This picture was taken last Thursday, at St Peters Cemetery in Philadelphia, by a friend of mine. It was taken with a digital cam, no flash, and the cam was set on a night setting. The only light was from an old fashioned lampost. It resembles pictures of "rods" (ghost rockets) which I have seen. Not sure about this one, but I thought I'd share. There is a larger version of it in my villagephotos album, and you can see more readily what appears to be a faint orb at the top or the beginning of its movement.



The larger version is at Larger View[/URL]

[ November 13, 2004, 02:42 PM: Message edited by: SavannahSilkie ]

Oh my that is so neat. I just love looking at your shots they are truly amazing =) Please keep up the great job you do

I don't know a lot about rods, but looks paranormal to me, especially in larger view. Cool pic

Thank you Barb and Knight. A friend took this and sent it to me. He's my ghost hunting buddy in Philly. He goes out every Thursday night and takes pics. I've got a few more interesting ones he has sent me, I'll have to put in a folder and share. I have more an "expert" taking a look at this one, so the jury is still out on it. Wouldn't it just be nice to know for sure on all of this? lol

That is a really neat picture. It certainly does look like a rod. It seems to be shooting up from the ground. The enlarged pic shows it really well. I don't know what could cause something like that - it's certainly not dust or bugs and given the different intensity of light that it has in different spots I can't see it being a reflection of something.
I had no idea that night vision cameras could give that much light off without a flash. I recently bought a Sony dig cam with nightvision but have not tried that mode out yet. Will have to give it a try. I look forward to seeing more of the pictures your friend took (and more of yours as well).

Thanks for sharing this one. Cat =)

Hiya Cat,

My friend that took the "rod" pic uses an HP digital (nicer than mine.) It appears from the orbs at the top, and the one further down in the "rod," that it is making a downward movement into the ground. There was some light from a lampost behind him, but those lamposts give off a soft golden glow, they're not like streetlights or flourescent lighting. One reason it looks a little brighter, is because I slightly increased the contrast, in EZ Viewer and saved it so I could see the details of the picture better. Normally, with my cam, if I use a night setting, I have to increase the contrast a little bit, after they're uploaded to the pc. Here's an example and a pic of the type lamposts I'm talking about. I took this one with my HP at the Bishop White House in Philly.

Night Setting No Flash:


Same Picture, Contrast Increased:(Normally, I'd make this pic smoother, but I just did this to show how increasing the contrast brightens the foreground and can give the appearance that a flash was used.)

Thanks Pate. Now that I have a little more info on the nightmode and how to enhance to see things better I will give it a try. My son picked me up a photosuite program for the computer so I will have to give that a go as well to see if it has that kind of feature to do this with.

I have taken a ton of pictures since getting the camera and have gotten a few shots that I plan to share for opinions. I think I may have gotten a moving orb in addition to some others. I don't know how to put pictures right on here like these ones are so will have to try photobucket. Problem is I wiped out my e-mail a couple of days ago when I downloaded an upgrade recommended for that new JPEG virus out there. I need to try and get that back as my sign in info for photobucket is on e-mail and I imagine I need my e-mail to do this.

Ok, the jury is in on this pic. My friend checked it out, and sorry to say... it's not a rod. Short explanation...cam picked up light source from somewhere, slower shutter speed on night setting, so stretched the light source creating a "rod" effect. Oh well...back to the old drawing board. I'll file it in my folder of disappointments, it seems to be growing. Interesting pic anyway, I wasn't sure, so doesn't hurt to get another opinion from people with more experience. Thank you friend. =)

Ah, Pate messaged me about this.. so I'll share my thought here as well..

I don't think it's a light source + slow shutter peed as mentioned.. but I think it may be a spider web.

I've taken loads of photos of spider webs (on purpose, and not) and this is what they look like alot of the time. The common make up of when the flash bounces off a spider web is: 'lines of light' (what may look like rods), and orbs.. usually all the lines/orbs line up. It's just the flash bouncing off the web.

Here's some examples that I've taken on purpose of Spider Webs:

http://www.ghosttracker.com/photossection/fakes/P6250150.jpg[/URL]

http://www.ghosttracker.com/photossection/fakes/spiderwebtolomato.jpg[/URL]

You can learn more about 'False Evidence' at:
http://www.ghosttracker.com/photos-Fakes.html[/URL]

[ November 13, 2004, 03:21 PM: Message edited by: Matt Ferrell ]

I was watching a cool TV show on SciFi the other day called "Proof Positive". They had a special on "rods". Come to find out they are bugs flying super fast. Like light speed for bugs. They even showed how to photo them on camera/video. Very interesting show. It made me actually think about it and I agree with them. They don't always prove things to be false either. Hope this info. helps you out! Good Luck with future pics!