BLURRY PEOPLE WITH SHARP SHADOWS

[Matt Cloud]

2 minutes ago, Matt Cloud said:

I see I did not respond to this by you.  I disagree. The Newmans appear, to me, to be in line along the North-South axis with the other two women.  Those women look to me as if they are right next to the Newmans, indeed the Newmans may even be a hair cloase to the camera.  If I extend the lamp post down, as you suggest, it necessarily has to be behind one of those women because she is what is blocking the post in the first place.  So, if Newmans and this woman are, again, aligned N-S, then Newmans too are to the east of that lamp post.

 

The purpose in moving the lamp post, if that happened, would be to extend the distance between the Stemmons sign and that lamp post, a distance which, based on the Zapruder film, takes about two seconds of film time to cover.  The purpose would be to make the still image more align with the Zapruder film.  I

 

The Zapruder film and, again this has been my central point all along, indicates a greater distance between the sign and the lamp post than was the case in reality.  

 

I fully recognize that this bend in Elm Street, plus the elevational changes, plus the width of the sidewalk, plus other topographical features all make for a complicated exercise in perspective understanding.  However, many photos, in my view, indicate that the distance between the sign and the post as not so great as certainly Willis-5 makes it appear.  Once more, the Smithsonian re-creation I referenced above, appears more accurate than any other descriptions of the actual layout.  There, the Stemmons sign is rather more easterwardly in the plaza and the lamp post not so far west of it.  That re-creation was not simply thrown-together but was achieved after apparently intensive study of the photographic record.  Here it is again:

 

https://www.google.com/imgres?q=dealey plaza smithsonian&imgurl=https%3A%2F%2Fth-thumbnailer.cdn-si-edu.com%2FS7kWaVctUOtm4Q3RMLGUeDIz4t4%3D%2F1000x750%2Ffilters%3Ano_upscale()%3Afocal(235x125%3A236x126)%2Fhttps%3A%2F%2Ftf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Ffiler%2F20131122100105JFK-3d-model.jpg&imgrefurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.smithsonianmag.com%2Finnovation%2Fan-interactive-3d-model-of-the-jfk-assassination-site-grassy-knoll-and-all-180947812%2F&docid=M96XmXZf_58shM&tbnid=sZb8XSCkwnWuGM&vet=12ahUKEwjIx-HphpiGAxWVFlkFHT-5Ca4QM3oECBcQAA..i&w=470&h=251&hcb=2&ved=2ahUKEwjIx-HphpiGAxWVFlkFHT-5Ca4QM3oECBcQAA

 

And btw the figures in yellow there, in that image, represent I think the Newmans.  If so, their position seems in many ways at odds with Willis-5.  

[Chris Bristow]

The math I used to get a FOV at frame 312 is as follows. Take the 65ft distance from Z to the right side of the limo as the radius of a circle. 65ft X 2 = 130(Diameter). 130 X 3.141(PI) = 408ft(Circumference). 408ft  divided by 360(Degrees) = 1.13 ft per degree. In frame 312 we see 12.5ft of the right side of the Limo. 12.5ft divided by 1.13 = 11 degrees FOV.
 

[Matt Cloud]

24 minutes ago, Chris Bristow said:

The math I used to get a FOV at frame 312 is as follows. Take the 65ft distance from Z to the right side of the limo as the radius of a circle. 65ft X 2 = 130(Diameter). 130 X 3.141(PI) = 408ft(Circumference). 408ft  divided by 360(Degrees) = 1.13 ft per degree. In frame 312 we see 12.5ft of the right side of the Limo. 12.5ft divided by 1.13 = 11 degrees FOV.
 

No, I understand.  You have accurately identified the FOV of the Zapruder film as being 11 degrees.  And I mistakenly said 11 degrees wasn't possible with Z's camera and lens.  It was -- at full zoom.  I apologize for taking issue with you on that.  I guess I got my FOV's for lenses at 35mm film confused with 8 mm film.  

 

Evidently the other Chris on this thread has personally done a test with the correct camera model and lens 20 years ago or so.  I have asked for more information from him on that.  I am somewhat dubious that Zapruder could be as steady as he was shooting at full zoom, which was roughly equivalent to a 200mm lens on a full frame dslr.  I would expect a lot more shakiness at that focal length, for a novice like Zapruder without stabilization (a tripod).  Wouldn't you agree?

 

Further, Is there the possibility in your view, Chris, that Zapruder was not shooting at full zoom but -- and here you need to indulge speculation -- the alteration that occurred, at least one of perhaps others, too, was a blow-up of what had been filmed at a wider FOV, at the lens's normal setting, and then reduced back down, presumably to crop out incriminating imagery.  If this were done, the persons who did it would of course have to know the technical spec limits of Zapruder's camera, specifically that the FOV could not be reduced more than to 10 or 11 degrees.  If that was one of the alterations, that would explain why it was so steady.  I'd be interested in your thoughts as to this "possibility."

 

However, I am also eager to hear back from the other Chris regarding his experience with shooting the camera, especially at full zoom -- whether it was possible to get a steady pan shot, hand-held.

Edited May 19 by Matt Cloud

[Matt Cloud]

5 hours ago, Matt Cloud said:

And btw the figures in yellow there, in that image, represent I think the Newmans.  If so, their position seems in many ways at odds with Willis-5.  

Back to this again.  Sorry.  And I see what you mean, to a point.  The Willis-5 photo shows 4 people lined up at the edge of the curb, seemingly shoulder to shoulder.  They're not aligned S-N as I said before, but W-E, going left to right, along the curb.  I'm referring to the Newmans and the two women next to them, to the Newmans' left.   But the problem is that there's no room for the lamp post to be positioned on the curb -- where it was -- because the woman is standing in that position. Unless she's squeezed between the edge of the curb and the base of the post.  But it seems like that would be a tight fit.  

Still I come back to this image here, recently released.  Scroll down to the botomm and the photo captioned, "Onlookers milled about, treating Dealey Plaza with reverence."   I realize that distance appearance has been flattened out in that image but can't help but notice also that the shadows appear basically perpendicular to Elm Street, due North that is, and that the shadow for the lamp post and the Stemmens sign are quite close together.  So it seems.  Also, of note, again, is the "P" in the "KeeP Right" portion of the sign's lettering, which evidently has no green paint within the loop of the P.  This is contradicted in other images, of that same day even, which I think is 11/24. 

 

https://time.com/3430022/never-before-seen-photos-of-jfks-final-minutes-in-dallas/

 

Edited May 19 by Matt Cloud

[Kevin Balch]

43 minutes ago, Chris Bristow said:

The math I used to get a FOV at frame 312 is as follows. Take the 65ft distance from Z to the right side of the limo as the radius of a circle. 65ft X 2 = 130(Diameter). 130 X 3.141(PI) = 408ft(Circumference). 408ft  divided by 360(Degrees) = 1.13 ft per degree. In frame 312 we see 12.5ft of the right side of the Limo. 12.5ft divided by 1.13 = 11 degrees FOV.
 

Geometrically, the limo is actually a chord rather than an arc. But the Angle of View is relatively small so it doesn’t make a significant difference. I treated it as an isosceles triangle with sides of 65’ and base of 12.5’.

Angle of View is 2*arcsine(6.25/65) = 11 degrees.

Your approach was very clever as it does not require a table of inverse trig functions. I did a few more sample calculations and your method works well (within 2 degrees) at resulting Angles of View as large as 55 degrees!

Edited May 19 by Kevin Balch

[Chris Bristow]

3 hours ago, Matt Cloud said:

No, I understand.  You have accurately identified the FOV of the Zapruder film as being 11 degrees.  And I mistakenly said 11 degrees wasn't possible with Z's camera and lens.  It was -- at full zoom.  I apologize for taking issue with you on that.  I guess I got my FOV's for lenses at 35mm film confused with 8 mm film.  

 

Evidently the other Chris on this thread has personally done a test with the correct camera model and lens 20 years ago or so.  I have asked for more information from him on that.  I am somewhat dubious that Zapruder could be as steady as he was shooting at full zoom, which was roughly equivalent to a 200mm lens on a full frame dslr.  I would expect a lot more shakiness at that focal length, for a novice like Zapruder without stabilization (a tripod).  Wouldn't you agree?

 

Further, Is there the possibility in your view, Chris, that Zapruder was not shooting at full zoom but -- and here you need to indulge speculation -- the alteration that occurred, at least one of perhaps others, too, was a blow-up of what had been filmed at a wider FOV, at the lens's normal setting, and then reduced back down, presumably to crop out incriminating imagery.  If this were done, the persons who did it would of course have to know the technical spec limits of Zapruder's camera, specifically that the FOV could not be reduced more than to 10 or 11 degrees.  If that was one of the alterations, that would explain why it was so steady.  I'd be interested in your thoughts as to this "possibility."

 

However, I am also eager to hear back from the other Chris regarding his experience with shooting the camera, especially at full zoom -- whether it was possible to get a steady pan shot, hand-held.

Ok, we now see eye to eye on the FOV. I can't see any reason to consider that Z may not have been zoomed in. If you can test the stability of a hand held 11 FOV and it isn't  stable,  then there is something to consider.  
 To speculate that the film may have been cut down to 11 degrees I would need something more than "presumably to crop out incriminating imagery".  That is your hypothesis and to make it into a theory you will need to bring some possible evidence of alteration in that vein.

[Chris Bristow]

3 hours ago, Kevin Balch said:

Geometrically, the limo is actually a chord rather than an arc. But the Angle of View is relatively small so it doesn’t make a significant difference. I treated it as an isosceles triangle with sides of 65’ and base of 12.5’.

Angle of View is 2*arcsine(6.25/65) = 11 degrees.

Your approach was very clever as it does not require a table of inverse trig functions. I did a few more sample calculations and your method works well (within 2 degrees) at resulting Angles of View as large as 55 degrees!

"Geometrically, the limo is actually a chord rather than an arc."
Ya  that dawned on me once. After checking how much error it introduced I decided it was not a big deal. That is true when just using a small 11 degree FOV but for larger fields it may screw up my measurements. 
I see you have tested up to 55 degrees. Thanks, I had forgotten the inaccuracy of measuring a straight line as an arc. That would have caught up with me eventually.

[Chris Davidson]

Full zoom?

Easier to compare extant Z to WC reenactment Z.

Triangulation of three stationary objects near the frame edges for comparison.

Unless you believe the reenactment was cropped approx 10% for some unknown reason.

[Paul Bacon]

What am I missing Chris?  The re-enactment frame looks zoomed in.

[Kevin Balch]

7 hours ago, Chris Bristow said:

"Geometrically, the limo is actually a chord rather than an arc."
Ya  that dawned on me once. After checking how much error it introduced I decided it was not a big deal. That is true when just using a small 11 degree FOV but for larger fields it may screw up my measurements. 
I see you have tested up to 55 degrees. Thanks, I had forgotten the inaccuracy of measuring a straight line as an arc. That would have caught up with me eventually.

It was reassuring that using the FOV calc using film size and focal length gave very good agreement with the value inferred from the extant film. Always good to see independent corroboration.

[Matt Cloud]

37 minutes ago, Kevin Balch said:

It was reassuring that using the FOV calc using film size and focal length gave very good agreement with the value inferred from the extant film. Always good to see independent corroboration.

Definitely.

[Matt Cloud]

3 hours ago, Paul Bacon said:

What am I missing Chris?  The re-enactment frame looks zoomed in.

Yes, it does.  Fuller, more complete sentences would be helpful here, Chris Davidson.

 

And would still very much like to see more examples from your test with the Bell & Howell as well as your experiences with maintaining stability when zoomed in.

Edited May 19 by Matt Cloud

[Matt Cloud]

8 hours ago, Chris Bristow said:

Ok, we now see eye to eye on the FOV. I can't see any reason to consider that Z may not have been zoomed in. If you can test the stability of a hand held 11 FOV and it isn't  stable,  then there is something to consider.  
 To speculate that the film may have been cut down to 11 degrees I would need something more than "presumably to crop out incriminating imagery".  That is your hypothesis and to make it into a theory you will need to bring some possible evidence of alteration in that vein.

Right.  Well, I've asked Chris Davidson who evidently has done a test to share his experiences with stability while zoomed-in.  Still awaiting that.  

Interesting that Zapruder couldn't get the full width of the limo when fully zoomed-in at 65 feet; highlights how narrow his alleged settings were.  

[Matt Cloud]

8 hours ago, Chris Bristow said:

Ok, we now see eye to eye on the FOV. I can't see any reason to consider that Z may not have been zoomed in. If you can test the stability of a hand held 11 FOV and it isn't  stable,  then there is something to consider.  
 To speculate that the film may have been cut down to 11 degrees I would need something more than "presumably to crop out incriminating imagery".  That is your hypothesis and to make it into a theory you will need to bring some possible evidence of alteration in that vein.

Also -- just to confirm: you find an 11 degree FOV across the entirety of the Zapruder Film, correct?  Across all frames, that is, from beginning to end?

[Matt Cloud]

22 minutes ago, Matt Cloud said:

Yes, it does.  Fuller, more complete sentences would be helpful here, Chris Davidson.

 

And would still very much like to see more examples from your test with the Bell & Howell as well as your experiences with maintaining stability when zoomed in.

I'll wait for Chris to add his comments, but looking at the two again, and in defense of the comparison, the WC re-enactment omits the sprocket edge and has more imagery above than Zapruder does, which had more imagery below.  Which is to say, when you omit the sprocket edge and account for the vertical difference in framing, do they not more or less grab the same FOV?