it would not have the speed to be so blurry. Even take-offs of the space shuttle are clear in photographs.

The photo was supposedly taken on December 26, 2009 in the Province of Buenos Aires, Argentina. The reason the picture was taken is reasonable: A man was taking a picture of a house he is building in the countryside near Buenos Aires and (he claims) he did not even see the object until he downloaded the photo from his camera. The setting is reasonable: Notice the outdoor hand pump to get water. Apparently, there is no indoor plumbing there.

It does not seem reasonable that someone building a house of concrete blocks with no indoor plumbing and no visible reinforcement steel is going to be the kind of person who would be technically knowledgeable enough to falsify a photograph of a UFO or photo shop the photo.

It is possible that this is a genuine photo of a UFO, but inasmuch as I’m not certain, I have to question its authenticity. This highlights one of the biggest problems when dealing with UFO photos and claims.

There are more than a hundred thousand photographs of UFOs. Without exception, those that I have seen are blurry and difficult to make out details. Put this together with the fact that people who falsify photos of UFOs are really hurting the very thing they are trying to promote.

Granted that, these days, you can do almost anything with a photo shop on your computer and by reprinting the “edited” photo, it becomes almost impossible to discern whether or not the original photo has been altered. There is testimony of an alleged photo expert accompanying the picture attesting that it has not been photo shopped. But I wonder if even the experts can tell.

I think we have to rely more on common sense: If the photographer is someone knowledgeable about high-tech and computers, then it becomes more reasonable to assume the photo has been “doctored”. If the photographer is someone who builds a house without steel reinforcement and indoor plumbing, it becomes more reasonable to assume that this is not a person who knows how to photo shop a picture.

Still, if it were not for the mean spirited pranksters who use significant effort to make their phony pictures look genuine, we wouldn’t have this problem: we could assume that a photo of something is genuine and examine the picture in order to (hopefully) learn something from it.

With the recent spate of UFO sightings and photographs, it appears that something may be developing in the UFO world. Let’s all try to keep our photos and reports of sightings honest so that we can all learn something.

Stephen Ellis stebrel@aol.com