Saturday, March 10, 2012

Can you find the Fairy?

Click on this image for a HI-rez view.

A few days after the interview with Rosemary Ellen Guiley, a friend posted an image (see above) on my Hidden Experience facebook page.

Her name is Kim, and she simply asked: Can you find the Fairy?

I replied: “There is a girl's face, mostly just her chin and lips, peering thru the branches in the upper right portion of the frame. Is this one of your daughters?”

Kim came back with: Well yes and no, my daughter was standing behind me, when I took the picture. Yet she showed up in the picture when we looked at it later. Just before I took it I was goofing around with my little nieces and telling them this was the part of the woods I saw the fairies when I was a girl. Then we heard a noise of giggling in the brush, they went silent with big eyes and I said,Shhhh I'm going to get a picture of the fairies.

So I took the shot. However when we got back to the cottage later that night we realized that this image was in the photograph.

Close-up of the face within the branches

This began a back and forth bunch of questions and answers about this picture.

Here’s what Kim had to say about this photo and the curious circumstances that surround it:

My family would spend summers at the cottage with my Grandparents. I was the first grandchild and my Grandfather and I were very close.

My Grandfather was born in Canada I think moved to the states, to Detroit, as a young man. He was a first generation Scots and very proud of our Scottish heritage. (Note: this is the same as my father who was born in Ontario and moved to Detroit when he was 6 years old. I wonder if my father knew Kim’s family?)

He would tell me stories about the fairies and other Celtic myths. As a little girl, he would show me the fairy rings on the property and in the woods nearby. He would tell me about how they gathered there and that if I was quiet and waited they would appear or they would be nearby and I could catch a glimpse of them. The other adults would go along with him as he told these tales to me, but I remember sensing that he really believed in them.

I recall seeing and playing with fairies as a child when we would be there for the summer. When I told my family that I had been playing with the fairies they would laugh and say that was fun to make believe. But I always remember my Grandfather winking and telling me he believed in them too.

The cottage was within walking distance of Lake Huron. This was in Ipperwash Ontario Canada. The photo was taken in the woods near the cottage in the early summer of 2005.

Here’s what lead up to the photo being taken. The mood was very relaxed, we had already had spent a week or more at the cottage so we were all in vacation mode.

I had shown the kids the fairy ring on the back of the cottage property and then we all headed for the beach via the trail, along the way I was telling them about the fairies, just as my Grandfather had done for me.

I was in a very playful mood, had a sense of being very much like I was as a child tromping in that same forest. I was indulging my nieces and their friend in this play pretend world I had experienced as a child. I was joking about the fairies in the forest. We were in that magical space that kids get into when they pretend.

My mood was one of recalling how it felt to be a kid and full of wonder. The kids seemed to be in the same mood, very happy and playful, all talking about the fairies. (see this video from just before the photo was taken) My sister and I spoke about this today and we both recall it being very surreal in the woods that day.

So when I actually heard the "giggling" in the brush I was a bit jarred.

I stopped looked behind me to do a kid head-count and they were all there. I asked them to be quiet and we heard the giggle again. That’s when I aimed the camera in that direction and took the picture. My oldest niece and daughter ran towards the area afterwards because they thought they would find someone - but nothing.

It was only later that the picture revealed the image. It almost went unnoticed until I zoomed in on it with the camera. Since we were at the cottage I didn't have the ability to upload this photo onto a computer to see a larger version, that didn’t happen until we got back home.

I spoke to my sister and daughter about this today. On the trail that day it was my sister, my two nieces and the neighbor boy. My youngest daughter was not with us, she had stayed behind at the cottage with my mother. [NOTE: this is different than her initial comment on facebook]

After we heard the giggles along the trail and took the picture it was my nieces that ran into the woods (off the trial) to see if they could find anyone. My nieces are mixed-race so they could not have been even remotely the image in the picture.

My daughter recalls the others and I asking her if she and my nephew had somehow snuck into the woods to play a joke on us by hiding in the woods and giggling. They said they hadn't and she remembers to this day how I kept at her to admit that she had, because it was so odd to see this in the picture. That coupled with the fact that this would have been virtually impossible due to the time frame and the conditions in the woods. This was also backed up by my Mother who said that they had all gone to the store a few minutes after we left. After hearing all this, I finally believed her.

So the event as my sister remembers it is the same as I stated earlier, however my daughter was not with us. That and she also said that she remembers not being able to find us on the trail for a period of time and that it was disconcerting.

Extreme close-up of the curious face

I emailed my psychic pal Anya Briggs and asked her to look at the photo. Here is part of her excited response:
OMG! That's an awesome picture! Kim. that's an honest-to-God elemental you caught! No lyin'! Straight up fairy person, a wraith fairy who stirs up energy! WOW! She's an inter-dimensional and looks a lot like some models I know- very pixie-ish, Pictish is more correct my guides are saying- they interbred with humans eons ago my guides are saying - WOW WOW WOW this is the real deal, how beautiful! That's really special and rare, most elementals do things in private away from the "humans beings" They are attracted to us but also fearful so she must have exhibited a lot of trust to make that picture happen the way it did! Wow!
There's a hyper-clarity that is the outline of her that is interesting as well- hyper-real almost- yep, that has the look and feel of a paranormal experience for me.

Funny- my guides are calling her a "hyper-dimensional shape shifter" and she is well known to the Native American spirits as well as the "white woman who walks among them" from time to time.

She doesn't seem to have the rest of a body! I just see a head and the faint inkling of a torso fading off into air. Definitely a shape shifter - of what origin beyond what I described, however, I really don't know!

Right on for you, Kim for taking that completely awesome photo! Wow! I am really impressed! I’d heard about the fairy people but really didn't resonate with it too much- this makes a lot more sense for me about how they could exist and how they choose to appear and so forth- all that info is my guides, btw, I don't pour over books about fairies

So right on for my guides with that very beautiful explanation as well!

Click on image for a HI-rez view. There are details and colors
that show up in this photo that are exetrmely curious.

This is Mike again, with a summation. Now, if I wanted to fake this photo, I would take a magazine image of a smiling girl, cut it out, a hang it in the trees, take 50 photos, and pick the most mysterious looking one. My gut tells me to trust that Kim didn’t do anything like this.

Oddly, this photo matches other images I've seen taken by other "experiencers" - that same "magazine cut-out" look. I get the feeling that whoever (or whatever) is feeding us these clues, they are doing it in a way that is purposefully elusive. I mean, they are staging these photos so they look mysterious, but not TOO mysterious.

Stan Romanek and Robbert van den Broeke have both taken photos that seem to have the same mood as this photo. I cannot vouch for the validity any of these photos, Kim’s included. All I can say it it’s quite interesting.

size comparison

I was curious about the potential height of the fairy image. I pasted two stock photos of girls next to the fairy image in among the branches. I tried to match the size of the fairy girl's head to the other two images. Nothing exact here, just an estimation.

The younger girl (far left) is as small as I suspect the hidden image might be. The older girl in the center is as large as the hidden image might be. The white line is positioned to show the height of the hidden girl's mouth, the only detail that can be easily used to gauge the height.


Please note:
Much of this dialog was posted on facebook or was sent to me via email. I have edited the text slightly for clarity and continuity.
_______________________________________________

12 comments:

  1. To be honest,it just looks like someone's tied a plastic doll onto a tree branch to me...but who knows?
    I'm just calling it as I see it.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Pretty interesting. It's one of those things that's so clearly defined, it runs up against my limits of belief. Which is not to say I don't believe it - merely that it's beyond my range, so to speak.

    When I saw why I call "faeries", they were just small balls of light, but they interacted with me. I saw them in the woods, by a brook, by myself. I was on a "vision quest", run by a classically trained shaman of a Canadian (native) tradition.

    As the light began to dim, 24 hours into my endeavor, I saw a cluster of about 20 lights or so. I first thought they were reflections of moonlight off leaves. But the darker it got, the more clearly I could see that they were throwing their own light. Another clue, is that they began to move. They never moved obviously. It was always when my eyes were averted. I didn't just STARE... I was too busy being freaked out and telling myself it was nothing.

    Sometimes, there would be a rustling beneath the leaves right next to me - I'd look, startled, see nothing, look back over to the lights, and they would have moved to the right a few inches. At one point, this game of "rustle and move" allowed one of them to come withing about 2 feet of me. It was just outside the circle of prayer ties I was confined to for the duration of the event. I could faintly discern a humanoid shape in it, but it was no more than 2 inches high. I'm embarrassed to admit they scared me senseless - it just blew my mind. I think they were playing with me, and teasing a touch. Nothing mean. Just... impish.

    Over the course of about 2-3 hours, the cluster of lights slowly made its way from the ferns on my left, down the embankment on my right, down the edge of the stream, and out of view.

    The following night is when I saw what I call whisps - balls of light that streaked in the air, just a couple of feet above my head - perhaps the size of a softball. They appeared out of nowhere, whizzed right by, and flashed right out of view. Very quick. Very brief. Two or three times. Not sure if it was one or more than one that did the "show".

    I wonder if anyone has a guess at the "kind" of faeries they are. The shaman just calls them "little people". He never got more specific than that, and I never pressed him for details. Somehow, in times like those, it doesn't occur to me to ask lots of questions. It almost feels disrespectful. Not sure why. Maybe just my ego.

    Cool story, Mike. Very happy you've included this Fey element to your blog. It's kind of a huge deal, IMO.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Mike,

    I have to come out against this. If they are unwilling to send you the image intact with exif data and a shot from the camera of a pure blue sky no clouds birds bugs and anything but blue sky so one can compare exif data, this is a manipulated image.

    I can tell a flash was used and that there seems to be excessive sharpening or clear focus on the leaves surrounding the face, but with a point and shoot, the whole image would be clear. Why? Because the camera was set to automatic and it fired a flash in daylight. The camera reads the surroundings and sets iso, aperture and shutter to make a clear and sharp image. Plus, based on what she said, she just took a shot where she heard the giggling. This is an assumption on my part yes, but till we get the original exif data, i will stand by this.

    Tell them to send the original file. What I got from your site was a file showing me, using filterstorm pro on my ipad, was 912 x 684 pixel image. No pixel density, no camera make, no date , lens, no iso, nothing. This is barely over a half a megapixel in size image.

    When we start to see raw images in the 18 plus. Mega pixel output size with pixel density at 300, clear and sharp with image authentication Turned on... Well then, time to change ones viewpoint.

    Basically what i am saying is Nikon, Canon, Red, leica, fuji x100, cameras that shoot raw. No jpegs! Raw! Where we can see all the exif data.

    Be well

    Laurence Zankowski

    p.s. Mike, this is for you. No snark intended. I scanned images in for the U of CT. School of medicine at 1800 ppi. Absolute accuracy so med students can learn to read slides and xrays. I was a contract photographer for the 377th ABW - USAF shooting Nikons, and lenses to die for. I have worked on commercials as an assistant with lenses that are in the $75,000 range.
    Nikons with 1000 millimeter lenses. Fixed 2.8 300 mm lenses. You can not fake with the cameras that are pro or military grade unless you had physical access to the sensor block and you had intent to mislead.
    There are phantom cameras shooting a million frames a second to watch explosions. Yes, there are probably images from these types of cameras that bring into question that we are not alone. But unless these images have exif data and a blank shot from same camera, preferably from the same time frame, it is just not an image to use.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Just so you all know, I asked Kim for the original photo - but she doesn't know where it is. The picture was taken in 2005, and I suspect it's gone.


    I wrote that the image could easily have been hoaxed with nothing more than a magazine page cut out and hung in the branches.

    So -
    This whole thing hinges on trusting Kim.

    I found her story really interesting. Especailly her grandfather and his similarities to my own father.

    Mike C

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  5. Exif Info and link :
    My Photos > Photo > Exif
    Can you find the Fairy?

    Date Jan 5, 2005 3:10:12 AM
    Width 1600
    Height 1200
    File Size 357972
    Camera EASTMAN KODAK COMPANY
    Model KODAK Z730 ZOOM DIGITAL CAMERA
    ISO 80
    Exposure 1/60 sec
    Aperture 3.4
    Focal Length 7mm
    Flash Used true
    Metering Mode 5
    Exposure Program 2

    LINK :
    https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/Hhbbbrgg9_Swf8KQIObCndMTjNZETYmyPJy0liipFm0?full-exif=true

    If that does not work please advise me of what you need.
    Thanks, Kim

    ReplyDelete
  6. Mike and Laurence ~
    Here is the Exif info and a link :
    My Photos > Photo > Exif
    Can you find the Fairy?

    Date Jan 5, 2005 3:10:12 AM
    Width 1600
    Height 1200
    File Size 357972
    Camera EASTMAN KODAK COMPANY
    Model KODAK Z730 ZOOM DIGITAL CAMERA
    ISO 80
    Exposure 1/60 sec
    Aperture 3.4
    Focal Length 7mm
    Flash Used true
    Metering Mode 5
    Exposure Program 2


    EXIF info Link : https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/Hhbbbrgg9_Swf8KQIObCndMTjNZETYmyPJy0liipFm0?full-exif=true

    ReplyDelete
  7. Sorry for the Repeat posting. Laurence , If you have any questions please feel free to ask.
    ~K

    ReplyDelete
  8. Laurence,
    Can you check out these photos I took in August of what may or may not be orbs?

    http://brizdazz.blogspot.com.au/2011/12/absorbing-orbs.html

    I have never been a believer in orbs,but after snapping the three pictures in this post with my 2 meg Sony Ericson cell phone camera,now I'm questioning my skepticism to the orb phenomena.
    These may just be nothing more than the sun's reflection into the lens...but this is the sort of energy I felt was with me on the day that I snapped these shots...so whether it is just an illusion of the sun on a lens (which I have never captured before on this camera after taking thousands of photos with it) or something less explainable,to me it will always be a good representation of what I felt was there on the day.

    Tell me your honest opinion,don't blow any smoke.I didn't see anything there when I took the photos of the sunset,it was just a feeling I had that something or somethings were with me.And when I looked at the photos later on the computer I was surprised to see these orbs in each of the three photos.

    I've shown a few people the shots,some say "yeah,they are real orbs". And some say "No,that's just the sun." But none of them were experts like you.
    So if you can take a look and tell me what you really think,it would be much appreciated.
    Because I really don't know what to make of this coincidence caught in the images of the camera.

    And what is your opinion of the orb phenomena ? Do you think some orbs could be real,or is it all just lens anomalies in your opinion?

    Cheers.

    ReplyDelete
  9. I'm no expert, so to me the photo is puzzling, but I cannot elaborate further than that.

    I don't know how trusty the exif data of the pic is. Clearly this photo wasn't taken at 3 in the morning! ;)

    But I find Kim's story very interesting. Specially the mindset of all the people involved. The adults were sharing a child-like sense of wonder, and that might have contributed to the end result --an image more according to the folkloric expectations of a fay-creature --the one a girl who's seen a lot of Disney movies would like to have-- instead of a more abstract encounter, like the energy orbs the other Mike and Brizdaz have encountered.

    My question to Kim would be, after this event 7 years ago, have you tried to go back to that cottage and trigger another encounter?

    ReplyDelete
  10. I like to keep an open mind as much as possible because so much in this world is unknown. However, I have to say that I really struggle with accepting this picture as real. It just looks so much like a Barbie doll to me! Even the shape of the hand. That said, I am not accusing the person who took the picture of staging this. God only knows where dolls can end up (maybe even in trees), especially if your brother is mad at you! LOL!

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  11. I do NOT make any claims to know if this photo is of a genuine anomaly or not. Kim said she thought it was her daughter when she first saw it on the back of the camera.

    The daughter denies this, and multiple memories seem to say she wasn't on the path.

    I wrote in the text that this would be easy to hoax. And I feel pretty strongly that NOBODY is going to be able to confirm or dismiss this photo with any authority.

    I am more interested in the odd narrative that Kim shares.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Mike and to kim by proxy,

    All i want is the data, not the story, that is yours and can never be changed.

    Here is what i found out from Kodak, based upon the english/ usa owners manual for kim's camera. The kodak ezshare z730 : chapter 9 : Page 56 if i remember rightly.

    If you need a link to the pdf online i will provide it.

    It has only a 33mm to 132 mm lens. No 7 mm. It has a a slightly smaller then 1600 by 1200 pixel size for its smallest size image. The camera's files size is 1.8 megapixels. The picasa size of image is nearly one sixth the size of the official kodak spec.

    The only exif data one can ever use is the one from the card to the computer or tablet at injest. Not after it has been uploaded to a online file sharing site. Google has its own algorithms to use when images come into the picasa online storage space. We do not know what their compression methodologies are, and at this point i really do not care. It just munges the exif data as to make it totally unusable for file verification. ( in this particular instance) .

    I have no issue with her story. Just the image causes me concern. Her intent towards her story and publishing it has been nothing but honorable.

    In two years time with the way cameras and sensors are going, some one some where is going to capture an event and will have all the bells and whistles in camera data, authentic and clean. No one is going to refute it.

    Just no no more jpegs... Raw image data.

    Be well

    Laurence

    ReplyDelete

Hi there. I am eager to hear your comments, especially if you have similar stories. I'm happy to answer any questions you have.

And - I reserve the right to delete any comments that are offensive or excessively harsh.