The Gordon Arnold Competition

[Craig Lamson]

Miles, I can assure you my alignment is not out, nor does the wall move. Here's my original overlay which I used over Jack's best Badgeman image. I don't think i've posted these seperate images before, other than in gif animations, but these are what I used.

Check it out for accuracy by comparing the original black and white with my coloured overlay. I can hardly make out anything in your black and white image, but it looks larger to me than the other image that you used.

Duncan

Duncan,

Thanks for this comparison.

Oh ho!

I didn't realise that you considered my query as a challenge to your alignments. I thought of another alignment, not yours.

Therefore, please assist me here. Thx.

Where did you obtain your various (these above) images?

From Jack? Elsewhere?

Any provenances?

Since I originated ALL badgeman images, I am the source of all of them.

As for provenance, the image is a gigantic enlargement from the Thompson Number 1

Moorman, photocopied by professional photographer Byrd Williams IV and drumscanned

by Global Graphics, and the colored version was hand-tinted with photo oils by me.

Jack

OK. Thx.

Big help, Jack!

So, this is a crop from the drumscan? Yes?

And what exactly is this Moorman, please?

The only image from the drumscan is the colored one.

There are MANY Moorman copies. Without checking, I would say

the one you ask about is the GORDON SMITH COPY from the original,

but I am not sure.

Jack

Its the Thompson thumbprint. Not sure if it is a scan from the print or from the negative. It appears to me to be the large digital images from the negative scan that I produced a few months back. It can be cross referenced with Robin Unger, he has the large digtial file I produced on his website (still I think)

[Jack White]

Miles, I can assure you my alignment is not out, nor does the wall move. Here's my original overlay which I used over Jack's best Badgeman image. I don't think i've posted these seperate images before, other than in gif animations, but these are what I used.

Check it out for accuracy by comparing the original black and white with my coloured overlay. I can hardly make out anything in your black and white image, but it looks larger to me than the other image that you used.

Duncan

Duncan,

Thanks for this comparison.

Oh ho!

I didn't realise that you considered my query as a challenge to your alignments. I thought of another alignment, not yours.

Therefore, please assist me here. Thx.

Where did you obtain your various (these above) images?

From Jack? Elsewhere?

Any provenances?

Since I originated ALL badgeman images, I am the source of all of them.

As for provenance, the image is a gigantic enlargement from the Thompson Number 1

Moorman, photocopied by professional photographer Byrd Williams IV and drumscanned

by Global Graphics, and the colored version was hand-tinted with photo oils by me.

Jack

OK. Thx.

Big help, Jack!

So, this is a crop from the drumscan? Yes?

And what exactly is this Moorman, please?

The only image from the drumscan is the colored one.

There are MANY Moorman copies. Without checking, I would say

the one you ask about is the GORDON SMITH COPY from the original,

but I am not sure.

Jack

Its the Thompson thumbprint. Not sure if it is a scan from the print or from the negative. It appears to me to be the large digital images from the negative scan that I produced a few months back. It can be cross referenced with Robin Unger, he has the large digtial file I produced on his website (still I think)

I just checked the GORDON SMITH copy, which was made from the faded original on 4x5 film. The edge notches

were DIFFERENT on the negative, though the image quality is similar. The one shown was NOT made from

the original, but apparently from a Thompson print. It is not in my Moorman files.

Jack

[Craig Lamson]

No it was made from the Moorman original polaroid. Tink had it made directly form the Moorman polaroid. This is the copy negative of the Morrman orignal...not a print of the Moorman. We have been over this time and time again. And I check, this is the image I created from the drumscan.

From a thread on this subject:

The extremely large Moorman scan posted by Robin has overwhelmed THE PARTY'S OVER

thread by Chris, making further replies impossible. I have a 19" screen and the Moorman

is twice the size of the screen, blocking all access to the thread. Can anything be done

about this?

Jack

PS...great Moorman image, Robin. The resolution is fantastic. Can you provide the

provenance. It appears to be my scan of the Gordon Smith copy from the original,

but my scan is not nearly that good. Can you give details?

Yes that is a great Moorman image Jack, its the Thompson drum scan you usually call trash. Did you get some new glasses?

I have to credit Lamson this one time IF that is indeed the famed drum scan, because the

quality is very good for a copy of the original print which has the fingerprint. At first glance

it appeared to be the Gordon Smith copy, which is one of the best that I have, made from

the original. As far as I know I have never seen the FULL UNCROPPED drum scan before.

This image, like the Smith image, includes the notches of the 4x5 film holder on the edges.

I did not know the drum scan had that feature. Previously I had only seen cropped images

from the drum scan, and perhaps inferior copies at that. The image posted by Robin is superior

to the Smith copy by about 10 percent in the Dmin/Dmax densitometer range. I compared

the two side by side full screen. The drum scan density is about 10 percent better; this is

mainly seen in the very dark areas such as the wooden fence, the badgeman tree, etc which

are enough lighter on the drum scan to discern detail, but are more blocked up on the Smith

copy. However, neither the drum scan nor the Smith copy, both made from the faded

original with the fingerprint, can match the high quality of the Thompson Number One print

as I have shown many times.

The drumscan exposure was very likely made using an electronic densitometer, which

takes a reading of the lightest area and darkest area and calculates a precise exposure

for minimum and maximum density. When I formerly owned three photostat cameras,

that is how my camera operators turned out high quality halftones...by using the densitometer

to set the camera exposure.

Jack

Actually the file that came off the the drum was very flat, as was requested. We asked the scanner tech to add no level or curve correction, nor any sharpening. The goal was to simply get the contents of the negative into a digital form without inducing artifacts, ringing or density changes which might effect the measurements on the pedestal area which was the entire reason for having the scan made.

The image Robin has posted was downsampled for the original 109 mb 8 bit file which is simply too large to post on the net. The original

scan was about 4"x5" at 2400 dpi or 32"x40" at 300dpi. At this resolution the negative was scanned down to film grain level.

I made the following adjustments to the image Robin has posted:

I downsampled the image to around 11x14 at 300 dpi IIRC, (Robin may have reduced it further)

I adjusted the levels to bring the flat tonal range of the image to a more normal level.

I created a duplicate layer and darkend that layer a bit more using levels, then I erased about half of that layer with a large, soft edge brush. I did this to even out the image from right to left, as the right side was quite a bit lighter than the left. This in essence is a digital "burning" similar to doing the same inthe darkroom. I then flattened the image.

Finally I saved the image in a lossless compresssed format, PNG and placed it on a pubilc photosite and made it available for download.

The goal was simply to adjust the master file to produce an image that included a full tonal range

There are many copies of the original, un-adjusted drum scan file in the wild. Tink sent me the one to the two master disks (one went directly to Gary Mack) and I made about two dozen duplicates of the master cd. SOme of htese were sent to the members of the group I was part of that was working on the Moorman in the Street issue. The rest I made available to anyone who requested it via the JFKResearch forum. This included a number of folks who were on the opposite side of the issue. I think I even sent a cd to Jack but I'm not sure.

In any case, I am willing to make the original file available for download. If you PM me with your email address I will sent you a username and passsword for my ftp site. I will make the file available on Monday and keep the ftp account open during the rest of the working week.

Edited September 1, 2007 by Craig Lamson

[Robin Unger]

Quote:

Its the Thompson thumbprint. Not sure if it is a scan from the print or from the negative. It appears to me to be the large digital images from the negative scan that I produced a few months back. It can be cross referenced with Robin Unger, he has the large digtial file I produced on his website (still I think)

Hi Craig.

You are correct, it looks to be the same one i have on my website.

Thanks for providing the original image.

Re: FTP SITE.

My email address is quaneeri2@bigpond.com

Thanks again.

[Alan Healy]

Alan,

In setting up a quick alternative to the Simkin forum for downloads, I forgot to tell my wife don't shut down the machine.

The link is good: http://66.75.7.97

If it's down, try back later.

Will try to keep it up and running for as long as possible.

chris

I don't want to prevent anyone from using the overlay for what ever purpose they think it may be helpful to them, but if one is trying to use it to show height comparisons beyond the wall - the two photos being taken at different elevations and locations will effect the outcome. The wall matches on the south dog leg, while the shelter is much taller in one photo than the other. The same can be said about the fence because the knoll slopes upward, so when an arrow is put at the base of the fence in one photo - it changes to the next because the two corners do not show at the same location, thus the two points on the fence in each photo are not even the same location.

Bill

Thank you Chris,

I've got them now

Chris,

could you tell us anything you noticed about the positioning of the Crawley photo from your work on the overlay?

We know he used Mary's camera with the same lens & had the focal setting calculated, it looks pretty good to me, not perfect but who needs perfect?

What is perfectly obvious to me, is that Nigel Turner seems to have stood in the place "they" thought Arnold stood, nothing to do with sizing the figure up to Moorman at all.

Turner et al never noticed the size difference & still don't today, but Crawley did.

That's why he puts all these characters way back in the car lot.

I say he puts them back there, if they were real he would.

Since Craig has now posted in this thread I wonder if he wouldn't mind giving us his honest opinion of the value of Chris's overlay above?

I know you probably think that we are all wasting our time here Craig but could you just pretend that the Arnold figure was a possiblity for a minute & comment on how Nigel Turner is three times the size of that Arnold figure in an overlay when almost everything else seems to line up?

Can we take anything positive away from a comparison like this in your opinion?

Thank you

Alan

Edited September 1, 2007 by Alan Healy

[Craig Lamson]

Quote:

Its the Thompson thumbprint. Not sure if it is a scan from the print or from the negative. It appears to me to be the large digital images from the negative scan that I produced a few months back. It can be cross referenced with Robin Unger, he has the large digtial file I produced on his website (still I think)

Hi Craig.

You are correct, it looks to be the same one i have on my website.

Thanks for providing the original image.

Re: FTP SITE.

My email address is quaneeri2@bigpond.com

Thanks again.

Robin, if you want the original file from the drumscan (its about 100mb) I'll put it on the ftp next week and send you instructions on how to get it.

DO you have any way of making notations on your website in regards to the history of the images posted? I was wondering if you could put the decription of what I did to the Thompson Moorman with the image so it everyone would know exactly waht they have.

[Craig Lamson]

Miles, I can assure you my alignment is not out, nor does the wall move. Here's my original overlay which I used over Jack's best Badgeman image. I don't think i've posted these seperate images before, other than in gif animations, but these are what I used.

Check it out for accuracy by comparing the original black and white with my coloured overlay. I can hardly make out anything in your black and white image, but it looks larger to me than the other image that you used.

Duncan

Duncan,

Thanks for this comparison.

Oh ho!

I didn't realise that you considered my query as a challenge to your alignments. I thought of another alignment, not yours.

Therefore, please assist me here. Thx.

Where did you obtain your various (these above) images?

From Jack? Elsewhere?

Any provenances?

Since I originated ALL badgeman images, I am the source of all of them.

As for provenance, the image is a gigantic enlargement from the Thompson Number 1

Moorman, photocopied by professional photographer Byrd Williams IV and drumscanned

by Global Graphics, and the colored version was hand-tinted with photo oils by me.

Jack

OK. Thx.

Big help, Jack!

So, this is a crop from the drumscan? Yes?

And what exactly is this Moorman, please?

The only image from the drumscan is the colored one.

There are MANY Moorman copies. Without checking, I would say

the one you ask about is the GORDON SMITH COPY from the original,

but I am not sure.

Jack

Its the Thompson thumbprint. Not sure if it is a scan from the print or from the negative. It appears to me to be the large digital images from the negative scan that I produced a few months back. It can be cross referenced with Robin Unger, he has the large digtial file I produced on his website (still I think)

I just checked the GORDON SMITH copy, which was made from the faded original on 4x5 film. The edge notches

were DIFFERENT on the negative, though the image quality is similar. The one shown was NOT made from

the original, but apparently from a Thompson print. It is not in my Moorman files.

Jack

Jack would you please post a large copy of your Gordon Smith?

[Craig Lamson]

Alan,

In setting up a quick alternative to the Simkin forum for downloads, I forgot to tell my wife don't shut down the machine.

The link is good: http://66.75.7.97

If it's down, try back later.

Will try to keep it up and running for as long as possible.

chris

I don't want to prevent anyone from using the overlay for what ever purpose they think it may be helpful to them, but if one is trying to use it to show height comparisons beyond the wall - the two photos being taken at different elevations and locations will effect the outcome. The wall matches on the south dog leg, while the shelter is much taller in one photo than the other. The same can be said about the fence because the knoll slopes upward, so when an arrow is put at the base of the fence in one photo - it changes to the next because the two corners do not show at the same location, thus the two points on the fence in each photo are not even the same location.

Bill

Thank you Chris,

I've got them now

Chris,

could you tell us anything you noticed about the positioning of the Crawley photo from your work on the overlay?

We know he used Mary's camera with the same lens & had the focal setting calculated, it looks pretty good to me, not perfect but who needs perfect?

What is perfectly obvious to me, is that Nigel Turner seems to have stood in the place "they" thought Arnold stood, nothing to do with sizing the figure up to Moorman at all.

Turner et al never noticed the size difference & still don't today, but Crawley did.

That's why he puts all these characters way back in the car lot.

I say he puts them back there, if they were real he would.

Since Craig has now posted in this thread I wonder if he wouldn't mind giving us his honest opinion of the value of Chris's overlay above?

I know you probably think that we are all wasting our time here Craig but could you just pretend that the Arnold figure was a possiblity for a minute & comment on how Nigel Turner is three times the size of that Arnold figure in an overlay when almost everything else seems to line up?

Can we take anything positive away from a comparison like this in your opinion?

Thank you

Alan

Alan, I've not really been following this discussion so I don't have the background. However in the overlay, its clear that the recreation has problems, the biggest is that the film in the camera was not flat. You can see evidence of that in the warping of the curb. I'm really suprised that no one else has simply taken the lens from a model 80 polaroid and placed it on a view camera to shoot recreations. I've done this and it works great, allowing you to shoot almost the entire image circle cast by the lens onto any 4x5 film of your choice. In fact, just the other day I shot that setup using modern 100iso 4x5 film and took a photograph of a human head at 100 feet, just to see how much the lens would resolve. Interesting results...I'll get around to posting them sometime.

Anyways, people are differnt sizes for one and size changes of person in a photograph due to changing distances from the camera can either be calulated or proven by experiment. That would be my suggestion, either do the calculations or experiment. As for the size difference in the recreation photo, it could be he was too close to the camera, or was bigger thana Arnold, or Arnold simply is not in the Moorman. I go for the latter.

Edited September 1, 2007 by Craig Lamson

[Miles Scull]

Miles, I can assure you my alignment is not out, nor does the wall move. Here's my original overlay which I used over Jack's best Badgeman image. I don't think i've posted these seperate images before, other than in gif animations, but these are what I used.

Check it out for accuracy by comparing the original black and white with my coloured overlay. I can hardly make out anything in your black and white image, but it looks larger to me than the other image that you used.

.

Duncan

Duncan,

Here's a Tink crop inset (lower):

Here below is the same with a yellow vertical line to show the apparent wall apex of Jack's colourisation.

Jack's wall apex seems offset to the left from the red Tink apex line.

Is that correct? It seems that the Tink is accurate as to wall apex & flash. Yes?

So, the questions are;

Did Jack simply paint a wall apex that is slightly off?

or

Did Jack shift all or any of the figure images, through inadvertence or happenstance?

Duncan, how do you see this, please; not that it is highly important?

[Craig Lamson]

Did Jack shift all or any of the figure images, through inadvertence or happenstance?

Duncan, how do you see this, please; not that it is highly important?

Jack wouldn't move or alter anything, i'd bank my life on that. Can you upload Jack's b/w version and your version both scaled to the same size for comparison with no lines drawn through anywhere on each image. Thanks.

Duncan

Actually Jack DID alter the Moorman to produce the figure he calls badgeman. How did the alter the image? Simple, he overexposed it to the point that highlight detail was lost. Thats why you can't really find the the corner of the wall (other than guessing) and it's why the "features" of badgeman seem to appear. The overexposure altered the detail edges of the original image. It pretty much makes any "study" of the badgeman image useless.

[Miles Scull]

Did Jack shift all or any of the figure images, through inadvertence or happenstance?

Duncan, how do you see this, please; not that it is highly important?

Jack wouldn't move or alter anything, i'd bank my life on that. Can you upload Jack's b/w version and your version both scaled to the same size for comparison with no lines drawn through anywhere on each image. Thanks.

Duncan

Actually Jack DID alter the Moorman to produce the figure he calls badgeman. How did the alter the image? Simple, he overexposed it to the point that highlight detail was lost. Thats why you can't really find the the corner of the wall (other than guessing) and it's why the "features" of badgeman seem to appear. The overexposure altered the detail edges of the original image. It pretty much makes any "study" of the badgeman image useless.

That's right, Craig.

I don't know you, but stick around.

You explain things better than I.

[Miles Scull]

Did Jack shift all or any of the figure images, through inadvertence or happenstance?

Duncan, how do you see this, please; not that it is highly important?

Jack wouldn't move or alter anything, i'd bank my life on that. Can you upload Jack's b/w version and your version both scaled to the same size for comparison with no lines drawn through anywhere on each image. Thanks.

Duncan

Duncan,

This is the Tink (I tink.):

I was using your Jack image here for comparison:

Craig gets to the heart of my question to you. No, not questioning your alignment.

Let's move on.

[Bill Miller]

Actually Jack DID alter the Moorman to produce the figure he calls badgeman. How did the alter the image? Simple, he overexposed it to the point that highlight detail was lost. Thats why you can't really find the the corner of the wall (other than guessing) and it's why the "features" of badgeman seem to appear. The overexposure altered the detail edges of the original image. It pretty much makes any "study" of the badgeman image useless.

What Jack did was lighten the image so to better see the images that were in deep shadow. In doing this, the white areas such as the wall are expanded as any photo would do when the contrast and lighting in increased. Does this mean that Jack created Badge Man out of nothing - absolutely not! Many times we have lightened an image of the knoll for instance so to see if something or someone was hidden in shadow. To date in all my experience I have seen images of people degraded by way of this process to the point of no longer being able to recognize what they were - even to the point of vanishing altogether, but I have never seen where the image of a person was created out of nothing by merely adjusting the contrast and/or lighting of a photo.

Bill

[Jack White]

Did Jack shift all or any of the figure images, through inadvertence or happenstance?

Duncan, how do you see this, please; not that it is highly important?

Jack wouldn't move or alter anything, i'd bank my life on that. Can you upload Jack's b/w version and your version both scaled to the same size for comparison with no lines drawn through anywhere on each image. Thanks.

Duncan

Actually Jack DID alter the Moorman to produce the figure he calls badgeman. How did the alter the image? Simple, he overexposed it to the point that highlight detail was lost. Thats why you can't really find the the corner of the wall (other than guessing) and it's why the "features" of badgeman seem to appear. The overexposure altered the detail edges of the original image. It pretty much makes any "study" of the badgeman image useless.

What an asinine accusation for a "photographer" to make. All darkroom photographers try to achieve

an OPTIMAL image with silver-based images. To achieve this they BRACKET exposures and print negs

using test strips, DODGING, and BURNING-IN, as well as various paper CONTRASTS. According to

Lamson, he says these customary darkroom steps are "alterations", as if there is only ONE TRUE

INTERPRETATION. Nonsense!

I BRACKETED the copy negative of the Groden slide (which was extremely dense) at half-stop

intervals from f4.5 to f22 at 4x magnification. This produced three negatives in the "acceptable" range.

The middle one of this group had the best tonal range, so ALL PRINTS of badgeman were made from

this single negative. As with any negative this was a compromise in favor of the middle-tone areas

of the negative. In this ONE negative, the very bright smoke and wall lost detail as did the very

dark areas, like the trees and badgeman clothes. However the very dark exposures showed very

clearly that the SMOKE HAD SHAPE AND TEXTURE, and thus was an OBJECT, not an artifact.

My final print was done from the best exposure WITHOUT DODGING OR BURNING-IN.

Lamson is unfamiliar with the work of famed American photographer Ansel Adams, whose test

prints marked with darkroom instructions for dodging and burning in are legendary, and which

are often included in museum exhibits along with finished prints, which are quite different. I guess

Lamson would say that Adams ALTERED all of his photos.

Jack

Edited September 1, 2007 by Jack White

[Craig Lamson]

Actually Jack DID alter the Moorman to produce the figure he calls badgeman. How did the alter the image? Simple, he overexposed it to the point that highlight detail was lost. Thats why you can't really find the the corner of the wall (other than guessing) and it's why the "features" of badgeman seem to appear. The overexposure altered the detail edges of the original image. It pretty much makes any "study" of the badgeman image useless.

What Jack did was lighten the image so to better see the images that were in deep shadow. In doing this, the white areas such as the wall are expanded as any photo would do when the contrast and lighting in increased. Does this mean that Jack created Badge Man out of nothing - absolutely not! Many times we have lightened an image of the knoll for instance so to see if something or someone was hidden in shadow. To date in all my experience I have seen images of people degraded by way of this process to the point of no longer being able to recognize what they were - even to the point of vanishing altogether, but I have never seen where the image of a person was created out of nothing by merely adjusting the contrast and/or lighting of a photo.

Bill

Sorry Bill but you are wrong. When you radically change the edges of detail by compressing the tonal range of an image, you ARE creating somthing new that did not exist in the original photograph. How could that not be true? Look at the "edge" of the wall in the badgeman alteration. Does it bear ANY resemblance to the actual edge of the wall? Of course not. The new "edge" created by the alteration is widely spaced from the original. Now apply that to the "face" of badgeman. Can you now understand WHY badgeman is simply made from nothing?

But all of this disregards the hard truth... and that truth is that the Moorman lens/film/f-stop combination simply cannot reslove the level of detail that was created in the badgeman alteration.

I've explained this more than once. I'll leave it at that.

Edited September 1, 2007 by Craig Lamson