Heard a rumour

[superman]

I've heard a rumour off a colleague that on some of the Apollo photos that the fiducials or crosshairs are visible and on some, the objects in the pictures over lap the crosshairs suggesting cut and paste techniques. I have never examined into this myself, i was wondering if anyone has???

[Bob B.]

The fiducials disappear when they cross a brightly lit light-colored object. It's just the light bleeding in around the fiducial and saturating the film. Here is an example:

[superman]

thanks thats really helpful but anyone can see that that would not constitute a hoax........are there any other, more convincing photos or is this a case of someone make something out of literally nothing

[nomuse]

superman said:

...anyone can see that that would not constitute a hoax....

One would think. But, no....the "missing fiducials" are held up as one of the more convincing bits of evidence by Kaysing and the other hoax-pushers.

Appallingly, almost all of the hoax "evidence" also fails to survive even casual examination. It is the rare hoax claim that actually needs some detailed science and history to examine.

[Jason Thompson]

anyone can see that that would not constitute a hoax

Well, they could if the people who produce this argument in favour of the hoax ever let you see pictures like the one above. They always provide examples where the fiducial appears to be obscured by the entire object, and indeed those examples can look like the object has been pasted over the fiducial. They never, ever point you to examples like the one above where the fiducial is only obscured by part of an object, for precisely the reason you state: anyone would see it's a rubbish argument.

[Jason]

Superman, you should really go check out www.clavius.org, as it goes into a lot of detail about missing fiducials, multiple light sources, and other conspiracist photography claims. There's a link at the bottom of the forum.

[JayUtah]

I did the unthinkable. I got a Hasselblad MK70 camera (what they call the EL/500 these days) with the same reseau plate as was used on Apollo. Contrary to popular belief, it's a standard Hasselblad accessory. And I shot a roll of film. And lo and behold, the fiducials in my roll of film also disappear behind bright objects.

So where do the conspiracy theorists get this notion that the fiducials should always be visible?

As with most conspiracy topics, this one has three levels of refutation:

1. Common sense. Why would anyone leave out the fiducials if they were compositing photos? Why not just put in the fiducials with a process camera in the last step? Oh, right those pesky "whistle-blowers" for whom no one has produced any evidence.

2. Empirical. Get a camera and see if that's how the film really works. Why didn't any of the conspiracy theorists think to do that before spouting off with alleged authority about how the pictures "should" look?

3. Scientific. Those of us who have some training in photography and optics and photochemistry can explain the various mechanisms -- optical and chemical -- that cause the fiducials to be eroded.

We know it happens. We know when it happens. We know why it happens. That pretty much leaves the conspiracy theorists without much of a leg to stand on.

[hplasm]

Here is a picture previously unreleased showing *how* the fiducials get onto the lunar pictures...

i7.photobucket.com/albums/y272/stOOpidgErL1981/mooninites.jpg



edit: stolen from digg- shamelessly
Thanks 'TheCasablancan'

[Kiwi]

jason said:

Superman, you should really go check out www.clavius.org, as it goes into a lot of detail about missing fiducials, multiple light sources, and other conspiracist photography claims. There's a link at the bottom of the forum.

Besides checking out JayUtah's Clavius website,
www.clavius.org/photoret.html
(that's the exact page about fiducials) you could also send your colleague to Thomas Bohn's site, where he will be shown how to easily make his own "vanishing fiducials" pictures using some hair -- the empirical test that Jay mentions.
www3.telus.net/summa/moonshot/index.htm

[JayUtah]

There are many ways in which you can empirically test this claim. The problem is that conspiracy theorists will always try to FUD away the experiment with handwaving claims of infidelity to the Apollo conditions. Bennett and Percy are old hats at this. Even the most trivial and negligible differences between an experiment and the Apollo lighting conditions are put forward as reasons why the experiment doesn't really falsify their claims. Of course their "explanation" is hogwash, as was the original claim, but when you're dealing with audiences that don't understand the bogosity of the original claim, they also don't understand the bogosity of the attempt to escape falsification of the claim.

[sts60]

I propose the "Percy" as a unit of bogosity. Since the bogousness is so strong, everyday values will typically be measured in micropercies or even nanopercies.

[nomuse]

But....bogosity will still be carried by the as-yet undiscovered bogon, right?

[PhantomWolf]

I don't know, I have discovered a few bogons in my time.

[hplasm]

I propose the Pepsi as the unit of information reflectivity. Knowledge Albedo- call it what you will.

Anyone got a schematic for a Bogometer? A simple modification to one of those should suffice.

[ShowCon]

Don't have a schematic, but here's a picture of the face panel.

www.kevvykev.com/images/spicoli.jpg

Doug