deirdre
Senior Member.
good point
"Metapod" UFO. Top voted post of the month on r/UFOs, maybe top of all time
- Thread starter jackfrostvc
- Start date
deirdre
Senior Member.
it's funny he mentioned storks because i looked to see if there were stork balloons that had a basket dangling.. but didnt see a similar basket/bassinette shape on a stork.
Last edited:
Z.W. Wolf
Senior Member.
The "string" does not lead to the same part of the structure in these two photos.
Top photo: String farther back
Bottom photo: String farther forward
This also leads to questions of center of gravity and how the thing would hang.
Reasons I don't find the suspended from string idea persuasive:
-Look at this section of the video. The camera zooms out until the image of the object is so small that it becomes invisible due to lack of resolution. It's awfully far away, high in the sky. How long is this string? What's it hanging from? A fishing rod? Fiddle-dee-dee. Trees? Where?
The thing then drifts to our right quite a distance. The thing from which it is suspended must also be moving? What? A drone maybe. But if the suspended object were being dragged through the air instead of moving with it, the air resistance would make it move strangely.
-I don't see any movement that is not consistent with a Mylar balloon drifting in the vagaries of wind currents.
Last edited:
Z.W. Wolf
Senior Member.
I do see the string at times in this Feb 2022 version...
But I don't see it in this July 2017 version...
Also note that the 2022 version has had a new hoax sound track attached with muttering voices, while the 2017 version has chirping birds and traffic noises, but no voices.
But I don't see it in this July 2017 version...
Also note that the 2022 version has had a new hoax sound track attached with muttering voices, while the 2017 version has chirping birds and traffic noises, but no voices.
jackfrostvc
Senior Member
JMartJr
Senior Member.
Hiya!
Well explained, let me respond where I can:
Z.W.Wolf posted, but somehow I got it outside the quote box and can't get it back in: "Reasons I don't find the suspended from string idea persuasive:"
It's a puzzler to me -- it LOOKS so much like a balloon, but there looks like there is a string above it in some frames, and to my eye it does not move like a balloon as much as it moves like something turning on a string (not totally inconsistent with either, but more the one than the other.) If somebody who knows more than I do about video artifact can explain the string popping up, always above the object, in at least close to the same spot, never elsewhere in the video (or find it cropping up somewhere else to show it is a video artifact) I'd be very comfortable with the balloon hypothesis. To me, so far, the string hanging concept seems to account for more of what I am seeing. Your mileage may vary of course.
Well explained, let me respond where I can:
I think it does in the video -- there seems to be sort of a bright line and a dark line component to the "string," assuming the real string, if there is one, to be sort of where their average position is, to me it looks close enough to the same spot on the object, given the admitted problems with image quality. The black "string" in my two images might indeed lead to the same spot if it comes to the object off to one side of the "cowl," but I don't think that is likely as it would be hard to balance it unless it is not symmetrically weighted, which would seem odd.
Does it? It hangs, if it is hanging, consistently throughout, as a hanging object would. If I wanted it to hang vertically, I'd pick a hanging point where that happened, and add some weight to the bottom as needed. On the other hand, a balloon in the vagaries of the wind might be more likely to tumble about, as in your video where they are down in the ground turbulence. Of course, a balloon might not tumble, especially if it has a string under it weighting down one end. But I don't see a hint of string below it anywhere in the vid. Only above.
Z.W.Wolf posted, but somehow I got it outside the quote box and can't get it back in: "Reasons I don't find the suspended from string idea persuasive:"
Or small and closer. I'll concede it looks further away than if it was hanging, say, from a fishing pole.
I don't know. One way to allow for it to be shorter it would be to run a horizontal string between two points on buildings or trees or something, out of frame l and r, and then drape the "hanging string" over that -- but that's just how I'D do it, I don't see anything in the video to shed light on what THEY did, if they did anything. But I do note that when they zoom in, they always keep the UFO very tight to the top of the frame, which would keep a horizontal string out of sight, IF there was one.
Addressed above, not sure what a fiddle-dee-dee is. ^_^
Or a shorter distance, the closer it is. I also wonder if, by stepping left, a potential hoaxer could use parallax to help on that move. But that again is how I'D do it... don't know if they did it.
I'd wondered about a drone. Given how far out they zoom, though, it would have to be on a very long string, depending on how big the object is. Again, this is easier to account for the smaller it is. I don't have a good sense of how big it is. I've been thinking of it as being a few feet tall, based on thinking it was a balloon. But if it is NOT a balloon, it may be bigger or, for a "thing on a string," smaller.
The less so the lower the center of gravity, I'd think. But there might at least be a little "list to the right" as it is drug right. If cameraman stepping left is helping with the apparent move, that would account for at least some of the lack of "being dragged lean." And the closer it is, the more slowly it could be dragged right for the same angular distance covers, so slower "relative wind."
It's a puzzler to me -- it LOOKS so much like a balloon, but there looks like there is a string above it in some frames, and to my eye it does not move like a balloon as much as it moves like something turning on a string (not totally inconsistent with either, but more the one than the other.) If somebody who knows more than I do about video artifact can explain the string popping up, always above the object, in at least close to the same spot, never elsewhere in the video (or find it cropping up somewhere else to show it is a video artifact) I'd be very comfortable with the balloon hypothesis. To me, so far, the string hanging concept seems to account for more of what I am seeing. Your mileage may vary of course.
Ann K
Senior Member.
It looks to me as if (with open side facing us) both pictures have the string to the right side, not front-and-back, with possibly a thing like a fishhook protruding a little bit to the left of center. And since we don't know how the weight of the object is distributed, we can't tell whether it is deliberately positioned to make it hang evenly.
Charlie Wiser
Senior Member.
The lack of dents, wrinkles, seam allowance or inlet, and the overall smoothness, make me think it's not a balloon or inflatable. I think the yellow part is rigid, which means it's heavy and that explains why it's fairly stable in the air (not tumbling). This would mean it's on string I guess. Maybe the transparent part is a helium balloon shoved inside... but that vertical stability sure does look like it's on a string.
Attachments
Mendel
Senior Member.
Then I'm afraid I don't understand the point of your post?
I thought you were commenting on the fact that the UFOVNI video linked forward to the not-yet-appeared blog post, but your point is that there's an even older video (from a presumably different source) that has been removed? And I don't see a link to the UVOVNI video.
CLASSIFIED CHANNEL Sep 7, length 1:59 (109,682 views in 2016)
https://web.archive.org/web/20160310042313/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eHyvfErhKAk
UFOVNI Sep 8, length 2:17 (13,869 views in 2016)
https://web.archive.org/web/20160827223749/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2aY8lbpY5p8
The re-upload that @Max Phalange posted earlier (the one with the string) has the "classified channel" watermark.
Last edited:
jackfrostvc
Senior Member
What I was saying is that the video dated on the 7th from Classified Channel, says the source link is OFOVNI which didnt get posted until the 8th.
Which is odd
BTW, it is odd that the blog to note the source email of the video and posted about it on 11 Sept 2015, was called thirdphaseofsun. Spanish blog, with a name oh so close to thirdphaseofmoon
Could be a strange coincidence for sure .
https://thirdphaseofsun.blogspot.com/2015/09/el-extrano-ovni-que-escaneo-el-terreno.html
I wonder what nationality background thirdphaseofmoon have , out of curiousity
jarlrmai
Senior Member.
TPOM are from Hawaii as I recall.
jackfrostvc
Senior Member
originally, ie natively?, ie what is their background. Are they from a spanish background?
jarlrmai
Senior Member.
They are American (cousins with the surname Blake) from what I understand, they would use a variety of made up sources for hoaxes, they would also do both full on hoaxes and misrepresentation of videos (made up source stories/selective edits/relabelling/intentionally low resolution) etc.
There was a good post on Reddit about them with some examples, it seemed well researched but I haven't done a full independent verification.
Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/t977vf/i_found_more_evidence_confirming_that_the_recent/
"thirdphaseofsun" does seem to be a Spanish language copycat or similar enterprise, of course all their stuff could be "legitimate"
Mendel
Senior Member.
Where does it say that?
View attachment 50806
OVNI means UFO in Spanish and French ( objeto volador no identificado / objet volant non identifié ).
Edit:
I decreased the text size and the third line with the link showed up:
The explanation would be the same: Classified Channel edited their description after UFOVNI decided to upload the video themselves.
Last edited:
jackfrostvc
Senior Member
Look at this dated the 7th Sept : https://web.archive.org/web/20160310042313/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eHyvfErhKAk
Look at where it says Link original:
That links to this dated the 8th Sept
https://web.archive.org/web/20160505092234/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2aY8lbpY5p8
Max Phalange
Senior Member
Click around a bit more and you'll find that the UFOOVNI channel had a link in its channel header to thirdphaseofsun.blogspot.com:
So it would seem they're run by the same people.
The blogspot post about this object is still live: https://thirdphaseofsun.blogspot.com/2015/09/el-extrano-ovni-que-escaneo-el-terreno.html
deirdre
Senior Member.
They are idential twins. Their names are Blake and Brent Cousins. I only know because we just discussed them in a recent ufo thread. https://www.metabunk.org/threads/recycled-ufo-video-2012-tictacs-over-the-pacific.12325/
(and i see many of those vids have been removed...hhmm. i can see them copyright removing the copies but i think one link was their original video. Maybe they remove the videos once they've been debunked? which would mean this pod ufo might have been identified at some point in the past.)
deirdre
Senior Member.
and if it's the cousins brothers... it might be a fairy/gnome home you hang in trees... my friend had a few similar...busy morning but ai found a few ones quick in cloth to give the general idea, but they sell ceramic ones too. so the ufo would be upside down. and @Ann K was right that its supposed to be a leaf.
actually that looks good, the dark brown is maybe a tree stump the fairy is standing on?
anyway...
orView attachment 50839
anyway...
orView attachment 50839
Last edited:
JMartJr
Senior Member.
...which brought to mind gourd birdfeeders also hang in trees.
Which in turn brought to mind gourd scoops and ladles.
Surprisingly large number of things that look more-or-less like the shape of this UFO.
KilliK
Member
JMartJr
Senior Member.
The rotation on a vertical axis makes it unlikely to be anything kite related. There are a variety of spinning kites, spinning on the x, y or z axis. However, I can't think of on that rotates on the vertical Y axis without a boom and tail like in the video below-- the kite needs to "know" which way is downwind to remain oriented properly for lift. A kite spinning on that axis can't use the usual ways to do that (dihedral, keels, tails fixed to a point on the sail), if there is a solution to that problem that does not involve a boom and tail, I don't know what it would be. I think the kite part of a kytoon would be almost impossible for an object behaving like what is shown -- adding kite elements would make it harder to do what we see than just using a balloon by itself.
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kaeo5Wt2K34
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kaeo5Wt2K34
KilliK
Member
sorry if this has been posted before:
Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/u3nqd3/metapod_ufo_eyewitness_testimony_other_current/
Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/u3nqd3/metapod_ufo_eyewitness_testimony_other_current/
Max Phalange
Senior Member
The original video must have been much less compressed, since this screenshot from thirdphaseofsun shows a lot more detail (this is approximately frame 1623 of the "Classified Channel" video)
vs. this grab from the available video:
If anyone with Twitter or Facebook would like to try contacting the UFOVNIgalaxi people to try to obtain the original video, or even the stills sent to them in the submitters original email (which is shown in a screenshot to be in a Gmail account, so should still be accessible), then they have (dormant) social media accounts here:
https://twitter.com/UFOVNIgalaxi
https://facebook.com/ufo.ovni/
(The facebook profile was updated as recently as 2020).
vs. this grab from the available video:
If anyone with Twitter or Facebook would like to try contacting the UFOVNIgalaxi people to try to obtain the original video, or even the stills sent to them in the submitters original email (which is shown in a screenshot to be in a Gmail account, so should still be accessible), then they have (dormant) social media accounts here:
https://twitter.com/UFOVNIgalaxi
https://facebook.com/ufo.ovni/
(The facebook profile was updated as recently as 2020).
Charlie Wiser
Senior Member.
Mendel
Senior Member.
That's assuming these screenshots were not processed. There are various "AI Image Sharpener/Sharpening" products available online; they basically involve the AI "guessing" at the missing information to achieve a pleasing looking result.
Max Phalange
Senior Member
True, although grain/noise in the sky hasn't been smoothed away as you might expect. This Japanese blog has full-frame grabs from the original "UFOVNI" upload which appear to have at least slightly better quality: http://13shoejiu-the.blog.jp/archives/51804715.html
Also the "Classified Channel" version has a their logo watermarked right across the centre of the image, which is barely visible in at the quality of the available version — it wouldn't make sense to add a watermark then encode the video so poorly that it's illegible (you can only really tell it's there when scrubbing back/forward through the video).
Plus their regular logo in the top left is horrible mess. YouTube had 1080p60 support by mid-2015, I have my doubts that someone running a commercial YouTube channel would be uploading such poorly encoded videos.
Last edited:
jarlrmai
Senior Member.
Any time anyone uses those tools it make me sigh, the algorithms are totally unsuitable for forensic analysis.
Assuming competence is always a risk.. You'd still have to upscale then add the logo at 1080p. The centre logo is possibly an attempt to avoid others cropping but still show the subject.
I don't know how to do it but, is it possible to stabilise across the wider scene the part where the object seems to descend? @Mick West are there any guides for stabilising like this that you could recommend? I have the After Effects trial.
JMartJr
Senior Member.
In another thread, a couple of us touched on detail checking; and trying to track down the very distinctive sounding bird in the original vid came up. I listened to way to many hours of birds of Europe (and of Hawaii, once the Cousins were mentioned) and did not hear a match. Which only means that I didn't find one -- there are a lot of birds!
There is a bird-call identifying app "BirdNet" that says "Carolina Wren," but on my version of their app it assigns that low probability.
Any birders reading this in Europe or Hawaii (or elsewhere) that can identify that bird, please squawk at us! If it IS a Carolina Wren, that would throw a monkey wrench in the origin story of the video, but wrens make so many calls, and in my limited wren experience they don;t persistently make the same call over and over again for that long, they like to switch it up. So I'm not confident that's what it is. (Got a pair nesting on the porch, as it happens, I'll keep an ear on them...)
There is a bird-call identifying app "BirdNet" that says "Carolina Wren," but on my version of their app it assigns that low probability.
Any birders reading this in Europe or Hawaii (or elsewhere) that can identify that bird, please squawk at us! If it IS a Carolina Wren, that would throw a monkey wrench in the origin story of the video, but wrens make so many calls, and in my limited wren experience they don;t persistently make the same call over and over again for that long, they like to switch it up. So I'm not confident that's what it is. (Got a pair nesting on the porch, as it happens, I'll keep an ear on them...)
jarlrmai
Senior Member.
I am in Europe (UK) and it says Carolina Wren for me
The API is here not sure if it takes into account location, I know the app on the phone does from GPS etc.
https://birdnet.cornell.edu/api/
The API is here not sure if it takes into account location, I know the app on the phone does from GPS etc.
https://birdnet.cornell.edu/api/
Last edited:
The guides I've seen assume good quality video that's amenable to tracking.
I basically just use the tracker, add a reasonably large track box around a feature, and change the options to enhance before match, adapt every frame, and (importantly) stop if <80% confidence. Them a bunch of manual adjustments if it stops, or loses track.
You will often have to change features, and I add a marker when I do that.
Max Phalange
Senior Member
Looking at this part, which has been motion tracked for both position and scale, it appears that the object is stationary relative to the cloud in the bottom left, then undergoes a horizontal translation while the camera zooms out. The tracking isn't perfect but is close enough that I don't think the object's apparent movement is caused by the stabilization.
Unfortunately the object goes completely out of focus when the zoom ends, so it's not easy to see if the translation stops too.
Unfortunately the object goes completely out of focus when the zoom ends, so it's not easy to see if the translation stops too.
Z.W. Wolf
Senior Member.
Accessing...
I believe that is a Song Thrush, Captain; a passerine bird of the turdidae family. An inhabitant of wooded habitats, including parks, gardens and farmland, it is partially migratory, with many birds wintering in southern Europe, North Africa and the Middle East. Its distinctive song which has repeated musical phrases, has frequently been referred to in poetry.
Range
Green=Year-Round, Yellow=Summer, Blue=Winter.
I believe that is a Song Thrush, Captain; a passerine bird of the turdidae family. An inhabitant of wooded habitats, including parks, gardens and farmland, it is partially migratory, with many birds wintering in southern Europe, North Africa and the Middle East. Its distinctive song which has repeated musical phrases, has frequently been referred to in poetry.
Range
Green=Year-Round, Yellow=Summer, Blue=Winter.
Last edited:
jarlrmai
Senior Member.
Yeah Bird.net id'd Song Thrush from the MP3 of the videos you posted, if it were a song thrush in the UFO video it would likely know it as well.
Known Song Thrush video:
UFO video:
So I think I am going with birdnet until an expert human says otherwise. Most likely there's been replaced audio in the UFO videos.
Known Song Thrush video:
UFO video:
deirdre
Senior Member.
if they did it likely they did it from one of the same sea cliffs, so there might be birds in their other videos to compare. i'm not sure which pod video has the bird sound... which comment number is it?
GlobularOrb
Member
Most likely. In the video you're looking at there's a high-pitched "hey look at me I'm a spooky alien" noise that runs for 30 seconds from 00:11 to 0:41 and loops again for 30 seconds from 0:51 to 1:21. There's also a specific combination of wind noise and background chatter that repeats at 00:06, 00:24, and again at 1:03. Also, the traffic noise from 0:45 to 0:51 is repeated again from 1:25 to 1:31. I didn't check to see if the birds also repeated or looped, seemed like more work than it was worth tbh. In any case the audio track seems pretty heavily manipulated, maybe composed of at least three, possibly four separate tracks (birds, wind and background chatter, traffic noise, and a spooky alien track), each of which loops or repeats at some point, it seems to me anyways.
Similar threads
Trending content
-
-
Thread '"Active Social Engineering Defense" and "Large Scale Social Deception"'- Mick West
Replies: 22 -
-
-
