Help Needed - Possible Ghost?

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Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 11:09 am

Hi everyone,

The picture below was taken by friends of my grandparents. My nan is convinced that there is the face of a ghost towards the bottom left of the picture, between the second and third persons from the left at about knee height.

I've never believed in the paranormal (ghosts, psychics, etc) but the image does look remarkably like a face.

I was hoping to canvass some opinions on what you make of this 'ghost face' and perhaps some of the board members who have skills with photography and the like might be able to provide a logical explanation. I've tried the error level analysis tool to see if has been modified but with no obvious result.

Appreciate the help Smile

(sorry, I don't have a higher resolution of the picture - it was taken with a mobile phone)

Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 11:18 am

Curtain / shadow. Like seeing Jeebus in a slice of toast, millions of photos / pieces of toast you can't make out a face, this time you do.

I'm a huge sceptic about ghosts, as Eddy Izzard says, if there was such a thing, where are all the cow ghosts? Also it should be impossible to take a photo on the WW1 battlefields or at the Colosseum in Rome without one or two showing up.

Baiting Guru Joined: 19 Mar 2007 Posts: 2628

Can't see it

Why would a ghost be at knee height?

I'm more worried as to why no one is comforting the poor child

Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 11:34 am

@Roy, absolutely agree with you. And the onus of proof should always lie with those making the extraordinary claim. In this case my 75yo grandmother isn't going to go to the trouble of 'proving' it is a ghost (she's stubborn like that).

We had a heated debate about it which has driven me to seek help (I probably need help for a lot of other reasons too Laughing

)

@Nanny Ogg - not knowing the people I'm going to decline to comment on their parenting skills Wink

Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 11:36 am

Looks like a kid's face to me.

Baiting Guru Joined: 19 Mar 2007 Posts: 2628

Nup still cant see a face
but then again I never did well with those magic eye images either

I agree with Roy, the human mind tries to make random patterns into something we are familiar with

Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 11:44 am

What's in the bottle that the blonde girl in white is holding ? - sure looks like some kind of spirit to me.

Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 11:51 am

I've already seen that "ghost" in a couple photos

Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 12:29 pm

It's a random shadow on the curtains. Notice how the "face" is actually delineated by the legs of the second and third woman and only extends downwards as far as the curtain's edge closest to the floor.

I've tweaked the levels and sharpened it in Photoshop to make it clearer.

What we are all experiencing here is "pareidolia" - the tendancy of humans to ascribe meaning to something that doesn't have it. Just like seeing a shape of an animal in a cloud or a face in a water stain - our brains are made to look for patterns.

There's no ghost - but your curtains on the right have come off the curtain rings Smile

Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 12:39 pm

And if it's a ghost, it should have combed his/her hair before posing for that picture.

Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 12:48 pm

FYI it's spelled "Ghort", and I am more interested to learn why one of our mods is creeping between women's legs in random photos.

Also I agree it's the curtains.

Baiting Guru Joined: 27 Mar 2011 Posts: 21158

Are those vertical blinds in that window? The curtains appear to be pulled back.

Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 1:37 pm

Yes, I don't think it could be the curtain as these are drawn back. There are vertical blinds in the window but these aren't full height. By the looks of it there's a radiator below the window.

It's certainly the phenomena sunshine has described. However, relaying this as evidence won't cut it with people like my grandmother Rolling Eyes

Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 1:42 pm

Whilst having encountered some sort of entity at my British MIL's home, I always remain skeptical when there are supposed to be ghosts in photos, or on slices of bread, inter alia.

I will ask the question (since I don't know anything about photo manipulation) could the photo have been "doctored"?

I think it is a shadow of some kind.

Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 1:46 pm

Looking again, it could be a shopping bag or handbag with an actual face on it, held by the third girl from the left or perhaps on the floor. I can't tell where her right arm is. There may even be handles on top. It comes out in front of the second girl's leg, which makes it spooky-looking. I doubt it's the radiator or blinds because the eyes don't line up with the rest of the object.

I'm sure I've seen shopping bags with cherubic-looking kids on them but I can't recall where.

Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 1:57 pm

Plus those girls are smiling liek they know there is a joke being played Laughing

Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 2:36 pm

The girl on the left has a ghost manifesting itself on her elbow. Its eyes are more open than hers, too.

ETA: Looking at the closeup. its odd that (a) The face is clearer than the rest of it, with no artifacts, again unlike the rest (b) The 'dark' below the radiator is very black - below the other gaps between the girls it isn't.

Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 4:28 pm

Like Jim, I have seen that photo before.

OP, do you know if your nan's friends have posted it elsewhere? Fortean Times forums perhaps? (Racking my brains to think where I saw it, that's the most logical although I've not been there in a while).

Also, what media was used to take the photo? Digital? Film?

Probably just a shadow/trick of the eye, but ooky spooky. Smile

Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 4:32 pm

bohigal wrote:

FYI it's spelled "Ghort", and I am more interested to learn why one of our mods is creeping between women's legs in random photos.

I agree I see a mod too. You might want to discuss who your Nan's friends keep company with.

Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 5:09 pm

Quote:

like Jim, I have seen that photo before.

Tineye brings up 97 hits.

Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 5:13 pm

^^^^^
*edit Then I am def' going with shopped, then saved with a high compression in order to artifact it all the same.

I'm personally thinking this is some kind of double exposure error, sort of like a cam with a shitty processor, and the kid off crying to the right was originally facing the camera and was chased off.

The curtains are pulled back, so I can't see it being that, and zooming in the face is full of the same artifacts as the rest of the image, all though it could well have been shopped in, then saved as a jpeg with high compression in order to artifact it all the same.

Having said all that, "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy."

<strike>It certainly is curious.</strike> less curious now ↓

Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 5:19 pm

following one of the links leads to :
http://www.badpsychics.co.uk/badghosts/modules/news/article.php?storyid=81

the picture claims to have been taken in Teeside, Liverpool, Bolton & at varying dates & times. Hoax

Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 6:07 pm

Then it sounds like mystery solved.

Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 6:23 pm

We have been baited by Nan!!

Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 7:10 pm

Cougar wrote:

Also, what media was used to take the photo? Digital? Film?

I remember taking some interesting photos using film. Somehow I managed to mix 2 photos and the result was a sort of ghost picture. The "ghosts" appeared at the end of the films.

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