O.K. commented in my posting, The Myth of the VP8 and 3D Uniqueness?
A lot of confusion is there. It is perhaps because the common way of lecturing about the Shroud, is a historical approach, in 1898 Pia discovered negativity, in 1970s Jackson & Jumper discovered 3D with VP-8 etc.
This is actually misleading, creates a hype, and in my opinion asks the wrong questions. How to make an image that is a photographic negative, 3 D rendering, without contours, isotropic, etc. ? There is always a way to do it regarding the individual properties -but resulting images have actually nothing in common with the Shroud (besides this single selected characteristic).
In my opinion, the issue should be lectured in more modern, compact way? The problem is: what constitutes the image on the Shroud, what makes it so specific? What are its basic components? And ONLY THEN ask a question: what are derived properties (like negativity or 3D) of such an image.
O.K. may be right. It is certainly a form of discipline that might eliminate the confusion. But the problem is bigger than that. It’s the “Wild West” nature of shroud research since STURP, a land of scientific lawlessness and tall tales where the closest things to order were the “O.K. Corral” shootouts called conferences. What did this atmosphere produce?
It produced the “I think I see” world of imagined images of ancient coins along with all manner of bric-a-brac, of plants from ancient Israel, of teeth and ponytails and of written messages in Greek, Latin or Hebrew — all these being wishful misperceptions or pareidolia. There were the dubious pollen charts and the radiocarbon dating fiasco. There were the tall tales: NASA analyzed the shroud, Ray Rogers was a general in the Air Force, America’s greatest scientists studied the shroud, and so-and-so was a Nobel prize-winning physicist. And it produced a lot of good science, too. Often that was overshadowed by the sensational.
There were short declarative decrees. They’re still sitting out there at shroud.com:
This spatial data encoded into the image actually eliminates photography and painting as the possible mechanism for its creation and allows us to conclude that the image was formed while the cloth was draped over an actual human body.
We can examine this in three parts:
spatial data encoded into the image: Is calling the data spatial not begging the question? Would it not be better to say relative greyscale values of the image that when plotted as relative distances from a planar surface suggest three-dimensionality, suggest spatiality.
eliminates photography and painting as the possible mechanism for its creation: That is simply not true, as has been shown on on this blog. One might argue about how difficult or unlikely it would be. But a blanket denial that it is possible is misleading, at best.
allows us to conclude that the image was formed while the cloth was draped over an actual human body: Conclude? How so? Not so if the cloth was draped over a statue or if the image was formed by some unusual photographic or artistic method that produces the right kind of relative greyscale values.
Being precise makes it more difficult to read. But compact imprecision leads to misunderstanding and to the dogmatism.
And then there is the Wild West’s Colorado Springs, once a place to soak in curative waters, and then a place to pan for gold, and now the home of the Turin Shroud Center of Colorado. Here is a brief statement from a document, The Shroud of Turin – A Critical Summary of Observations, Data and Hypotheses on the TSC website. I call this the Rube Goldberg miracle; you know, where a miracle happens, that causes a body to become mechanically transparent allowing a cloth to fall through it and get a controlled dose of radiation.
Consistent: [= in context The Fall-through hypothesis is consistent with the 3 Dimension attribute of the image.] The initial draping configuration of the Shroud over a body establishes the initial cloth-body distances. If, then, the Shroud overlying the body falls into the body region, different points on the cloth will intersect the body surface at different times depending upon how far that point was originally away from the body. Thus, each cloth point will receive a radiation dose in proportion to the time that the point is inside the emitting body region. Since that time is inversely proportional to the initial cloth-body distance, it follows that the radiation dose, and hence image intensity, is likewise inversely proportional to the initial cloth-body distance. Correlation of image intensity with cloth-body distance is consistent with the Shroud VP-8 3-dimensional effect.
I was just wondering: what is the body like at this stage of the miracle? Is it a liquid that holds it’s once-solid shape or a gas or something specifically miraculous? Does the part of the cloth under the body fall upwards? What type of radiation works best for resurrection miracles? What happens after the cloth has finished its fall? Is a mechanically transparent body able to pass through locked doors yet walk on the road to Emmaus and eat fish?
Those are the questions that come to mind. Silly, perhaps, but they do come to mind. Let me put it this way: I cannot begin to imagine that I will ever believe this. I believe in the Resurrection and I may believe the shroud is real but I cannot believe one word of Fall-Through hypothesis.
If you haven’t read The Resurrection is Just Too Mysterious to Be Described & A Response to Dr. Colin Berry, you can’t understand where I’m coming from.
Oh dear. Despite the welcome start of Dan’s resurrected site in pricking the ‘supernatural’ balloon of 3D, we now see its place being taken, at least partly, by the ‘negative’ image.
(That’s the Secondo Pia-discovered negative image upon which STURP could not be bothered to comment in its 1981 Summary!).
Yet here we read:
How to make an image that is a photographic negative, 3 D rendering, without contours, isotropic, etc. ?
No, no, NO. Sure, the negative image was discovered tail-end of 19th century by photography (aided by added tone-contrast via silver-salt photography making its features more discernible than is possible with the naked eye).
But that in itself does not, repeat NOT, make the image itself a negative. Assume that, and one is committing a major logical error.
Negative (tone-reversed) images have been around a lot longer than modern photography, even the early 19th century pre-digital variety..
Negative images have been around for as long as there have been muddy foot/boot prints on medieval white tiled-floors, or their prehistoric equivalent.
Unless or until contact-imprinting has been definitely ruled out (which Jackson failed to do with his totally irrelevant references to lateral, i.e. wrap-around distortion, given the lack of sides to the Turin image) there should be no further attempts to shift negative image to the so-called ‘science-defying’ realms of pro-authenticity fantasy.
Is it too much to ask for internet- visiting feet to be kept firmly on terra firma please?
That applies especially to ones that carry and deposit an acquired imprinting medium, where it’s mainly but not entirely the highest relief that leaves its signature as a NEGATIVE contact-ONLY imprint, enhancible with 3D-rendering computer software …
Here endeth this morning’s sermon….
PS: Here’s a pair of images I displayed on a recent posting (Dec 30).
https://shroudofturinwithoutallthehype.files.wordpress.com/2018/12/1.-charcoal-pre-versus-post-inversion.png?w=640
It shows, on the left, a negative image of my own hand, obtained via contact-imprinting with dry powdered charcoal. (Thanks pre-21st century Emily Craig and her partner for providing the cue).
The image on the right is the one obtained via tone-reversal using ImageJ software, i.e. the corresponding reversed-tone positive.
Both have a near-photographic quality (well, sort of) but are not, repeat NOT, photographically-obtained images, at least not in the first instance. (Recording of images via photography should not be confused with image-acquisition via preceding non-photographic means).
End of this afternoon’s sermon (but don’t rule out an additional evening one).
Hey Colin, With regard’s to Antero de Frias Moreira’s claim’s on the shroud’s “3D information” and his belief’s that no other image respond’s to a VP8 or any software that emulate’s a VP8 that renders brightness map’s, isometric projections etc, I bet that the image you attached of your fingers respond to the 3D surface plotter in ImageJ. Have you tried it ?
«With regard’s to Antero de Frias Moreira’s claim’s on the shroud’s “3D information” and his belief’s that no other image respond’s to a VP8……»
The question is: that’s not my claim and it is not my belief, it is what I learned by reading several papers written by Shroud researchers with the knowledge and tools to conclude that- or are all of them dishonest and want to deceive people???
Although I’m no image expert as many people seems to be, fortunately I ‘m aware of how VP8 works, I’m aware of Volkringer image processing, and the 3D processing of the image of William the Conqueror produced an interesting resullt indeed.
Nevertheless I think that it brings nothing new, and I ask again have those images EXACTLY the same behaviour as the Shroud image?
I don’t think so but I respect those who think otherwise.
Even Garlaschelli’s shroud face-produced by oxidation of the surface of tiny areas of linen fibers-when submitted to 3D analysis produced a different result from the Shroud face and so did Shadow Shroud and Nickell’s shroud face.
The question is, it is not the response to VP-8 but rather the SAME RESPONSE as the Shroud image
Thanks any way for the images you provided.
regards
Lee asks: have/had I tried it? Had, no. Have? Yes, albeit hot from the press…
Why not previously checked out? Because I long ago viewed the “3D” thingy as a near-featherless dodo that needed rapidly to become extinct …
(Dan started to express the same sentiments way back in 2015, pre his extended vacation -break – despite those still-current pro-authenticity leanings of his – sadly still tilted inexplicably through 85 degrees off the vertical – bless!).
But my ImageJ software continues to crunch out 3D-rendered images, albeit slowly with frequent warnings of imminent overload/shutdown on an ancient chuntering laptop.
Here’s the one you requested, Lee, summoned up just 20 minutes ago:
https://shroudofturinwithoutallthehype.files.wordpress.com/2019/02/3d-fingers-for-lee.png?w=640
Yes, it looks like a steam-roller has run over my fingers somewhat. But wasn’t the same said on this resurrected site not so long ago re the Turin body image (3D-rendering like “icing on cake” etc?)
Regardless of it looking a little “like a steam-roller has run over my fingers” haha :p Your image respond’s to ImageJ’s 3D rendering with the same way that image’s of the Turin shroud respond to it, Lighter shade’s up and darker shade’s down, or vice-versa, which ever way you set ImageJ to respond.
Your point about the bottom/Shroud back, and does it fall up to get imaged in the same way that supposedly the top does when it falls through the disappearing body of the resurrecting Jesus, is the Silver Bullet. There’s nothing really different about the image properties of the top or bottom, so another mechanism has to be found to explain the vertical-only scanning feature. Maybe radiation from the tomb’s bench and ceiling? Natural radiation from the rock or secondary radiation from whatever happens during resurrection?
“from whatever happens during resurrection.” What? Personally, I don’t think anything happens during a/the resurrection. In fact, I don’t believe there is/was a “during” in which a happening can happen.
One of the strengths of the VP8 was precisely its straightforward analysis, which makes it robust. More ‘complex’ image analyses ( see flowers, letters), are subjective to say the least.
STURP team was at its best when it delivered clear, simple data.
TSC is beyond facts.
Why was the VP8 better at straightforward analysis? What do you mean by that? The picture was lit with a floodlight, the image was captured with a rather basic video camera with a hand-adjustable lens. The settings seem to be by rotary dials. Does anyone have the specs and documentation for the VP8?
http://www.a1main.com/main/sales/ebmanual.htm
-there is a “Interpretation Systems INC VP-8 Image analyzer Maintenance HandBook” for sale.
Besides only Shroud related documents:
http://shroudnm.com/docs/1977-08-VP8ImageAnalyzerBrochure.pdf
http://shroudnm.com/docs/SEAM-VP8-Presentation.pdf
https://www.shroud.com/78strp10.htm
I see no reason why VP -8 should have any advantage compared to (any) modern image analyzing software.
Ok, do you buy Thierry Castex complex image analysis?
Do you buy the vp8 greyscale?
The bloodstains really muddle a lot of ideas of a man made image. That data is just as important as the body image data and the blood arrived on the cloth first.
This is what makes the entire question of image formation so much more awesome and daunting.
Wow! Dan, what an entry! Especially regarding that I have nowadays a real “shooting range” in my real life (unfortunately) and just like in the case of the Shroud, there are also some Italians behind the scenes.
Now regarding 3D.
EVERY image would render 3D in ImageJ. This is best demonstrated by black & white
square example in my presentation: https://shroudofturin.files.wordpress.com/2015/10/3dproperties6_1.pdf (pages 22-23).
This is because every image has AT LEAST 3 dimensions: x,y coordinates, plus intensity (or grayscale) of the image I(x,y). This is trivial.
But the 3D effect of the Shroud is specific.
In case of most images, the third dimension, the intensity provides no useful spatial information. It is essentially garbage. But in the case of the Shroud, the intensity I(x,y) represents the presumed body-cloth distance, consistent with real body covered by the cloth. The details of exact relation, however, must be postulated, and that’s the problem -there is no single way to do so.
Very Good explanation OK. Thank you.
Really?
Take a long hard look at what you describe as a “Very Good Explanation”, Hemraj:
But the 3D effect of the Shroud is specific.
In case of most images, the third dimension, the intensity provides no useful spatial information. It is essentially garbage. But in the case of the Shroud, the intensity I(x,y) represents the presumed body-cloth distance, consistent with real body covered by the cloth. The details of exact relation, however, must be postulated, and that’s the problem -there is no single way to do so.
That’s the equivalent of saying that everyone has two eyes and a second sense organ nearby. With just one notable exception, it’s not generally considered to be an eye. Indeed, it’s generally described as a nose, being incapable of sight.
But there’s someone very special where the nose IS a third eye. Why?
It belongs to a friend of ours, a very exceptional friend.
Know what? You can blindfold him and he still knows where he is going. He displays an uncanny ability to “follow his nose”, at least into certain locations (the kitchen, provided there’s food cooking; the back garden, provided there are roses in bloom etc etc…).
Yes, there’s always a qualifying assumption. But let’s not allow ourselves to be overly-concerned by such tiny imperfections in our otherwise impregnable line of reasoning.
Sorry, Hemraj, forgive me if I say that some of us are not bowled over by that kind of special pleading, dare on say perverted logic, involving as it does outside observers with slanted perceptions of reality…