Zipping mystery video orb mystery

[Caustic Logic]

http://www.youtube.com/user/RiversMiranda

This is the Youtube page of a friend who's taken to filming "UFOs" of unusual type. I'm curious about the "Sun spot" ones(multi vids). Theyseem to be in the sky, but maybe not, zipping by at inredilbe speeds - just little dots.

Does anyone here happen to know what explains these. Is it a video optics, optical optics, cryptozoology, or UFOlogy, or ...

[Ziggurat]

http://www.youtube.com/user/RiversMiranda

This is the Youtube page of a friend who's taken to filming "UFOs" of unusual type. I'm curious about the "Sun spot" ones(multi vids). Theyseem to be in the sky, but maybe not, zipping by at inredilbe speeds - just little dots.

Does anyone here happen to know what explains these. Is it a video optics, optical optics, cryptozoology, or UFOlogy, or ...

Looks like out-of-focus dust drifting close to the camera to me.

[Caustic Logic]

Looks like out-of-focus dust drifting close to the camera to me.

Thanks. That's about all I can honestly guess as well. I'm going to see if he has or can test this possibility.

[Corsair 115]

I'd say at least some of those "UFOs" are actually backlit insects, e.g. flies, wasps, bees, mosquitoes, etc.

[Caustic Logic]

I'd say at least some of those "UFOs" are actually backlit insects, e.g. flies, wasps, bees, mosquitoes, etc.

That's... yknow, hold on... yeah!

At first I thought they were too uniform. It looks like a windy day by the clouds and these things are nearly all zipping along R-L as the wind. But some do zip in at other angles and veer. And this is what bugs would do. Some of them seem to fast for bugs, but that's plus wind. And it's windy.

Also maybe debris, dandelion wispy things, dandruff, creating glare blobs, passing very close to the lens, could, with illusion of depth, imply incredible speed. That and/or bugs with the same idea. Anyway, small foreground objects probably not hyperspeed ships clustered in the stratosphere invisibly until you "put on those sunglasses" (I made that up, not my friend's theory, which I don't think he has). It looks like they're beyond the light pole, if you look at it that way. Alternately, they may be skimming the lens with their glare lost in the shadow.

[EHocking]

http://www.youtube.com/user/RiversMiranda

This is the Youtube page of a friend who's taken to filming "UFOs" of unusual type. I'm curious about the "Sun spot" ones(multi vids). Theyseem to be in the sky, but maybe not, zipping by at inredilbe speeds - just little dots.

Does anyone here happen to know what explains these. Is it a video optics, optical optics, cryptozoology, or UFOlogy, or ...Talk about a blast from the past. I was aware of this over 10 years ago, but never got around to reproducing it.

Here's my usenet post from 1998 (http://groups.google.com/group/sci.skeptic/msg/4c31ecad4fc20e8e),
Bob, don't know if this is really what you're after, but I found it
interesting. Picked this up from a website posted at sci.skeptic. Can't
remember who it was, so I've left the followups as per your post, just in
case someone can supply more.


The technique is for filming UFO's and is attributed to John Bro.

In short, position yourself so that the sun is just blocked by an eave and
you can see the sun's 'corona'. What this area for some 5 to 10 minutes
(wear sunglasses) and soon you will see "UFO's" dashing around. This is not
an optical illusion, as you can set up a camcorder to record these objects.
I've seen some of the results and they are better than some of the best
frauds I've seen.
Hopefully someone on sci.skeptic will recognise this and be able to supply
an URL. I do have a JPEG of a sketch of the setup from the site if you're
interested. And will give full credit where credit is due if I can track
down the website.

Oh, and here's that website (http://web.archive.org/web/20021010034800/www.bvalphaserver.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=21&mode=&order=0&thold=0) I was referring to (courtesy of the WebArchive). It probably is the original article I read and has link to the passage from a book by the originator of the "technique", John Bro.

[Caustic Logic]

Talk about a blast from the past. I was aware of this over 10 years ago, but never got around to reproducing it.

Here's my usenet post from 1998 (http://groups.google.com/group/sci.skeptic/msg/4c31ecad4fc20e8e),


Oh, and here's that website (http://web.archive.org/web/20021010034800/www.bvalphaserver.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=21&mode=&order=0&thold=0) I was referring to (courtesy of the WebArchive). It probably is the original article I read and has link to the passage from a book by the originator of the "technique", John Bro.

Cool, man, thanks! I couldn't get his pictures to come up. But you've seen these zippers too? I'd be interested to know if you ever developed a theory as to just what was responsible?

I talked to "Rivers Miranda" (not real name, my best friend) and he says the particles seemed to be in the distance, given the way they responded when zooming in, I think. I'm not sure. I need to re-watch. Not an expert.

Why I suspect small foreground stuff just drifting by on a decent breeze is how it can look large and fast and thus "whao, crazy!" Further objects would need to be increasingly fast/large to both appear on and traverse the screen in the time they do. Basketball size orbs at say 100 ft altitude would probably have been noticed by now, crusing at fastball speeds at least. Yes, even if they were invisible normally. Spaceship-size cruisers higher up would also be hard to miss zipping by at the rate of hundreds per minute like this.

They can't be physically real... ghosts? OMG, ghost attack! Why it's considered a UFO issue I'm still not sure.

[Caustic Logic]

ETA: Watched again more closely and yeah, I didn't notice it before it's totally zoom-dependent. At one setting there invisible (or nearly so - a few show up). Zoom in and suddenly there's a swarm. Pull back and they fade away.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5E9DcMpvhkQ
At 2:20 and esp. right at 4:03 you can see the shift on zooming.

Perhaps a camera and lens / light processing issue?

I'm still not confident how to decide scale and depth here.

[Corsair 115]

ETA: Watched again more closely and yeah, I didn't notice it before it's totally zoom-dependent. At one setting there invisible (or nearly so - a few show up). Zoom in and suddenly there's a swarm. Pull back and they fade away.


Zooming in a lens causes the visual depth-of-field to compress. That is, objects which appear far away relative to a foreground object in a wide angle view will seem much larger and closer to the foreground object when zoomed in.

Seems to me this fits in well with some of the 'orbs' being insects. Zoomed out, they're too small to register well. Zoom in, and they'll show up better since they're magnified relative to the foreground due to the foreshortening caused by zooming in.

[Caustic Logic]

Zooming in a lens causes the visual depth-of-field to compress. That is, objects which appear far away relative to a foreground object in a wide angle view will seem much larger and closer to the foreground object when zoomed in.

Seems to me this fits in well with some of the 'orbs' being insects. Zoomed out, they're too small to register well. Zoom in, and they'll show up better since they're magnified relative to the foreground due to the foreshortening caused by zooming in.

I'm inclined to agree. I'm not the video expert my friend is, but it seems like something beyond normal magnification, but directly related to the zoom effect. I'm wondering about the way light is processed in the camera, either from the zoom setting itself or simply from what's in the frame (light vs. dark). Plus magnification.