Tramp Shots: Facial Recognition Software

[John Dolva]

From what I have read the human head has so many planes, that shifts in aspect can make a big difference. I do some sculpting (IOW handling 3D heads) and that has only made me aware of how poor my personal face recognition skills are. It is probabably one of those things that some are naturally gifted in, and some can, by applying strict professional techniques, provide some reliable results.

this document seems pretty up to date on 'Biometrics' - 7 Aug. 2006:

http://rds.yahoo.com/_ylt=A0geu_B37yhGcEIA...ocs/facerec.pdf

as "PROFESSOR RAINER KNUSSMANN'S PHOTOGRAPHIC ANALYSIS(1975)" on that Weberman nodule states:

"A successful identity establishment could truly be expected if STURGIS and HUNT photographs, which should be obtainable, were prepared showing the Subjects from the same head angle and under similar lighting as in the Death Site photographs"

this is IMO still fairly correct.

________________

The history of criminal detection received an enormous boost when fingerprinting was proved as a reliable means of identifying persons, (similarly of course now with DNA testing). Before these means the criminal could often continue for long periods in society without definite detection, unless caught in the act, or through deduction, basic detective work.

The French criminologists, pre fingerprinting also sought to find a standardised system using various body measurements. I understand this reached quite a high standard, but it too was ultimately supplanted by fingerprinting.

Does anything remain that could possibly have a fingerprint of any of the tramps?

[Charles Drago]

Friends,

If I may reiterate an earlier post: Blind testing of a control subject seems to me to be the key to establishing the bona fides and refining the processes of this technique and, for that matter, facial reconstructions from skulls.

As a student/researcher of the Little Bighorn battle, I've followed, quite closely, the efforts to accomplish the latter from remains unearthed at the site of Custer's demise -- the end result of a political conspiracy, I submit, that would be all too familiar to contributors to this site.

When forensic artist Lois Gibson presented at a series of Dallas JFK conferences, she failed to demonstrate how her work on skulls had been falsified/verified through the scientific method.

Until and unless we have such data in hand, we are grasping at straws.

Charles

[Kathleen Collins]

I have asked AJ Weberman to use facial recognition software on the Donald Norton and Ralph Geb photos on a blog from February 2006. This material was published in Feb. 2006. If anyone would like to see this, here's the link:

http://thecloakofdarkness.blogspot.com/200...01_archive.html

Kathy

[John Dolva]

Friends,

If I may reiterate an earlier post: Blind testing of a control subject seems to me to be the key to establishing the bona fides and refining the processes of this technique and, for that matter, facial reconstructions from skulls.

As a student/researcher of the Little Bighorn battle, I've followed, quite closely, the efforts to accomplish the latter from remains unearthed at the site of Custer's demise -- the end result of a political conspiracy, I submit, that would be all too familiar to contributors to this site.

When forensic artist Lois Gibson presented at a series of Dallas JFK conferences, she failed to demonstrate how her work on skulls had been falsified/verified through the scientific method.

Until and unless we have such data in hand, we are grasping at straws.

Charles

There is this other possibility, 'facial reconstruction', though highly doubtful (IMO) it would ever be allowed to happen in this case. In one of the very earliest ID attempts using photograps in England, a photo of a skull was projected onto a photo of a face and a murderer confessed and was convicted.

Mengele:

"Then word came that he had drowned in 1979 and was buried in the tomb of "Wolfgang Gerhard." To be certain, the Brazilian government decided to open it. For identification, they needed experts, so Clyde Snow was called in, along with a forensic anthropologist from Germany, Richard Helmer.

Snow arrived in Sao Paulo that summer to find the skeletal remains in a state of disarray. In fact, some of the bones had been fractured by those who had dug them up. Nevertheless, the team got right to work. The bones were those of a right-handed Caucasian male between the ages of 60 and 70. Estimates from bone measurements came within half a centimeter to Mengele's height.

For comparison purposes, they had few records of the living Mengele. There were no dental x-rays, and while the number of fillings had been noted in his files, no other characteristics were included.

Snow and Helmer decided to use a technique called "video skull-face superimposition," which was Helmer's expertise. Piecing together the shattered skull, they marked it with pins at thirty points of comparison. They did the same with photographs of Mengele, and set the skull and photo side-by-side for cameras. If all thirty points lined up, then they could say they had a positive identification of the Nazi fiend.

The cameras recorded and then superimposed the images, and the experts carefully examined the matching areas. Finally, they pronounced the exhumed skull as that of war criminal Josef Mengele.

Some time later, Mengele's dental X-rays were located and compared to the teeth in the skull. They proved a match, supporting the video superimposition.

Then a DNA analysis confirmed once again that the methods of anthropology had proven reliable and accurate."

A depth map of the skull of a head can also be got by ultra sound. This could, if allowed, be done on Hunt's body.

Highly unlikely it would ever be allowed by the family, IMO. But still, it could be a way to prove whether the tramp is indeed Hunt.

Edited April 22, 2007 by John Dolva