SUBJECT: EDUARD "BILLY" MEIER - PHOTO EVIDENCE FILE: UFO2548 Subj: Eduard "billy" Meier - Photo Evidence * Forwarded from "ParaNet General Echo" * Originally dated 03-07-92 13:40 In 1981, the late Frank Gillespie wrote the following review of "UFO ....Contact from the Pleiades." In light of recent Paranet discussions on this very outdated subject, I will repeat Frank's article here. Before doing so, I would like to point out that Frank Gillespie was a scientist with the Commonwealth Scientific & Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO). Being a photographic expert, Frank was, for many years, a scientific advisor to Australian UFO groups. ------------------------------------------------------------------- Part 1: "UFO...CONTACT FROM THE PLEIADES Vol.1" The presentation of this UFO contactee story is quite different from any of its predecessors. The backbone of the book is a series of twenty two flying saucer photographs, supported by a rather sketchy and disjointed text; and padded out by personal photographs, snatches of cosmonaut and other philosophy, and seven pages invoking tenuous connections with the pyramids, the parthenon, and verious other ancient structures. There are also some visually impressive computer generated images, for which the interpretations may or may not have been quoted correctly. The credit for the preparation and publishing of this book is shared by a team of nine indivduals and four companies; but all of the flying saucer photographs are attributed to Eduard "Billy" Meier, a farmer/caretaker of Inwel, Switzerland. A connected series of photographs such as this can be likened to a chain, where the failure of a single link disrupts the entire chain. Rather ironically, the very first photograph in the book is the one in which evidence of fakery can be most clearly seen, so that detectable discrepancies in later photographs only go to confirm that a superimposition technique such as front projection has undoubtedly been used. The first picture, which is reproduced again precisely half way through the book, is one of a series supposedly taken just before sunset on 29th March, 1976. It has the appearance of a scene largely in shadow, but lit from the right by a reddish sun, which also flashes brightly off the upper section of the spacecraft. However, this apparent illumination terminates abruptly along the line of the distant hilltops, along with the transition from pale blue sky to brownish hills. Close examination reveals that this appearance of sunshine has been achieved by displacing the magenta and yellow colour image laterally from the cyan and black, thus generating an orange flash on one side of the tree limbs. The effect of this technique is apparent only where the background is lacking in magenta and yellow - in this case, the sky. The question arises, was this the result of poor printing technique, or was it deliberately done, either before or after the picture reached the hands of the printers? Consider the evidence; that the only pictures in the book which have this defect to any serious extent are the ones in this particular series, that the extent of the defect is far beyond what any reputable colour reprodcer would allow, and that the effect of the misregistration is so pronounced that it could not possibly have been missed. As to who was responsible for the fakery, the buck appears to stop at the colour reproducers, because in the second printing of this picture, the colour displacement has been done in the wrong direction, and the trees appear to be sunlit from the left. The printers would have used the blocks as received, on equipment which automatically preserved the registration of the four colours. It would be tedious to go through all the individual discrepancies in the various pictures, particularly as the book pages are not numbered for reference. Suffice to say that the faults to look for come into the following categories: 1. Lighting direction discrepancies between the background and the spacecraft. 2. Overcast sky and flatly lit ground scene, with a brightly lit craft. 3. Correct exposure for the craft, when the scene is badly underexposed. 4. Craft in better focus than any part of the scene. 5. Lack of ground shadow cast by the craft. 6. Inconsistent lighting between shots supposedly taken at the same time. 7. No signs of life in any of the UFO pictures. The first five of these faults all indicate that a superimposition technique has been used, probably involving models for the spacecraft. Confirmatory evidence comes from the last saucer picture in the book, where the painted on "portholes" are fairly obvious. The most likely technique used for the superimposition is front projection, which is widely used in the United States today. With this technique, you can have your wedding day photographs taken in front of the Salt Lake Tabernacle, even though the ceremony took place in a Brooklyn registry office. The technique is virtually undetectable, except when mistakes are made, such as those listed above. The text of this book is also not immune to criticism. The claim is made, for instance, that the focussing of the camera used for all the saucer stills was jammed just short of infinity. This is just the setting which would be used to obtain maximum clarity in a landscape photograph, so it becomes a rather hollow excuse for the poor focussing evident in many of the pictures. The captions of the two micrograph pictures are nonsensical - all metals have adequate conductivity for scanning electron microscopy, but the specimen in the picture exhibits signs of poor conductivity, suggesting an improperly prepared nonmetallic object; and the machining in the other micrograph is not only very poor, but it appears to have been done by an unsuitable technique. It is repeatedly claimed that an abundance of pictures are available for publication, which makes it hard to understand why five of them have been printed twice, for no good reason. Looking at the drawings of the various craft, one would expect from their clarity and detail, that they would be accurate. This appears to be so for type 5 craft, and for type 2 other than the one in the movie sequence, but it is definitely not the case for the remaining variations. The claims made for the movie segment deserve some attention. Ask any film producer, and he will tell you that these are all standard effects with a tripod mounted camera, involving only simply stop/start and time-lapse techniques. The scientific investigation is one aspect of this book which worries me. Apart from acknowledging the part played by De Anza Systems Inc., the book does not name any of the persons involved; but one would expect an honourable scientist to revoke any abuse of his professional status. I can only conclude, therefore, that some, at least, of my colleagues, have allowed themselves to be so blinded by state-of-the-art technology, that they cannot see how easy it is to cheat such a system. Relying entirely on a computer for UFO photograph analysis is like staking your reputation on the computer beating all comers at chess. Anyone knowing or guessing the factors on which the computer calculations are based, can devise techniques to force incorrect analyses from the comptuer. For example, distance and size assessment are both based on edge sharpness data, which can be readily manipulated to give any desired result during a superimposition. Regarding the metal, biological and mineral specimens left by the cosmonauts, there is a technique called isotope analysis now available, which will determine with absolute certainty whether a material is of extraterrestrial origin. There are many places where it can be carried out; and some of these must be known to the American scientists allegedly involved in the investigation. Significantly, no mention is made of this technique being used. This scientific aspect is so important, that, at the risk of boring layman readers, I will deal specifically with some of the misconceptions which appear in the book. Electron microscopy always sounds impressive, but it would be hard to conceive of a greater exercise in futility than using it on colour film images. A scanning microscope would show only the topography of the emulsion surface, wheras in a transmission microscope, the dye materials of the image would be indistinguishable from the gelatin medium. Three dimensionality can be detected with reasonable certainty from an original photograph, taken under known conditions. However, UFOs have frequently been assessed as three dimensional from analysis of copied photographs, which are, by definition, photographs of photographs having only two effective dimensions. Alternatively, skillful artists routinely transfer attributes of three dimensionality to canvas, sufficient to fool any computer analysis. In colour film, the image is composed of three dyes, each of which is visible to the eye. There is no other material present with which any invisible image could be formed; and to suggest that some mysterious radiation produced such an image is surely ridiculous. Similarly, it is foolhardy to suggest that any wire or thread supporting a model must show up with computer enhancement. A 300mm diameter foam plastic model, for instance, could easily be supported by a single fibre from a nylon stocking, which, at 2 metres from the camera, would be well beyond the resolving power of its optical system. A general characteristic of film grains is that they overlap - it is only thus that a true black image can be built up. This is especially true of colour film, where each of the tree emulsions has to be capable of developing as a solid colour. Another characteristic of film grains is that once they are developed, there is no way to tell how or when they were exposed; hence film grain analysis gives no information about the use of multiple exposures, or of most darkroom techniques. In conclusion computer techniques have their place, but they cannot substitute entirely for careful visual examination of any UFO photograph. ------------------------------------------------------------------- The above article which appeared in the `UFO Research Australia Newsletter," Vol.2 No.1, Jan-Feb 1981, is one of many written at the time. Other individuals and organisations wrote expose as well, so the above is not an isolated critique. I reproduce Frank Gillespie's article here in an attempt to show those who have only been subjected to pro Billy Meier arguments that scientific evaluations revealed a very different story. I think it a shame that time is wasted on cut and dried hoaxes when there is so much that is presently unexplained and far more deserving of our time and attention. In closing, I would like to state that the above ends my participation in the Billy Meier farce. I will not enter into any further discussions, I value my time far too much to debate proven hoaxes. ********************************************** * THE U.F.O. BBS - http://www.ufobbs.com/ufo * **********************************************