The Case for Spirit Photography: With corroborative evidence by experienced researchers and photographersDoyle, Arthur Conan
Religion
The Case for Spirit Photography: With corroborative evidence by experienced researchers and photographers
Doyle, Arthur Conan
Spirit photography; Spiritualism
When the second exposure was completed, Mr. Hope took the slide out of
the camera, carried it into the dark room, and emptied the plates into
my hands in front of the red glass window. Making sure that my signature
was on each of the plates, I placed them in a shaded receptacle, signed
other two plates and put them into the slide with the same precautions as
before. Then, seeing Mr. Hope out of the room, I shut the door and stood
before it whilst two other exposures were made. Re-entering the dark
room, I received the plates from the slide as before and proceeded to
develop the four plates with material supplied by Mr. Hope, who remained
in the room but stood as far from the developing dish as possible and
left the whole of the handling to me.
Standing before the red window, I saw the images come up on the plates
and noticed that on three of them there were figures other than the
ordinary representations of the sitters. When development was finished, I
carried the plates from the dark room and, before anyone else was allowed
to touch them, I examined them individually and satisfied myself beyond
doubt that they were the four identical plates on which I had written my
name and that the normal figures on these plates corresponded with the
four exposures I had seen made.
That each of the four plates bore my signature, clear and characteristic,
I accepted as proof that these were the plates I had placed in the slide
and no others, for it was impossible that my signature could have been
forged: therefore, I reasoned, there had been no substitution of prepared
plates.
Looking through the negatives, I could see that, in addition to the
normal figures of the sitters, there were distinct “extras” on three of
the plates, each “extra” being distinct in form from the others.
On No. 1 plate—that for which my wife and I had been the sitters—there
was the clear representation of a face looking out from an arched veil.
This “extra” was superimposed on the image of the sitters and partially
obscured them, as if the “something” it represented had come between them
and the lens.
As soon as the plate was dry, a rough print was obtained by placing
a sheet of printing paper over the negative and holding it up to the
window, through which the sun was shining. That rough print showed the
normal figures and the “extra” as they were afterwards printed by Mr.
Hope.
Five possibilities are, therefore, ruled out in seeking to account for
this particular “extra”:
1. The plates were not faked before exposure.
2. There was no substitution of plates.
3. There was no double exposure.
4. There was no double printing.
5. The plate was not faked after development.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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