Re: Missing 757

From: G. R. L. Cowan (gcowan_at_eagle.ca)
Date: 09/12/04 

Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 08:53:50 -0400

robert luis rabello included:
>
> Fred B. McGalliard wrote:
>
> > Sorry. I may be only mildly competent at these things, but I did not find
> > any "glaring" hack in interpreting the traffic light shadow. Would you care
> > to explain in more detail?
>
> There are several issues. Start with the shadows from the parking
> control structures. In the first photo, a clearly defined shadow from
> the parking control structures extends toward the right lower corner
> of the picture. The back sides of the pillars are shaded, so they
> appear slightly darker in color. The next photo shows a bright, white
> flash from impact that represents another brilliant light source.

A source spanning a large angle,
much greater than the sun's angular width,
and illuminating the ground in question much less brightly.

> This should induce multiple shadow lines on nearly every object in the
> field of view, but doesn't.

Extended light sources do not cast sharp shadows.

> Nowhere on the photograph do these
> appear. The first and third photos have the same ratio of light to
> shadow on the parking structures, even though a secondary light source
> remains visible in the billowing explosion. Also, there is no change
> in shadow intensity from photo to photo. The second picture shows the
> foreground washed out in light, but the shadow lines remain very well
> defined, despite the fact that the explosion is casting its light from
> a different angle.

A wide range of different angles, as above said.

>
> A helicopter control tower is in deep shadow on the first photo. In
> the second, it's outline is not only visible, but the side facing the
> camera is lit in red / orange, with clearly delineated shadow lines
> all along its perimeter. This would imply that reflected light from
> the explosion striking the back side of the control tower is being
> carried to the camera lens,

It would not so imply.
It would imply that the fireball's reddish hue saturates
to orangey-white on those pixels it illuminates directly,
but where it leaks into an adjacent shadow,
saturation does not occur and the shadow looks red.

http://www.imagekandi.com/photo/images/Sunset%20Clouds%20On%20Pacific.jpg

> and while it looks somewhat believable to
> an untrained eye in a two dimensional photo, the eastward extending
> facade of the Pentagon is actually much closer to the explosion than
> the control tower. Yet, the south facing part of the facade
> extension--the part facing the camera lens--remains in shadow. The
> explosion would have had to travel MUCH further down the building to
> achieve the effect in the picture, and had it done so, the facade
> extension would have been engulfed in the actual explosion and would
> not be visible at all. The back of that control tower should remain
> in very deep shadow. It even LOOKS painted!

>
> Notice also that the "reflection" of light on the grass directly in
> front of the helicopter control tower consists of a very neat
> rectangle that not only fails to match the contour of the tower, but
> also blurs the shadow extending across the walkway in front of the
> control tower from left to right. That shadow is dark on both sides
> of the lighter "reflection", blurred across the walkway "reflection",
> but remains perfectly aligned an in the exact same contrast as the
> shadow of the building cornice, which runs parallel to the Pentagon
> roof, but on the grass where it belongs. (That sounds a little
> obtuse, but if you follow the Pentagon's shadow on the ground from
> near the bottom of the photo forward, my observation should become
> evident.)
>
> Pay attention to the dust grains on the left side of the camera lens.
> These transform quite mystically and move across the photo in each
> frame. Dust grains that obscure one part of the building magically
> move to blur another part from frame to frame. The first and third
> frames are almost identical, indicating that the dust is stationary on
> the lens, but they change dramatically on the second frame. Now,
> before you start attributing this to light action in the camera's
> aperture, note that the third photo is much darker overall than the
> first (as would be expected as the aperture closes in response to a
> sudden increase in light), yet the dust grains are almost identical.
> This is not the case with the second frame. Dust grains that are
> transparent to light in the first and third frames become solid enough
> to block light in the second, while the reverse is true of those
> blocking light in the first and third frames. This makes no sense!

Only on the second frame was there some slight ground shaking.

>
> Also, there is a circular lens shield visible in the upper right hand
> and left hand corners of the photos. Notice how this lens shield
> magically grows in size from the first frame to the second, then
> shrinks to less than its original size in the third frame. There are
> other subtle things going on from picture to picture. I don't want to
> get into all of them now, but I hope you grasp where I'm coming from
> in this.
>
> I've been shooting pictures with cameras for many years. Paying
> attention to light is something very important for photographers and
> artists. (In fact, I complained rather loudly to the publisher of my
> book for screwing up the impact of a light source on my novel's
> cover.) I noticed the flaws in the Pentagon photographs after looking
> at them several times. A casual observer might not notice, and I'm
> certain most people didn't. But I DID notice.

You noticed a lot of stuff that wasn't there.

--- Graham Cowan
http://www.eagle.ca/~gcowan/Paper_for_11th_CHC.doc --
"Boron: A Better Energy Carrier than Hydrogen?"

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