THE TRUTH ABOUT THE BALWYN UFO CASE. Part 1

G' day Folks. I've decided to get on and finish this post, I've tried dozens of times but it just plain depresses me and I just end up giving it away, The case should have been put in the bin 51 years ago.

This is for those who really, really want to know the truth everybody claims they do, so we shall see which ones say, great work Les and those who curse me. Actually I already know.

So this is my Report.

I've had this Blog ready to go for some years with illustrations showing why/when and how you can have an image/reflection on the side of a polished metal bowl like in the Balwyn/Deepdene UFO case and showing that is why it is a hoax and how you can prove it is a hoax but nobody was interested in proving it, however I could see the hoax being groomed to support the Westall UFO Incident and so I scrapped what I had done in favour of visual images of the Balwyn UFO Case to demonstrate beyond a shadow of a doubt that it is indeed a bizarre elaborate hoax.

 I have also pointed out in the past that the image/reflection on the object is what is behind the witness/camera but no " you don't know what you're talking about Les," having an image/reflection like that even at a hundred feet up and/or hundred feet away is physically impossible, this has nothing to do with me it is simple physics you can prove it, yourselves, however it is ignored by Ufologist/Believers as is the witnesses story, I don't know of another case where the witness's guesstimates and now his ability to sketch at the time are now to be ignored in favour of their own version of events,  so taking the story the witness claimed at the time, how far and high he thought it was (over near a school) and where he was standing at the time is ignored by Ufologist, believers who want the object down low and near/beside the roof/chimney in order to have a image/reflection on the object, this should tell anybody blessed with logic/common sense that it is a hoax but no, "It means it's real Les" I don't know how they do it, they just want to keep flogging a dead horse.

What you are about to read is my work, just by throwing a polished metal bowl up in the air if one looks at the BP and thinks that it looks like a metal bowl thrown up into the air then Ufologist, Researchers back then should damn well have done just that, then the hoax would have died 51 years ago.


For those of you who don't know I'm the so called skeptic, the word skeptic to me means someone who has doubts about something, I'm in no doubt the Balwyn UFO case is a hoax because I/you can prove it.

I am the one that found the correct chimney on Google Earth I put a copy on Shane's website forum showing them from which direction the Balwyn photo was taken. Thinking at the time the house to the East was the family house and the chimney was their neighour's house, I found out from the council the chimney was the family home which I past on to Keith, Shane and Francois as they all know. I removed my post on Shane's site because after I gave the address out privately they were now throwing the address's around on a public board and it was turning into a circus I didn't want the owners of both properties having to deal with the strange folk. I will not be using the address's even though they are out there, I won't be the one causing the owners any grief. 

The house to the East of the family home, that is, from the direction the photo was taken (the area) I'll just call it EH and the family home naturally FH.

So there we are Keith, Shane, Francois, and me communicating via email.

Unbeknown to me Paul, (Keith's partner)  has gone around to the FH and taken a photo of the correct chimney which was really great but unfortunately he is at the wrong end of the house I had already shown them in which direction the photo was taken had I known Paul was going to take the photos I would have liked to see it more scientifically structured with all photos taken in one go and the farce would have been well and truly over by now.

 

In Paul's photo above the ridge capping is on the left side of the chimney you are at ground level so you can't see the ridge capping running along the apex and you are looking up through the trees.

 In the BP you are looking from the East end to the West end, line of sight is nearly level with the ridge you are nearly level with the tops of the trees.

Logic, common sense should be telling you something isn't right.

I'm going to use my pencil here to demonstrate a visual problem. We all know how long a "new" pencil is.

 

The pencil is representing the ridge capping, the scrap of wood the chimney.

 

 The chimney of course on the wrong side of the ridge this is the wrong end the same in Paul's photo.

 

 Apart from this being the correct end looking West the point of the exercise is to show my pencil (representing the ridge of the roof) has shrunk, Huh? No nothing to do with the cold, it is a parallax error the same thing as in the BP if you were there looking along the roof line towards the West your eye/brain would make the necessary adjustments. You just need to keep that in mind. 
Already you should be thinking, yikes that looks more like the BP.

Anyway back to it, because Paul had established contact with the owner and had taken photos I thought it fair to keep him in the loop (the group) and waited for them to get over their excitement and said something like, "Hey pssst fellas correct chimney but wrong end, you need to take the photo from the other end of the FH," Paul then tells me they are satisfied with the wrong end and what I am explaining to them is irrelevant, it is then I gave it away and watched the outcome which was predictable I have also waited to see if any Ufologist/Researcher stepped up to the plate, sadly no one has, Ufology is now definitely a religion in Australia.

It is sooooo obliviously the wrong end, not even wearing the biggest blinkers could you avoid seeing that, you would have to have a chaff bag over your head as well, I think even a believer in this case would finally see the light, so what is going on?

Well I'm thinking there maybe a sycophantic relationship going on here? Where there are those still wanting to keep the hoax alive/running, deride/ignore anybody who wants to show them it is a hoax, so long as the witness keeps saying it is true and remaining anonymous they will keep running with it. Quoting a line from James McDonald "That is kind of bad." I mean how could you not see, no matter what camera you used what angle you took it from (even standing on your head) you are never ever going to photograph the exact same image as in the BP from the wrong end.

I pointed out to them that in the witness's sketch's (more than one) that everything is happening on the left side of the chimney when the BP shows the object/bowl is on the right side of the chimney as you see on Paul's and Keith's page they will fix that as well. That is kind of bad.

The sketch above is cropped from a report and I moved the witness's signature up from the bottom, it is dated 19 April 1966  you'll see to the right he has even sketched in the dividing fence and part of the EH on other sketches the hand written text under the EH is there but the house isn't, interesting.

I placed the chimney roughly where it should be and cleaned the roof up and added text boxes, that is all I've done to the sketch.

This sketch above dated 7/5/67., (The two sketch's above are from 16. Barry Greenwood 1966 report.) As you can see this is another completely new sketch in 67, proportionally different from the one above yet telling the same bizarre story, standing to the extreme north of the garden and the object seen on the left side of the chimney, bit of a worry.


I used the double ended arrow line to point out where the witness claimed he was standing (his X mark),  showing that anywhere along the double ended arrow line at the wrong end you would see the left side of the chimney and you don't do you in the BP? I put it to you all, where he put his X mark was so he could be seen from those working in the kitchen.

At the wrong end everything is happening on the left side of the chimney if you look back from the East to the West the object is on the correct side of the chimney as in the BP. Yeah, I said it was bizarre.

Even the science that Dr Berson was suppose to have done is weird as well, to be fair I don't see his name on anything, at the wrong end if you take the measurement 76.6 feet from the chimney where Paul was standing (incidentally he could not move back any further because of the boundary fence) puts you in next door (west) in the neighbours yard or measuring the chimney from the correct end (east) puts you in the pond/lake, measurements were suppose to have been taken of the property didn't Dr Berson check his findings out at the property, didn't anybody do a followup?

Actually at the wrong end standing where the witness said he was at the time he took the photo you wouldn't see the chimney at all in the photo you would be looking up over the study/kitchen/bedroom extension along the north side of the FH,( refer to sketch) in other words you would be photographing/looking at the roof of the extensions, no chimney would be in the photo at all and another kicker is if the object was roughly at 400 yards away and 300 feet up which the witness is happy with back then, you are too close to the extensions, that is if the extensions were two story back then to be able to see the, err, event over the roof you would have to be in the property next door (West) of the FH.

 White arrow pointing to extensions, study roof I think with kitchen/bedroom behind this is over where the photo was claimed to have been taken you can see how high it is, even if they added the second story later this house has very high ceilings meaning if they were single story extensions back in 66 the apex of the roof would still be what was photographed not the chimney, orange arrow pointing out the correct chimney at the Wrong End.

So let's see this get explained away, are you all ready?

A near scale model of the main part of the roof and correct chimney in the BP.  You will have to use your imagination a bit and include the ridge capping, I knocked the model up out of scrap. 

Paul's Photo at the wrong end where the BP is claimed to have been taken.

 Same end as Paul's photo, wrong end

  If you were standing down at ground level where the witness claimed the photo was taken to be seen from the kitchen, you will realize you are standing in front of the extensions, you would have to turn your head to the right and look up to see the chimney and you also would see the left side of the chimney. You don't in the BP do you?

Let's stop here a moment and ponder, Scientist's/Ufologist's/Researcher's  suppose to have visited the FH,  measurements were suppose to have been taken so there they are standing on the spot in the garden where the photo was suppose to have been taken and most likely with BP photo in hand and somehow no one notices it doesn't match the BP.??????????????????????????????????????????

Look familiar?

The tree is my neighbours across the road I left it in for fun. 

As I pointed out to the gang there is absolutely no reason in the world why you cannot take exactly the same photo as the BP, the chimney hasn't moved nor has the house what needs to move is the camera person to the east end of the FH they will discover they have to elevate the camera and/or themselves in order to be able to see the chimney from the east end, they will also be close to the house when doing this because the trees are full grown in the yard and are in the way, once they have the photo proportionally matching the BP they then need to turn a 180 degrees and it is at that height and line of sight (camera lens) somewhere along that line of sight the photo was taken further east, as I said the trees are in the way now but one could work it out.

As it is known I cannot get down to Melbourne to take the photo myself at the correct end of the house however there is no need to now the model I knocked up is good enough to get my point across.

The Photo above is a bit messy somewhere between the two red lines you will get the same image as roof and chimney in the BP the vertically red line you could use a very long selfie stick and camera or a drone just be on the right side of the ridge/apex a little up and down and left and right, bingo but you are too close to get the right perspective you have to move away from the house the BP was taken anywhere along and between the two red lines it could have been taken at the boundary fence and I haven't ruled out the EH.

The C is the camera facing west and the O is the objects position in front of the camera as I said the photo was taken somewhere along there.

The trees are in the way now full grown the two yellow lines represent the sun early in the morning summer, (discussed on the other page) the cusp as it was called on the object could either be the the steep gable roof on the two story part of the EH or the first tree (a pointed cypress/conifer type of tree) to rise above the roof top on the single story part of the house that's the one I lean towards, remember the reflection /image on the object is what is around/behind the camera the green arrow could have been the first tree/part to pop up over the roof.

The other thing to get your heads around is the camera is up high enough to see most of the chimney the only part you can't see is where the chimney actually comes out through the roof because the ridge on the right side blocks your view. This is what puzzle me all those years ago if this photo was taken at ground/garden level you wouldn't be able to see the chimney at all or not that much of it.

Just a few more incidentals I have waited for soooo long for some one to realize the tops of trees you see in the BP (in front of roof tiles) are the foliage tips of the willow trees, drawn in the sketches  at the east end of the house there is no trees in front of the garage in 66.

Paul's 66 aerial photo would confirm that, what would be interesting to know is there anything at the east end of the property on or near the pond/lake or close to the dividing fence high enough to stand up on at the time, failing that on or near the patio of the EH.

This is a continuation I've realized I could use the model of the roof to demonstrate the theory put forward by those who have dismissed the witness's account he put forward at the time and replaced it with their own which is also weird, in reality the chimney is about a 100 feet away from the camera the object is close to the camera and is not that high above the chimney just looks that way, the camera is up high so you can see along the ridge and see the complete chimney at the other end of the FH, however dismiss what I have just said and have a look at what they want to put forward.

They want the image/reflection on the object to be that of the chimney I assume then the object has to be little further back/away from the chimney in order to align the cusp they consider to be the chimney with the camera, please correct me if I'm wrong.

I've said all along that it is impossible to have a image/reflection like that on an object that is a sphere shaped object in this case a half a sphere and not a perfect half sphere at that.

The moment an object like that in the BP is above all other objects on the ground which I gather you are all happy with, that is it is above the chimney then the image/reflection always forms a half sphere or half a circle starting at the rim and curving out and back the rim in line with the observer, if the object stayed still in the sky and the observer walked under it and out the other side the image/reflection follows the observer of whatever is around him/her as they move from one side to the other when the object is above everything else it compresses everything from horizon to horizon a montage including the observer into a half circle as I have explained.

There would be no cusp which you all consider to be the chimney, the object has to be close and lower in order to break out of the half circle and form a cusp which I now will demonstrate. 

  
 In the photo above I have placed the camera roughly where you will all be happy with where you think the object is in relation to the chimney further to the left further back is not going to matter when I explain this.

To a camera, a sphere, flat mirror a reflection, the image/reflection  is always flat if you look at a google map any aerial photo of whatever it is always flat as paper it is your brain telling you that a tree, house, chimney are erect, as you see the chimney doesn't stand out it is part of the roof the image/reflection on the object would be everything down on the ground compressed to the rim in a half circle.

There is only one way you can get the image/reflection as you see on the BP object and that is to be level or lower than the chimney with only the sky in the background.

If there was a tree behind the model chimney then that will be the cusp if you kept rising up higher and higher so that now you have other homes/ground behind the chimney then the chimney just blends in with the background and will not cause your cusp. As I've said I'm pretty sure the image/reflection on the object in the BP is the EH with a tree rising above the roof on the single story section of the house no chimney's involved. 

As I have said all along it is not my opinion my theory, it is simple physics logic/common sense.

To be continued....

THE TRUTH ABOUT THE BALWYN UFO CASE. Part 2

Analyzing the Balwyn Photo 

I almost posted my first BP blog then thought I'd wait to see who the expert was going to be analyzing the original BP I mean there was no hurry, it was not like someone anytime soon was going to solve the case, the results/conclusion was much what I expected, so it seems you needed my help after all.

I will put it to you all that part of the family home was to be involved in the photo where other sightings have taken place, those who have studied the case will know what I'm talking about so the chimney with part of the top of the roof ended up in the photo nothing else is to give away any details of the house itself, however it was the fact the chimney was unique that made it easy for me to find. 

As I have mentioned in throwing a polished stainless steel metal bowl up in the air things started to unfold as to why and how the Balwyn UFO photo came about.

Some of the things I discovered.

Throwing a bowl up in the air as in the BP and photographing it in an open area I noticed the reflection/image on the bowl in the photo I had taken to be the ground I'm standing on and what was behind me, compressed (for want of a better word) towards the rim in a half circle it doesn't matter how big the bowl/object is whether it is 6 inches, 10 feet, 25 feet, the reflection/image on the BP is behind the photographer, it's just plain common sense.

Why in portrait mode.

The photo was taken in a portrait mode to keep a narrow field of view and more importantly to allow enough leeway in the frame vertically for your bowl to come to a stop somewhere in the frame along side/above the chimney. (To make it clear not physically near the chimney just in respect to its position in the frame of the photo).

Why throw it vertically

Throwing it horizontally like a Frisbee requires a big area to get it up high enough to photograph and as with a Frisbee it can veer left or right striking something hard as it comes down to the ground enough to damage it. It would be better to have some help in launching and catching it. Trying to get a good shot as it past through the frame with the chimney in the photo is going to be very difficult not impossible but you would go through a lot of film.
Throwing it straight up gives you control, putting a spin on it as you launch it vertically, all you have to do is practice getting it to reach its apex within the frame you can remain in the one spot (moving a little left and right) with the chimney remaining in the left hand bottom corner of the frame in each shot, each throw you inch your bowl closer to the chimney until you are satisfied with the shot. Having someone launch and catch would be great but there are ways you can do this on your own.
The chimney is quite a distance away from the camera the bowl was launched in front of the camera get over it.

Information unfolding.

Next, getting sick of throwing the bowl up into the air and now wanting to take a photo with our house in the background (behind me) I wanted control over the bowl vertically and horizontal so I fixed the bowl to a pole, box tubing about 20 foot long able to move it up or down, then fixed the pole to my trailer so as to move the bowl in any direction. The weather was a perfect summers day no clouds. The first thing I notice in taking a photo of the bowl fixed to the pole about a half hour after the free spinning shots was it had a strong glint of sunlight at the top of the bowl, what they call the diamond ring effect and the reflection/image was clearer, this was because the bowl was no longer spinning, the imperfections in the spinning metal skin of the bowl and possibly the bowl slightly out of balance caused a slight dulling of the glint of sunlight and a slight blurring of the reflection/image on the bowl, not all that important just an observation something for me to take into account, however what I found out next turned out to be very important I picked at random a wall/roof of our house it turned out to be in full sunlight taking a picture with the house behind me, (so I'm with my back to the wall the bowl mounted on a pole fixed to a 6x4 trailer in front of me). I took the photo, the reflection/image on the bowl even though it was curved into the rim as I have described, the distorted wall guttering roof tiles were very bright, too bright compared with the BP so I had to find a wall in the shade and sure enough it took the edge off the brightness indicating to me the reflection/image on the object in the BP was in shadow. I will discuss this further later on.

The information I had gathered thus far goes like this, spinning bowl/object as in the BP causes a slight blur, this is to be added to vertical camera movement, the reflection/image is in shadow a dark silhouette, shutter speed is not right, out of focus, the bowl/object not coming to its apex when the photo was taken plus the circumference of the bowl is not even that is it is not a perfect half sphere and so the distortion of the reflection/image varies from the rim to the base, so thinking if you had the original photo to analyze on your computer that somehow you are going to glean some sort of new information out of it you would be just fooling yourself.

I suspect the cross hairs to be a little lower and a tad more to the left in the original.  

What is interesting in the BP above, you would expect the cross hairs to be on the object (the focal point) that is an object appears in the sky and that is all you are focused upon, taking a photo of the object would be centre in the frame.

To put it another way if you where taking a picture of a couple of friends you consciously/subconsciously share the frame between the two, your focal point would be between your two friends both sharing the frame equally. The same goes for the BP above wanting to share the frame with the chimney and object.

I have a confession to make I had the Kodak Instant version and so thought the Polaroid Land 800 series was much the same as my Point and Shoot Kodak camera, it turns out my Kodak version came out a good decade later after the Polaroid Land 800 and was easy to use however not so for the Polaroid Land 800, there is quite a few steps to go through before taking a good picture as you will see if you read the manual. This link explains what you have to do in order to take a good photo on a Polaroid Land 800. 

Two photo's cut and joined.

When someone says it looks like two photos cut and joined and claims to be an expert then I figure if I cut and join a colour BP together (which I did) I will get the same result as the BP and I expect Ufologist/researchers/photographic experts to do the same (silly me) not getting the result claimed by the expert and armed to the teeth with evidence that it doesn't work, I email the good Professor quoting what he said stating that he "thinks" the BP is two photos cut and join together, tactfully as I'm well known for and this being our first contact but wanting to know how he was able to hide the white line, (the white card backing) let alone matching the sky/cloud was impossible I left it in his court to show me how the hoax was done, all he does is copy and paste the paragraph regarding his statement that it was a cut and joined the very thing I was referring/quoting back to him, it didn't really matter though I already had my answer.  Yes I'm Aussiebloke.

Experts dime a dozen.

My point of mentioning this, when an expert makes a statement you see all these other so called experts who want to run with it. Is it two photos cut and joined? Yes it is, no it's not, actually doing the work you realize all these so called experts are just plain clueless, had they cut and joined a photo they would be able to tell you the jagged line in the BP was not two joined photos. More about this later.

The same goes for BP itself you would be able to read what the photo was telling you just by throwing a metal bowl up in the air but no they are all clueless even the ones who "think" it's a hoax wouldn't it be better to do the science and "know" it is a hoax?

Science is important to me I just can't understand when given the opportunity as in this case to test it, everybody either just wants to believe it's a hoax or believe it is real. Belief belongs behind the four walls of a church but unfortunately it has ventured out into reality in a big way as though belief has some kind of ranking with science. It is absolutely scary.

Reflection/Image behind the Camera.

Now I'm going to repeat this one more time the image/reflection on the polished object in the BP is behind the witness or more to the point camera, as I said like standing in front of a full length mirror taking a photo of yourself anything behind you is also in that photo but with a sphere like object edge on as in the BP everything around you and behind is compressed towards the rim, including the camera that took the photograph.

Sun too Low.

Now here's another kicker, on April the 2nd at 2.21 pm the sun is too low in the sky to cast a reflection on the bowl, (Rim facing North as in BP at the correct end of the house,) this is finding the true east and west watching where the sun rises and sets the day before setting up the bowl on the pole about twenty feet up in the air aligned with Google Earths image of the EH and the FH as you see in the BP and now my model on the other page. Bugger me no matter what I did two years running on the 2^nd at 2.21 not even at 12 o'clock midday, I cannot get the the image of the sun like on the BP so what is going on? To get the suns image like it is on the BP object it needed it to be on my left side, it was then I had an eureka moment or something like it and realized the sun was rising up behind the house in the refection/image, this is why the reflection/image on the bowl in the BP is in shadow just a silhouette of the west side of the EH which is behind the photographer/camera not up in the sky above the object, to make this clear this means the photo would have to be taken around summer time, the summer equinox just before or after, the sun will rise further to the south behind the EH, the suns reflection on the object is early in the morning you can actually get close to when but you need to be there and carry out experiments, the next kicker to come to terms with means the photo has remained in the back of the camera for about five months or even from the Summer before. Here's a Link showing where the sun rises in summer compared to March/April. 

This is the need to explain away the film as being old, there it is in the back of the camera waiting for an opportunity to come along, parents overseas work being done in the house, a captive audience (Carpenter/worker/s) the only problem is the work is to be carried out at the opposite end of the house the kitchen where he needs to be seen going through his pantomime taking the photo but from the opposite end of the house to where the photo was actually taken.

Jagged Line.

If you read the Polaroid Land 800 Camera manual I link you to from one end to another you will see that you must not let the print fall back on the negative I put it to you all after the photo was taken, either the print was peeled back diagonally enough to see that the bowl/object was in the right place the chimney was a given, pleased with the result lets the print go and shuts the back of the camera and there it stays until an opportunity comes along that's one idea, the second idea confident after other attempts knows the bowl/object will be in the frame and does not peel the film apart to check but remember it is sitting in the back of the camera for months if not more and perhaps the print starts parting from the negative leaving only a part still intact when removed from the camera. The point I'm trying to make, the jagged line is not a cut mark it is a difference in colour strength where it was in contact with the negative and where it was not I like my first scenario but I don't have the equipment to prove it.

The other point I want to make this camera needs a lot of setting up in order to take a good picture, in an instant it has gone (according to the witness) from taking photos of flowers (close up) at the time then suddenly photographing an object at some distance judged by the witness to be much further away than the chimney read the manual as to what you have to do in order to take a photo. Boy are we lucky, today just point and shoot.

The Object.

The object is unusual I started out looking for something commercial something off the shelf with no success however I put it to you it will sit in the palm of your hand a metal bowl sized object.

I then found out the family business (and that is what it is) imported lathes and other equipment, however lathes can spin a metal bowl so either as part of a course or the equipment is there so let's spin a bowl, and so a bowl was spun with lid and polished this is why I have used the words in the past, as if it was an exercise, I'm just saying the witness was in a good position to spin something out of the ordinary and/or in his visits to China and so on come across something that said Hmmm UFO, the word hinged also was used which I found interesting but that is another story.

I have only used what was around in the 60's to solve this simple case the computer wasn't much help except for enlarging, printing etc,.

Recapping

The BP was not taken in the garden at the West End.
The BP was not taken on the April the 2nd.  
Hope that was of some help.

Cheers Les Medew