A big group of us did took a walk through Elmwood Cemetary over the weekend and it was pretty interesting. While we were in a big group the pictures we were taking had nothing special to them. One other person and I decided to fall back a ways from the others and once we did that the pictures became pretty bizzare. These were all taken around midnight in complete darkness. I have more if anyone wants to see them.

Very good photos wow. The only one I cannot see is anything by that person's leg but the others are pretty impressive..Good Job!!

Thanks....never done this before and I am pretty excited about it.

Well i to am unable to really get anything with the leg pic. the one with the shack is pretty cool. the other one though i am unsure of. basically, i have had the same thing happen when i was taking a picture of my friend in her car. as i was taking the picture of her i moved the camera some and got this result. tried it again to see if i could do it and was able to. so what kind of camera were you using. i guess that is my question. but you just may6 have something here.

Welcome to the site

The first pic: I see eyes in the orb(light)

Sec. pic: Open shutter to me.

3rd pic: A mist, anyone smoking? or cold breath?

Enjoyed the first one.

Maybe I am the only one who sees anything in the picture of the persons legs but I see shadows and smokey images coming frome the area around her feet. I know what you mean when you say similar light effects have happened in other situations but I have never had anything that intense show up in pictures. If something like that showed up there is usually a light source other than the flash of the camera that it bounces off of but i could be wrong. It was kind of strange though because my sister and I have the exact same camera and were both shooting pictures of total darkness. I got the smokey images and the light shows but she didn't. She mostly got hundreds of little orbs everywhere.

Wll the first pic was cool. THe second pic I think is a camera error. (I have pics similar that I took in Rachel Nv) But the third Im a little more interested in. I did a little experiment and I tried to take a picture of cigarette smoke. Nothin to the effect as your pic. Have you tried blowing it up in photoshop? Paint even blew it up enough. Maybe Im crazy, but you can make out a shape if you blow if up enough. I dont think if fog or mist because it's localized. Fyi . Thanks for the pics.

In regards to my last post....

I could also understand the lights in the picture if it had only happened in the one shot but I have at least 15 pictures with these little light strings in them somewhere...I will try and post them all later on. Also if you want to see something really cool, zoom in to the top right corner of the first picture and you can make out 3 faces

Light strings can be caused by firefly's or bugs flying though the scene as well as the camera moving slightly while a regular light source is in the photo. This gets particularly bad at night because your exposure time goes up - and if you have a flash going it can contribute since it exposes most of the photo quickly while the long exposure since it's still dark causes light trails and slight motion blur.

I think many times you will see what others dont, because you not only shot the photos but obviously aimed toward the correct areas. But I truly believe they are great shots, and the first not only has an orb, but the cloudy mist extends in front and around it which is not normal or camera related in my opinion. The second one is very good as well. Many people blame the shutter or whatever, but these are common paranormal anomalies in my opinion. The first one is similar to a shot of my ex's house, in which he has a shed out back that I sensed had some activity.

Edit: Mine was taken with a simple disposable camera, there was no rain, or fog.

I'm curious if either of you were carrying flashlights? The first one looks like a flash light being turned on to me.. This is total speculation so sorry if its off .. but I notice some motion blur in the photo, so you might not have expected the long exposure time. If your friend had turned off the flash light for the photo, and then turned it on again when it was done (but it was actually still exposing).

We had thought that perhaps fireflies or another sort of bug had been the the reason for the light strings, but why would they happen only in the shots where i was pretty much alone and not any of the others? At the time we were out there it was around midnight so it was totally dark and there was no light source anywhere for it to reflect off of.No flash lights, total darkness

Any number of reasons why they might come out later. Might even be as simple as they were disturbed by the larger group and flew off before pictures were taken. I'm not much of an expert on firefly's though, I've only ever seen them once.

cool pics!

I'm horrible at what I think I see, but the pictures were great...thanks...

Thanks for sharing your photos. The first photo is cool looking however anyone who judges it first shot would most likely say some dork was behind you with a flash light since its a orange round shot in one spot. The shot of the leg may be something "if" there was no smokers around you at the time. All and all they are cool photos and thanks for sharing.

The one with the legs looks like a smudge in the camera. THe one with the string like things type things I have no idea what that is! I have never ever seen anything like that before any clue on what it is? The first one whats with the top of the photo it almost looks to be the camera moved and came out fuzzy the right of the side of the building? It looks like part of the sky is going right over it. Cool photos.

This is just one site I found regarding the stringlike, or wormy annomalies..JN--


http://www.ghost-trackers.org/gloriaresidence.htm

Look...thes pics are awesome....but fake, man. C'mon, it's obviously Photoshopped. Cool looking neon in the 2nd pic though.

5/5 on the pics.

Photoshopped? Please, I wouldn't know how to o do that if i wanted to. This was my first time going on a "haunted tour" of the city and when I got these pictures I was curious if it might have been something so i searched the net and ended up here. I swear I have done nothing to these pictures, they are uploaded right from the camera card.

neat looking pics, but they all look like they can just be attributed to shaky camera or a glitch with the camera and such. I like the first pic though, the tomb thing is pretty.

As an aside.. since you mention this is your first haunted tour etc... When taking photos at night, since the camera is so sensitive to movement (flash often doesn't help outdoors like this) there are a few things you can try. It's always best if you can see try to find something you can brace the camera on to stabilize it (I know this isn't always possible), I've also been told soft bean bags can help for stabilizing cameras (since they absorb the shaking) .. never tried this one. Finally, if you want you can get a monopod (.. a 1 legged tripod type thing ) .. Essentially you get them like walking sticks.. but you can set your camera on the top to give a stable point. Useful for anyone planning on taking ghost photo's outside at night, both a walking stick and something to improve the shots .

Neat pics!
Would the streaking lights be labled as orbs?

But the cameras seemed to shake too much when these photos were taken. Were you nervous at that time? Did you see anything shining point near the cemetry? It seemed to me the shaking alone can account for the weird light paths in the photo. If so, these pics may be no paranormal than the flying rod. They may be the same thing!

The first one looks like a dimmed, battery dying flashlight.

1st pic - reminds of some bad pictures I've taken before in poor light or night time pics. The camera either struggles to focus correctly so comes out morphed like that, or the exposure is extended to try and cope with the poor light making it more likely to catch a shake or slight movement of the camera.

2nd pic - These again could be created under the same conditions as pic 1, the squiggly lines look like insects, they are even duplicated suggesting camera shake or movement.

3rd pic - This pic is a little more interesting, but can the usual be out ruled, smoke or mist?

I loved the pic's and I see exactly what you're seeing.

The first is my favorite. Excellent shot! Jody

I am not sure what they would be...trying to figure that out. Everyone seems to think it is a camera glitch but I am not convinced of that. They showed up in just about all of my pictures while I was alone but not while i was with a group which kind of make me think they are not camera errors.

Bren, once you post photos on this forum, there are many who try to debunk them, using camera malfunctions, or something perhaps you did wrong to create the images, and skeptics. All that matters is, you know what you felt and you know what those photos indicate. In my opinion they are fantastic paranormal shots..Good Job..JN

The first one looks like a flashlight and someone showed how to create those stringy light things in a picture a few weeks ago.

I completely understand that and i appreciate everyones opinion....except the guy that said they were fake!!

LOL I have posted photos here too awhile ago and everyone blamed my "thumb"..So with that, the next time I took pics, I put my fingers in front of the lens and it didnt look anything like the others, as it was white NOT red (use disposable cameras) but no one said a word LOL..I dont have photo shop either and even if I did, I would have no clue how to use it..I think many dont want to believe, or they are just skeptics thru and thru. Also I have only met one local professional photographer who validated my pics, but only after seeing the negatives. Hang in there and TAKE MORE!!

So, is it better to use the disposables as opposed to my digital? These ones were all taken with a digital camera...

Seems no matter what we use someone will blame the camera or the person using it. However, I find a simple disposable camera can be more effective than a digital due to the fact, Digitals pick up more orbs and can have other malfunctions. The average disposable will take a great photo, and cannot mess up, just use flash when needed. I take pics, then have them developed at a one hour photo lab with one set of prints and CD, then pop CD into pc, its easy as pie. Long ago lots of people said my photos were an obstruction such as my finger, so I brought them to a this local photographer who looked at the pics and said it was an obstruction, and I said NOPE, then he looked at next photo and said "looks like you used a very old camera." WRONG LOL..They were both used by same disposable camera, and once he saw the negatives he knew it was not a camera issue. Digitals can be altered, but with a simple disposable I couldnt even imagine how to alter them. But do what feels right to you, because I still believe you got some great shots...JN

Negatives can still mislead (and no this isn't suggesting your negatives did - just stating a fact). Generally people do put a little more faith in pictures that are analog - but as soon as you put them up on the internet they are digital and could have been manipulated. In addition some extra info for digitals is that they can sometimes catch a wider range of the light spectrum (like IR on remotes). While analog could in theory, the film usually isn't reactive unless you get specialised film.

Really there's no getting around the skepticism. Even beyond regular skepticism you'll run into, there are so many issues with photography in poor conditions (and really that's the only time you usually see ghost pics.. how often do you see one in ideal conidtions) and people who aren't familiar with what happens you'll have people trying to explain other ways of causing the exact same effect. For example those light strings -- if you google around you'll find not only can they be caused fireflys, but also if you take a photo of light using AC sources (like outdoor lighting) it alternates on and off, and can cause light strings that are just the same. It happens faster than our eyes can see, but the camera picks it all up. Does it mean there isn't paranormal activity related to that effect ? No, but any possibility should be considered - and Occam's razor is that the simplest explanation is usually the correct one.

hey i looked at the one with the girls leg and if you look hard by her knee there's like a blue area

Having looked at these images and the others posted in the galleries, what is the mystery here? You have motion blur caused by waving the camera around during exposures of between 1.6 and 4 seconds - and that on the images where the EXIF data hasn't been stripped.

Not sure if the date/time is set correct in the camera, but the stamps do not match the claims to have been taken "over the weekend" and "at midnight"; they are stamped around 03:30 on 2-May or 5-Feb - depending if you have DD-MM or MM-DD date format.

Thanks, but a negative can show whether there is an obstruction or not, as opposed to what is posted here from the CD or in my case anyway. Also when a finger or thumb is involved it is red using a Digital or phonecam, but not in a disposable camera in which it is flesh colored. So there are variations of issues regarding cameras. Yes skepticism is what we are here to debate which makes it alot more interesting, but sometimes frustrating for new comers. The stringlike images I have researched, dont look the same as some I have seen at cemeteries and other area photos. I do understand they can be electrical due to lightening storms, static electricity, fireflies and other things. But they can also be "energized orbs" "orbs in motion" and things of that nature. When I look at any photo, I never automatically believe it is of the paranormal thats for sure. But in this case, I think this kid captured some good photos. My favorite is the first one, and not the orb/flash that got to me, but the cloudy mist surrounding the grave site. That is not fog, as it only goes to one area, and I sense that is paranormal. The stringlike annomalies are commonly seen in cemeteries even in the winter so that rules out fire flies and other insects, so with that, people blame the camera.. LOL..Some ya just cant win..JN==

K, again far too technical for me. I am not sure where you see time stamps on the pictures, I have never seen time stamps on any picture that I take with my camera but I assure you that they were in fact taken this past saturday around midnight. I have no interest in wasting anyones time, especially my own with bogus photos. I for sure wouldn't have taken the time to search around the net and find this site if the were fake or altered...I just kinda thought they were neat is all. EXIF data?? Sorry I am a technical idiot....

oh, really?! (sarcasm)

anyone can see that.

In photo's on digital cameras, many cameras store information history about the photo taken in EXIF data (stored in the photo, sometimes resaving causes this to be cleared). For one thing, EXIF data is usually pretty good indication the file wasn't manipulated , though it's not fool proof. But it includes all sorts of information about when you took the photo. For example your camera is a pentax optio s55 you used a flash, your f-stop was f/2.6, your focal length is 5.8m, ISO 200, exposure time varied.. with the light strings it was 4sec, with the first photo it was 0.6sec. If you were into photography this gives all sorts of details about what the camera is doing even if your not aware of any of it.

But to put it in perspective.. in the 2nd shot, from the time you hit the button to take a photo.. everything in front of the camera for 4 seconds would be captured - that's a really long time when taking a photo free hand.

To read EXIF data I usually open the photo in an editor and view file info. If your just using windows, right click the file, select properties, summary tab at the top, then the advanced button. This isn't the complete EXIF data, but it's some of the useful stuff.

This illustrates, and contrary to some views posted on this thread, that digital is a better medium than analog when it comes to photos; a digicam records all settings within the image data; this reveals all manner of info about how the image was taken.

Brennly, regardless of whether you have the date/time set wrong on your Optio S55, the images do not all tally with the account. If we take the first image of the tomb, this is taken around 20 minutes earlier than others, the sky is remarkably bright and overexposed for close to midnight at that shutter speed (3/5 sec) and aperture (2.6).

Sorry, but someone has modified some of the images - different resolutions etc; why have some of the posted images been altered to have the EXIF data removed?

I get EXIF data on all the files, and the image size is consistent at 480x360 with resolution of 72pix/in.

The images to appear to be over a 30min period.. but how is that inconsistent with her account.

As for the the brightness of the sky.. 6/10 sec is actually a pretty long time.. in regular lighting 1/60 (or even faster..) is a normal exposure. Given that length of time, it had to be dark (especially given how dark most of the photo still is). Depending on where the metering is done, if she was facing a full moon (I ... have no idea what phase the moon is in atm or then) or other artificial lighting.. behind the tree line, it could plausibly overexpose.

u said they were all taking around midnight when the first pic really looks as if it was taken at dawn and the orange glow could be the glare of the setting sun, the second pic looks as if someone couldn't hold the camera steadely and the last pic just looks like if u have a dirty lens. not criticizing just offering explanations.

On the resolution and EXIF questions, Nocturnal - check out the postings in the image galleries.

The inconsistency arises over the claimed time of the events, you don't overexpose the sky like that at midnight with those camera settings.

Ok I'm a noob for find the post in the image galleries.. will look some more in a bit.

0.6 seconds, facing a bright moon with metering in the dark zone.. I dunno. I wanted to go out and test this with my camera - but alas no visible moon here (would have been half moon on saturday). f/2.8 is the lowest registered value this size of camera will go unfortunately.

Edit: Duh, wasn't looking in members galleries. Ok I found four other photos, all with EXIF and 480x360 res.

Also.. having just looked this location up (and assuming it's the right one).. this cemetary is in the middle of Memphis with a highway on one side. I can only Imagine the light pollution in the sky is huge (especially facing a highway). I can't imagine this being at a different time (well day, dusk or dawn) resulting in the white/blue sky and such an underexposed foreground (using 6/10 sec exposure time) - could be wrong though

More edits (Yes I hate replying immediately after my own posts): Ok, actually after paying attention to the other photos.. you do see a red light along the bottom of the tree line (images 905 and 908) .. so maybe it is dawn (the time stamps and photo numbers both seem to imply these are later.. and it *seems* to be getting brighter). It would help if you could qualify what you mean by close to midnight.. with a couple hours? 20mins? and.. which Elmwood Cemetary ;D

Elmwood Cemetery - Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada.
Close to midnight - We were in the cemetery from about 1100 pm until about 1 am so the pictures were all shot anywhere in that time frame...but closer to 1 am as i didnt lose the rest of the group until later on.

I don't think they are camera errors, rather, user errors. Looks like the camera was moved while snapping the pic (easy to do). In daytime pics that wouldn't show as clearly, but when the light is low (like at night) the camera shutter will stay open longer (especially if an auto setting is used) and the shot will be exposed longer, meaning any movement will show up.

interesting....B

Everyone is examining the camera, photos, the shutter, the speed, time, date and validity? Have any of you actually thought this kid caught a few good paranormal photos? JN---