Real-Life X-Files: Investigating the Paranormal

27. Miracle Photographs

~ Chapter 27 ~firacle Ph.otos:ranh.s ...... , On Friday, October 27,1995, the television program Unsolved Mysteries aired a segment, "KentuckyVisions;' that included investigative work by the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal . The popular, prime-time television series had requested CSICOP's opinion ofsome"miraculous" photographs taken at a recent Virgin Mary sighting at a hillside spot in central Kentucky. This was my first significant case as Senior Research Fellow-or as the narrator termed me,"Paranormal Investigator" (a "P.L" nonetheless). The photographs were made by a Sunday school teacher who had visited the Valley Hill site (near Bardstown, Kentucky) with eight girls from her class. I did not see the photographs until the day I was brought on location for filming, but I was sent color photocopies of them in advance . The lack of reproductive quality put me at more ofa disadvantage with some photos than with others. I did recognize that the claimed"faces of Jesus and Mary" in one photo were simply due to random, out-offocus patterns of light and shadow caused by mishandling of the film pack. (More on that later.) I also recognized in another photo the now common effect at Marian apparition sites, a phenomenon known as the "golden door!' This is an arched-door shape, filled with golden light and believed by some to be the doorway to heaven mentioned in Revelation 4:1. In fact, as explained in an earlier Skeptical Inquirer (winter 1993), it is simply an artifact ofthe Polaroid OneStep camera, which when flooded with bright light (as when pointed at the sun or a halogen lamp), produces a picture ofthe camera's own aperture (Nickell 1993a) (figure 27.1). This was codiscovered by Georgia Skeptics members Dale Heatherington Miracle Photographs Figure 27.1. "Golden door" photograph. and Anson Kennedy, who tutored me in making such photos. (Together we have wasted much Polaroid film , all in the interest of scientific experimentation .) I telephoned Kennedy about two of the other "mi rade" effects, and he was already familiar with one of them. Sight unseen, simply from my description of the alleged "angel wings," he diagnosed light leakage into the Polaroid film pack. My subsequent experimentation confirmed his explanation and showed how the leakage could have occurred (figure 27.2). Fortunately, my experimentation also provided an explanation for the remaining effect-one that had at first puzzled both Kennedy and me as well as some professional photographersand film processors Iconsulted . The effect was that of a chart superimposed on one picture. The chart was slightly out of focus but nevertheless unmistakable. One of the girls at the site thought she could see in the blurred printing the name of 175 ~ 176 "f' Real-Life X-Files Figure 27.2. "Angel wings" effect. a deceased friend. Where had the chart come from? It appeared to have resulted from a double exposure, although the Polaroid OneStep camera should not ordinarily permit that to occur. Suddenly, I realized that the card atop the film pack, which protects the film from light and which is ejected when the pack is first loaded into the camera, has a chart printed on its underside! Indeed, that was clearly the mysterious chart in question , somehow appearing in mirror image in the photograph taken by the Sunday school teacher. But how had it gotten onto one photo? My subsequent experiments showed it was possible to produce such an effect by light leakage (the same culprit that produced the "angel wings"). The light had leaked in between the card and the first potential photograph , bouncing off the white card and onto the light-sensitized surface of the film, thus making an exposure of a portion of the chart. In this way it was superimposed on the first photograph made from that pack (figure 27.3). Miracle Photographs Figure 27.3. Detail of"miracle" chart superimposition. (Experimental photos by Joe Nickell) Taken together, the evidence from all four photographs, some of which had multiple effects, provided corroborative evidence that the film pack was somehow mishandled and admitted light, maybe by the front having been pulled down with the thumb on being inserted into the camera , or even by someone having sat on the pack. Since the other major effect, the golden door, was due to the construction of the camera, there was therefore no indication of hoaxing with any of the pictures. On...