Last Week Anthony Black, Don Hardy and myself went to check out our new performing venue at the George IV in Lichfield. This is to be our new home for the famous ‘Evening of Mystery’.
We had chosen this venue as it is reputedly haunted, and this seemed to be a good venue for a Halloween show.
There was certainly a rather odd atmosphere in the back room, which we are to use for a small theatre on the night. One of those things that you cannot quite put your finger on. We all picked up a great sadness there, although none of us could form any concrete conclusion.
So I decided to take a few photos. When I got back home, I sent them out to the people who may be performing there, so that they could get some idea of the venue.
Nothing seemed odd about these photos, until one of the performers (who is sharper of eye) noticed an anomaly in one of the photos, Now, I think that if you look real close up into the graininess of a digital image the grain and ‘artefacts’ produced by the digital process can stimulate the imagination to see things, in much the same way as we may fancy seeing faces in clouds, or the face of the Virgin Mary burnt into the surface of toast.
Still, when magnified, there were a few things that certainly spooked me a bit. I am not offering the following photographs as proof of the existence of spirits (I am still rather ‘on the fence’ regarding such things), and I am quite aware that the anomalies could all be rationally explained away. I leave this for the reader to make his or her own mind up.
Here is the first photograph.
At first glance this seems a normal enough (albeit not professional) photograph. However, this is the photo that the performer claimed that he could see a shadowy figure. I wonder if you can see it too? I must admit that I could not see anything, but when pointed out to me, I cannot not see it.
You will also notice that Don Hardy (in the picture here) is beating something of a hasty retreat. He later said that he really wanted to get out as he had the distinct feeling that someone was standing behind him and approaching at a rapid rate.
Now Don is quite capable of winding us up, but he did look genuinely, well…. ‘spooked’; enough for us not to make light of it at the time.
On this photograph I have artificially darkened the ‘shadow figure’ and also outlined what I can see. I am sure that after seeing is, you will also not be able to ‘un-see’ it in the above photo.
Remember though that I have doctored this photograph. The first image is untouched.
The next photo is of the same room with Anthony on the balcony, I am standing next to Don and photographing through the mirror. Why not? It is not everyday that you get three such handsome chaps in one room.
Nothing amiss here you may think. Well, try zooming in on our faces. When I did this, I was seriously spooked. I found sleeping very difficult the night after.
You can see from this photo, that nothing has been altered and you can download the photo yourself and zoom into the areas as I did and receive the same results.
First, let us look at the face of Mr Black.
Believe me I have known Mr Black since he was a small child, and he does not look like this on an ordinary day.
Let us look at the photo of Mr Hardy and Mr Grab.
Again, I can see the same facial distortions. Nothing as demonic as the photograph of Mr Black, but odd in that neither of us resemble the people in the photograph.
You may put this down to an over active imagination, and you may well be right. But the thing is, really, you do know what you look like, and if you see a photograph that deviates from this, you are the first to know. Later it occurred to me that Mr Hardy bears a remarkable resemblance to my deceased grandmother. When I revealed this too him, besides being understandably upset, he told be that he had not wanted to say this, but thought that I looked uncannily like his own grandfather. I wonder if there is a mechanism whereby memories of deceased loved ones can somehow be projected to alter the arrangement of pixels inside the delicate working of a digital camera, or had we simply had too much port by that time.
In this photograph, we see the same facial distortions. Again Mr Black look frankly demonic when his face is blown up. Mr Hardy looks quite distressed and totally unlike his normal jolly self. Indeed I remember telling the two gentlemen to smile as I took the photograph, and saw nothing untoward as I took it.
Here is the original photograph, which looks normal enough.
And here is the close up of Mr Black
And of Mr Hardy
Trust me, neither of this hansom gentlemen actually look like this, or I would find friendship with them somewhat difficult.
Here is the final photograph. It also seems perfectly normal at first glance.
However, as the other photographs had contained interesting elements, I decided to zoom right into this one and examine all of the areas. It was then that I noticed something that looked like a displacement of specific graininess of pixels on an area of the floor. Again, I invite the reader to see if he or she can spot this for themselves. I am aware that the imagination can project all sorts of fantasies onto innocent images.
Here is where I fancy the anomaly to be.
Here is a blown up section of the area in question. I swear I have not touched the photograph in any way.
It is clear to me that there is some alteration of the image. It seems to be a product of the process, rather than anything there at the time. I mean that it seems to exist inside the camera. Again, I can only testify that I have not changed the image in any way. I am wondering if I am seeing things in the image that are not there. Can the reader see what I am seeing.
I would rather you looked in this images for a while and see what I see.
As following this, is the same image – only I have darkened the displaced pixels to highlight what I think to be there.
Please do not refer to the following image until you have studied the one above.
So there we have it. What seemed to be normal photographs at first, reveal some anomalies that are interesting if nothing else.
I will leave it for the reader to decide and to collaborate or dismiss these strange images.
As we had no intention of taking photographs that were anything more than functional and pedestrian, we are intending to return with more sensitive equipment to see if we cannot obtain more conclusive results. So be sure to check back here after Thursday.
In the meantime all three of us would welcome your views on this.
The thoughts of Theodore J Grab 