Sorry .. a little misleading in the topic, but i'd like an explanation from our ghost hunters.

It seems that modern Ghosts are rarely seen by people but infact recorded by camera's, Digital Cameras, Video and Digital video.

I have studied electronics all my life and hold a few quailifications (don't want to get into it)

I know exactly how images are recorded onto these formats. I am wondering if the ghost hunters can explain to me how Ghost images magically appear on film when the "ghost hunter" can not see the reported ghost.

I know nearly a century ago "Psychics" used to magical powers to mentally project images onto imaging plates and i wonder if this is some kind of throw back to this time?

There a several theories.

One theory is that, somehow, ghosts (especially shadows), can control their light in such away that renders them invisible on film or digital.

Another theory is that a ghost can make itself visible to a specific person only. IOW, the image you see is for youself only, not for others too see.

There's a theory that ghosts interact with our minds on a more telepathic level so when we think we "see" a ghost it's really an image in our minds and not a real image of light.

And there is a theory that ghosts move extremely FAST through our reality so it's hard for normal cameras to capture them.

All in all it may be similar to how EVPs are formed and that you can't hear an EVP without the "E" part.

Awesome topic!!! Can't wait to see more theories!
I too, wonder how a ghost can appear on camera and not to the eye. But then again, my eye can't capture an image for very long or zoom in to some unimaginable degree, therefore rendering it useless in this day and age. Or maybe not.

Hello Courage Now!

This is a good topic!
Master Pro those are very good possibilities and surely worth considering!
I often wondered if people who don't see ghosts but the ghost show up on film or digital footage actually induce a sort of self blindness. This kind of popped in my head one night when I was talking with my spouse after watching an episode of Ghost Hunters. Well... the question was asked by him, 'why do they show up on camera but not to the naked eye, especially if the person is looking right at the spot?' I thought about it for a while and said that a camera captures what's there not what is perceived to be there. Without going into the whole how eyes perceive images (which can be googled or looked up elsewhere) one of the factors is that humans can look straight at something and if it causes them distress not see it. Ghosts/spirits would/could be considered disturbing to some so perhaps they 'blank' them out of their minds eye.

Anyway that's my story and I'm sticking to it. LOL!

Regards,
Mabon.

Ghosts do not show up to the naked eye because they don't exist. Ghosts don't show up on cameras either...for the same reason. Thank you for listening....(slinks away)...

How come most "so called" ghosts that show up in photos are dressed in old fashioned clothes? I appreciate the fact that it is probably because they are the spirits of long dead people but what i mean is how come there are hardly any photos of a ghost wearing crop tops and sneakers?!?! I would love to see a photo of a ghost wearing something cutting edge like a mankini*.

Just wondered.

P.S. i don't believe in ghosts.

How do you know?

Well, if such a phenomenon is real:



Light is light though isn't it? I really don't see how light can be changed somehow to be visible to a camera and not the human eye. I guess it could be a different wavelength. But I would think a a camera would be designed to pick up the same range as a human eye. I'd like ideas about this in more detail.



Yeah, that makes sense. But it doesn't explain how.



That makes the most sense to me. I definitely think the psychological angle makes sense.



Which would make sense. It's true that if something is moving fast enough, a camera wont be able to record it. But then, if something was travelling that fast, would people notice it?



Isn't that circular logic? It's picked up electronically because it is picked up electronically? Doesn't make sense.




That's pretty interesting. I've held the exact same theory for a while now.

You can have your ghosts looking like that.

Wow thanks for that.

Anyhow, I always wondered this same thing. I think the theories as to why ghosts can appear on a camera and not to a human eye have been covered and are pretty good.

The question about the clothing though, it seems that it is always Civil War or Victorian style clothing that the ghost is wearing. We never hear about anything earlier than that, like why don't we see a Native American in full battle dress, or even a caveman? Do ghosts expire after some amount of time?

LOL! I wish that my eyes/mind would have blanked out that photo! It's too horrible to look away from yet enthralling too!

Well if you want an honest opinion on the clothes thing... There are stories of people seeing ghosts and people who look 'timely' dressed and the person didn't realize that it was a 'ghost' until after the encounter (hitchhiker ghosts are the first that come to mind or stories of the recently dead that manifest to their loved ones). But if the story/spirit is around for a while its clothes will become dated, you know how quickly fashion changes. LOL!

Regards,
Mabon.

I just checked Tobin's Spirit Guide and it said that the reason that ghosts are never dressed in modern day clothes is because the tailors of the spirit world are very very old and they like to keep it traditional. Phew, mystery solved.



*hey the photo of Borat wearing his mankini was deleted as it is apparently too racy for you sensitive readers!! well it looks like this...
Click to view attachment

surely even the most sensitive souls out there cannot possibly be offended by a photo of a lump of plastic molded into the shape of a mans torso?!?!!?

I don't know where you got the idea that they always wear period clothing. The ghost at my work wears jeans and a flannel shirt...much the same outfit my ex wears. (and yes he is still alive...I haven't killed him and I am not being haunted by him). I have heard of native american spirits being seen also. As for caveman sightings....I have wondered in the past if that wasn't what bigfoot sightings could be....it would explain why no one can find one.

Spanky the Roylance Guide and the Handbook for the Recently Dead seem to contradict that!

Interesting thought Jewels. That could maybe explain some of the sighting of Big foot anyway.


Regards,
Mabon.

I'm not offended, just a little turned on.

pfffft, those are not even real books!!!




(i know, i know, neither is Tobin's Spirit Guide).

Well if you assume the ghosts are self aware and can hide themselves.. maybe the reason the 'older' ghosts appear to cameras and recorders is because they aren't aware what they are - and don't know they have to hide themselves from them.. in their time period there was no concept of a digital camera

Thanks Nocturnal, this could very well be a possibity and does make sense when you sit and think about it, if an astrol planer can cloak themselves while traveling the astrol plane why can't a ghost, considering that the astrol plane has many realms including the other side, and if a ghost knows your trying to capture them on flim, and they do not want to be captured, they would cloak themselves, I just had a brain wave, what if someone who thought they saw or captured a ghost had really saw or captured an astro planer, it's possible if you look at Astrol planing, and all surrounding issues.

My sister opened the door into her childs room to check on him and saw a ghost beside the cot for an instant and it faided away really fast. I've seen an aura around someone and seeing aura's are something my sister is also able to do. I had tried to see them for ages but the one time when I wasn't trying to see one I saw saw it. I was watching someone talk in a really dimley lit room and I saw her aura for about 2 minutes (a projector had been on so the room was dark) I've experienced a lot of retina burn trying to do it but when you see an aura or experiecne the aura phenomenon it looks pretty ****ing heavenly. Doesn't seem like retina burn to me.

Interesting topic. My thoughts on the subject are close to Mabon's, though I think her idea is quite possible as well. Instead of the brain blocking what it doesn't want to see, I think sometimes people simply don't notice. Anybody that takes a lot of photos can tell you that they are constantly noticing things in photographs that they didn't see when they took the shot. If you're in a studio or trying for that perfect shot, sure you will see everything in the frame. But if you're just walking around town taking shots, there are often plenty of things that go unnoticed. There is just too much information for the brain to process, and the busier the photo is, the more chances that something will go unnoticed. Add to that all the distractions - kids hanging on your arms, street vendors, music, stormy weather - our minds are pelted with distractions so we never notice every detail our eyes see. (Perhaps another reason why there are so many amazing hearing impaired photographers?) This wouldn't explain the obvious close up photos, of course, but I think this is a possibility for many ghost photos.

I remember a few studies saying that the take in everything but we only notice a few things consciously and the rest is seen by the subconscious

Thanks for that, I did a little googling and came up with a news release from John Hopkins University which was quite interesting:


Source

"...what we know, think, or expect."

Sure they have to exist for hypnosis or magicians using suggestion to get you pick something

Not really.

Visible light is only a mere fraction of the entire electromagnetic spectrum. The spectrum runs from the low frequenct/long wave radio and infrared up to the high frequenct/short wave x-rays and ultra violets. Human visible light is a bare scratch of that range. I say "human" because other animals such as bees and deer can see other frequencies that we humans can't. It's well with in scientific possibility for entities to reflect or emit a frequency we can't readily see.

BTW, most digital cameras are capable of viewing IR very well.



The speed may not be constant. Entities may go at different speeds and when they slow down enough we can see them with the naked eye.




What's so circular about saying that electronic devises may be able to detect that which our 5 senses can't?

try pointing your phone camera directly at a crt monitor or tv.... you can see it flickering or have lines of of streaks which are usually invisible when viewed with the naked eye etc

That would be a good example of light at different speeds.

For viewing invisible light try aiming a remote control (TV, VCR, DVD player etc) at your camera and pushing a button. You'll see a flickering light out the front of the control. That's the IR signal.

Just gave it a shot and it came out purple
It's remarkable how somethings are unable to be seen by our eyes like ultraviolet light for example but can been seen by other animals in our world. Come to think about it, maybe our pets can really see ghosts after all...

Bees see in the UV spectrum. If you saw what flowers look like in UV you'd be surprised but they evolved that way to be more attractive to bees. I once heard in a movie that rats can see in UV too but I haven't checked that.

I don't think our house pets (cats and dogs) can see other light spectrums. Just they have better overall vision (and hearing!) than we do.

Dogs at least don't really have better vision in general than humans. They have more rods in their eyes and a Tapetum Lucidum to see better at night than humans. But humans have a wider range of colors in day vision, and better depth of field.

For different speeds of light appearing.. imagine if an image appeared for a length of 1/60th of a second, 30 times per second. This is frequent enough for our brain to start making it a continuous image in that location.. but infrequent enough that I bet we would view the image as translucent.. like a hazy / transparent image of a ghost. Even if the ghost were actually fully opaque if it stayed around without interruption. Like a double exposure for the eye.

Edit: Thought I would add.. if you've used some old CRT monitors and your eyes are sensitive enough. Sometimes you'll synch in on the refresh line.. and be able to see the line scan up and down the screen, and sometimes your eyes will totally ignore it. An example how even though you are paying attention to something, sometimes your brain will have you overlook it.