The Churchyard Sphere
One of the first
cases I looked into as a newly accredited investigator with BUFORA
involved a series of photographs taken by a retired police officer whom
we‘ll call Mr. Smith. He had been out on a photo shoot with the
intention of using the early morning sunlight to its best effect and as
such had taken a series of digital photographs featuring an old Norman
church. The photographs had been taken from the boundary of the
churchyard, and showed an area of lawn in the foreground flanked by
various trees and bushes leading up to the church behind which could be
seen a range of hills. Upon examining the photographs later that day he
was somewhat surprised to discover that an unaccountable sphere
of some kind was clearly visible in the sky to the left of the
church tower in one particular photograph. Curious as to what the
object might be, Mr. Smith re-examined the other images for signs of
it but without success. This he found somewhat curious as
upon checking the a available photographic data accompanying
each image, he found that only a few seconds actually separated
the previous and subsequent photographs, so logically the object
should have shown up in at least one if not both images.
Pondering over the
object and trying to come up with a rational explanation over the course
of the following day or so, Mr. Smith ultimately found himself leaning
towards the possibility that he may have unwittingly photographed a
‘UFO’ and as a result decided that it might be best to contact a group
or an organisation that dealt with such things.
Upon eventually
receiving copies of the photographs via an Email attachment along with a
report of everything he could recall at the time, it was quite obvious
upon an initial evaluation of the images that had they had all been
taken from the same spot but nonetheless contained enough subtle
variations between each shot to suggest that Mr. Smith had certainly
been conducting a photographic exercise as stated rather than simply taking
snapshots. The object itself appeared -on face value at least- to
be spherical in shape and dark grey in colour, whilst both distance
and height created the visual notion of its passing somewhere
behind the church itself and in front of the hills beyond, and perhaps
being anywhere between 1000 to 1500 feet in the air.
My first task was
to examine the primary photograph carefully for tell-tale signs of
enhancement or tampering, and upon finding no such evidence I had to
assume that whatever Mr. Smith had unwittingly captured, it did seem to
be a genuine part of the scene. I then examined the other photographs
for any sign of the object, particularly those taken immediately before
and after the primary picture. Despite the accompanying photograph specs
indicating that around 10 seconds had elapsed between all three shots,
Mr. Smith was correct in stating that no other sign of the object could
be found. This consequently implied that the object would only
have been visible for a couple of seconds at the very most and as a
result had either appeared and disappeared more or less instantly, or
had basically passed through the scene at a phenomenal rate of speed!
The consistent
quality of each photograph proved to be good enough that I could magnify
on the computer on the computer any particular part of each to a very
high degree before resolution began to deteriorate. As a result of this
added bonus the object revealed a surprisingly clear outline with very
little loss of definition under enlargement, and as a result revealed
the fact that it wasn’t completely spherical, as a curious flat spot-or
depression- near the top left hand edge of its rim (corresponding to a
10 o’clock position) could clearly be seen. Whilst enlarged it also
struck me that the surface of the object didn’t appear to be reflecting
sunlight at any point, and that for something possibly passing across
the sky at breathtaking speed, it apparently wasn’t fast enough to
out-pace the camera’s chosen shutter speed at the time.
It was time to
take stock of the evidence thus far:
· The object
wasn’t completely spherical.
· The object
wasn’t reflecting sunlight which, given its apparent position and the
conditions at the time, it should have been if it had been comprised of
any surface coating other than a hi-tech light absorbing paint.
· Accompanying
image data suggested that the object had appeared and disappeared within
a second or two yet magnification revealed a remarkable degree of
clarity for something potentially moving far faster than the
camera’s elected shutter speed at the time should have been able
to ’freeze’ in such a way.
· Irrespective of
the above points, no evidence for post-photographic tomfoolery could be
found within the image, so whatever the object was, it was certainly
real and as a consequence most definitely there at the time.
My observation
concerning an apparent lack of reflection upon the object’s surface took
me back for a closer look and eventually revealed that rather than
becoming lighter towards the top as you might expect on a bright and
sunny day, our mysterious object seemed to display the exact reverse by
becoming slightly darker towards the top instead! At this point in time
I wasn’t happy with what I’d found because the visual evidence was
throwing up clues that didn’t correspond to the circumstances and
situation of the event itself, and as a result my instincts had found a
bone to chew upon. I came back to the photograph during the course of
evening number three, however, more or less resigned to the fact
that despite this instinct I was no doubt going to have to initiate a
series of long and protracted enquiries that would probably, if
not definitely in fact, draw a damned blank. In such a negative frame
of mind I put the offending image on screen once again and
proceeded to roam around it enlarging various things at random. During
the course of this vaguely meaningful exercise I scanned the line
of trees running along the right hand side of the
churchyard foreground, particularly near the tops of each in the forlorn
hope that I might have missed the object as it transitioned from left
to right or right to left of the scene and had been otherwise
partially obscured by the foliage.
During the course
of this procedure I became aware of the fact that most of the trees
seemed to be fruiting with some kind of berry.
They weren’t
immediately obvious unless you first took the effort to enlarge those
areas where daylight played through the leaves and highlighted them. I
thereafter make a purposeful effort to look for them amongst the leaves
and in doing so noted that their overall shape seemed not dissimilar to
our UFO…and that upon closer analysis they shared a suspiciously similar
colour tone within the photograph.
I pondered upon
this point for a while, then giving vent to my instinct, dashed off a
swift Email to Mr. Smith simply asking him to return to the exact
location where he had set his camera up and take a look at the ground in
the immediate vicinity. I asked him to report back to me as soon as
possible thereafter. The following evening I received a reply containing
an attached photograph showing a twenty pence coin placed beside three
slightly larger berries that he’d found amongst a number scattered over
the ground where he’d set his camera up. All three were more or
less spherical in shape, apart that is from a distinct flat spot where
the stalk had been attached. Mr. Smith had unwittingly photographed
a berry falling from a tree above his location….nothing more nor
less bizarre than that, but the journey through his apparent
“sighting” was both interesting and revealing, and as a result
firmly established, or perhaps reinforced, a few salient facts in my
mind concerning ufological photographic evidence.
The next
significant development in my greater ufological awareness concerned a
phone call one evening at around 8.30 pm from somebody who proceeded to
inform me that he was an alien who’d been on this planet far too long
and now wanted to get back home…
….But that’s
another story. Watch this space………. |