Just an exercise here but I was thinking about just what was on these two rolls of film. The creature walking along the creeks sand bar is only in 23' 9 and 1/4" of a 100' roll (Bigfoot Times, Danny Perez, Center for Bigfoot Studies, pg.2) and is at the end of that roll. Danny states that 76' 2 and 3/4" of the first part of the roll contains scenery, horses and riders. Did he in fact watch this for himself? Hmmm.

So this roll of film obviously could not contain close-up footage of the track-way made by the filmed subject. Roger Patterson and Bob Gimlin have both gone on record that Roger ran out of film and had to reload the camera right after filming the creature (the film is daylight loadable). They are also on record saying that it began to rain that night and they had to get out of there so packed up and left early the next morning. All casts and the roll of film that contains footage of the tracks were made before the end of that night. Some were covered with bark by Bob when it started to rain, but they never returned to make more casts or film more.

Therefore the #2 roll of film made that day (there may have been other rolls exposed earlier that day but for the purpose here...), the one everyone thinks has gone missing or is misplaced should only contain the tracks and the casting of them. Their camp was already setup and there was no mention of running into the creature with a pack horse in tow. SO there should not be any footage of either one of them leading a pack horse on the #2 roll. This second roll may even not have been all exposed.

I am thinking that we have in our possession all of the second roll, because there wasn't that much filmed on it, and the material on the first roll has been mistakenly thought to have belonged to that second roll.

Many of you may already know all of this or have already come to this conclusion. Most likely though the only persons still with us who have seen the unedited, uncut rolls of film is John Green and Al DeAtley. I wonder if what we see today is what they saw then? I mean look at the images posted elsewhere on the board or below. I tried to correct them with the same filter pack I use on the creature sequence and it still looks like a different emulsion, processing or was severally underexposed. Why would it be so different? Could Roger have taken a light reading beforehand and changed the settings? I don't recall anyone mentioning anything like that. In fact I thought the camera was setup and left as is for quick pull and shoot tactics.

I cannot believe that Roger bait and switched in front of Bob a pre-exposed roll of film with a hoaxed creature in it but the film change happened at just the right time to have done so. Reloading a partially exposed roll of film I think was also beyond Rogers expertise with that rented camera. If this had happened we would most likely get some double exposure stuff on the roll and some over exposure at the transition point. Granted now I have only worked with a copy of it but there is a very sharp cut between the creature scene and the one before it. Was the camera capable of stopping like that on a dime without much content movement in the frame... handheld? The lever to turn the camera on and off was in a very awkward position to do so and the exposure was consistent at that particular spot.

Which now brings me to Bruce Bonney. He was commissioned by René Dahinden to print a select few frames deemed the sharpest in order to fulfill René's rights as a co-owner. Bruce decided to use Cibachrome technology and supposedly had access to the original film down in LA at the time. Right after the images were made and published in Man Like Monsters on Trial though, these two had a falling out... a pretty serious one. What was that about I wonder? Did Bruce see something or want to do something different than René with the film? They were suppose to have written a book about the film but that got canned as well.

Any way... doubts I have had with the film have been the exposure problem, Bruce Bonney's exodus and the timing of and transportation for development. The only answers I ever got from René was... just look at the damn creature... is it real or not... that is the question. I felt a bit misdirected with that.

Just some food for thought and musings from the past.

Very interesting - yet in several of the accounts I've read it is mentioned that RP's ride and the packhorse bolted and fled the encounter - (Granted I can't locate a version where either RP or BG says such directly) - Which of course would mean they did have the packer in tow if this is correct. How sure can we be?

Any hypotheticals as to how the film(s) might have been shuffled?

It seems unlikely that the cast making stills shown here were made the same day as the
film of Patty, if we are to believe the time line we have been given.

Gemlin says the encounter was filmed after 12:00 noon, but that they had to return to camp to
get casting materials . He also said that the Sun was setting around 3:00 - 4:30 ..
Of course the actual time of sunset can be easily verified.

If you account for other time that may have been spent; ( one account says they tracked the subject
for over three miles ), the shadows in those casting stills look a little short for the time to have been
much past noon..

Yes, easily verified:


I chose San Fran since smaller towns like Willow Creek weren't in the database.

Sunset on that day would have been 6:25. Up in that valley among the tall trees, I can see why Gimlin said the sun set around 4:00. It would have seemed so in that setting.

The timing of the events that occurred after the filming have always been difficult to understand. I'd like to hear from someone with experience in casting and the other things P&G said they did after the filming as to whether they think the timing is realistic. Better yet, let's get someone out there to try to reenact the events and see if it was possible.

With the results Roger and Bob bring to the table and claim was made after the creature walked across the sand bar I would say a minimum of 3 hours were needed, a more comfortable time would be 5 hours though.

Tracking the animal from horse back for a ways, changing film, recovering Roger’s horse, filming the tracks, returning to camp, getting material ready for casting, return to the site, cast two tracks and let set, film making casts, pull the casts, pack the casts, return to camp. Darkness could have descended towards the end.

I see no problem with the time line. If I am not mistaken going to Willow Creek, talking to Al and air mailing the film was done afterwards.

It still remains; it appears the sun is high ( relatively ) in those cast-making stills.

Bipto,

Can you find how many degrees the Sun would would have been above the horizon, at transit ( 12:54 ) on that date ?

It's hard to do with those stills, but yuo draw a line from the edge of the shadow on the back of the man casting to the edge of his hat and you see that the sun is actually pretty low on the horizon. Also, there is a lond slender shadow in front of the man casting and that indicates a pretty long shadow. The shadow length in the shallow track is another indicator. Late afternoon easily.

Dan

Nor do I. Especially since the shadows in the "2nd roll" clearly show a low sun.

I agree that it's a "late" afternoon shadow. If it were around 12 noon the sun would be directly overhead and be casting a very short shadow.

According to a map of Bluff Creek in Byrne's book on p. 132, at the point that P & G rounded the log pile and encountered Patty they would have been riding roughly in a NW to N direction. Referring to Krantz's map on p. 88 Patty started walking away in a roughly NW to N direction. If the track being cast in the above photo is pointing roughly NW to N, then that long shadow indicates that the sun has "swung" past due South towards the SW.

Roger

This is a minor detail, but at noon, on Oct 21st, the sun would not be anywhere near directly overhead. It would be as short and as high overhead as it's gonna get, but the farther distant from the equator the cast shadow is, the longer it will be. For instance, at Amundsen Scott South Pole Station at midsummer at noon, the sun is still only 23.5 degrees above the horizon and it casts a commensurately long shadow though that is as short as it can get. I'd bet that at the latitude of Bluff Creek, on that date the shadow at mid-day would be at an angle of about 45degrees above the horizon. It would cast a shadow that is as long as the object is high.
And it sure does get dark early and fast that time of the year when you're camping especially.

Yeah, you are right about the sun never being directly overhead at noon in Northern California. I found a drawing of the Earth depicting the summer solstice in the northern hemisphere. The sun would only be directly overhead (90 degrees) at the Tropic of Cancer (at 23.5 degrees north latitude). And just as the sun would only be 23.5 degrees above the horizon at the South Pole during the southern hemisphere summer solstice, it would likewise be 23.5 degrees above the horizon at the North Pole during the northern hemisphere summer solstice.

Roger

Excellent. I knew sooner or later you wouldn't be able to talk about bigfoot with any degree of authority until you gained a thorough understanding of astronomy!


Thanks, DDA. That's what I wanted to know.

What's next Greg?

Dan

Greg I think it's something like this.

Location: 123.7 degrees West, 41.43 degrees North
Date and Time: 1967/10/20,13:30 , -8hr from GMT
Twilight: Morning -6 degrees, Evening -6 degrees
Sun Altitude: 34.21 degrees
Sun Azimuth: 207.18 degrees
Morning Twilight : 6:04
Sun Rise: 6:32
Midday: 11:59
Sun Set: 17:27
Evening Twilight: 17:55

m

You might ask DDA .. I just try to address them as they come up ..


We can play with this a little more ..

Depends on how long, slender, and how perpendicular the object was that is casting that shadow ...
We don't have any of that information.

However, that shadow is a good indicator of the direction the sunlight was coming from ( front - left ), and when you consider that, it would indicate
a relatively high ( at least 34 degrees at 1330 ) angle of the sun, for the brim of the hat to be casting the shadow we see on the side of rogers face.

Also, note the shadow of Rogers nose in this pic..



It falls on his lips and chin directly below his nose . Not higher and to the right like it would, if the sun was lower ..

Looking at that shadow, I would suggest the sun was higher than the 34 degrees of 13:30 ..



But, there is nothing to indicate the time proximity of the filming of the tracks, and the filming
of Roger making the casts ..



I think I have the clip these stills were made from .. I'll have to take a closer look.. I'm pretty sure that there
is a wider/taller angle of view than shown here .. There may be more to see.

Keep digging. You'll prove Patty is real eventually.

Dan

Nope .. Only a body that shares Patty's physical traits will prove she could have been real ..




No more shadow analysis ?


I could have overlooked how a low sun would produce that shadow of Roger's nose .

Any ideas ?

Greg,

As I stated in my above Post #9, Patty's tracks are pointing roughly N by NW, which is the direction P & G were riding when they encountered Patty, and the direction in which she walked away from them. The long shadow to the left of Patty's casted print indicates sun has "swung" past due South towards the SW. Which means we have a late afternoon sun position.

Roger

"I could have overlooked how a low sun would produce that shadow of Roger's nose ."

"Any ideas ?"

Why yes Greg, I do. And if you look closely, you will too. Shadows are interesting things, but they are effected by many things that at first glance don't seem to make sense. There are enough shadows in the above photographs to suggest the sun is at an angle low in the sky and not high. You have one shadow in the entire sequence that seems out of place. You ignored the suggestion to trace a line from the edge of the shadow on Roger's back to the brim of his hat, and focused on a shadow that seems to indicate Roger's nose is casting a long shadow. You ignore the rather long shadow in the foot prints, despite their having very shallow edges and focus on what appears to you to be suggestive of a high sun.

There were shadow anomalies on the moon as well and the conspiracy theorists went mad. In the end, the reflectivity of the moon's surface - similar to the reflectivity of light skin - allowed shadows to form some distance from the edge that created them, while area one would think would be in shadow, experienced some reflected light. What was created was a form of disembodied shadow.

Look at the shadow again. look at the tilt of Roger's head and compare it with the other shadows. The direction of the shadow and such. See if it comes to you.

Dan

The length of the shadow is affected by the geometry of the surface onto which it is cast. Were the subject's face a flat perpendicular object, at known angles, etc we could use it, like the other shadows, to determine the angle of the sun, but the face here is irregularly spherical but basically obloid and a short shadow such as you'd expect from the nose in the photo would seem to stretch as the receding curivng suface of the face extends away from our view. I don't see any definite known sizes and orientations for sure but when I look at the shadow the cuff of his pants make on the ground behind his cowboy boot, it seems to me to say that the sun is at low angles, though the strong contrast and angle of the camera seems to say bright mid-day sky and short shadows. There's no doubt some geometry specialists who can analyze it with a higher degree of certainty...and I sure wish they would.

A long shadow, is meaningless unless you can show the object that is casting it.

Speculation about the orientation/direction of the tracks is interesting, but not supported by any evidence we have been shown .



What about the nose shadow ?

Could you diagram that ? How are you tracing a light ray on the Z axis ( from the left front area in relation to Patterson ) across his hat to the shadow.

You should be able to match a feature on the hat to a feature on the shadow.


In the zoom below I have tried to line up a feature on the shirt with the shadow below .
( The thicker red line is indicating the azimuth to the sun . )



If the line is ~correct, it would indicate a sun even higher than what it could have been at zenith on 10/20/67 ..

However I could certainly be seeing something wrong.. That was just one thing I grabbed real quick.
As I said earlier, I believe have a few seconds of video these stills are derived from .. I will see if I can
find some features and their shadows that will lend themselves to a further analysis..

I'll take that as a " No, you can't account for the nose shadow with a low sun .. "


I didn't ignore it . You ignored my response.



I say ' high ' , you say ' low ' .. I haven't seen any ray tracing that would support your position, nor have I presented any that is conclusive either .. I hope to have something in a day or two.. If I can't justify my position, I'll be happy to admit it.


Sounds like something to keep in mind while we look at these things.


I'll do that .

Greg,

As far as the shadow under the nose, it's too small to use for my illustration estimating the position of the sun in the sky and time of day. Logically, whatever is casting that "long shadow" has the sun directly behind it. That's all the information I need, plus the orientation/direction of Patty's tracks.

And the track orientation/direction isn't speculation and is supported by Byrne/Krantz. When Patty walked away from P & G she was heading in a roughly N by NW direction up the creek bed (again by referring to maps on Byrne p. 132 & Krantz p. 88).

I'll use my same cropped image from my Post #9. A line drawn thru the track indicates North (top) and South (bottom). The second line drawn thru the shadow will intersect the N|S line. The object making the "long shadow" has the sun directly behind it, therefore the "shadow line" points in a roughly SW|NE orientation, therefore the sun should be in the SW.

And using bipto's data from Post #4, as we have approx. 11 hours of daylight, we can figure out the approx. time of day that the sun would be in the SW. So sunrise in the East at approx. 7:30AM + 8 hours and 15 minutes gives us an approx. time of 3:45PM when the sun is in the SW sky casting that "long shadow"

Actually this has been a fun exercise and I ended up convincing myself thru trial and error if no one else. This is how I see things, and any and all errors are my own.

Roger.

The problem is, Greg is thinking one dimensionally, when the characters in the photograph were three dimensional at the time of the photo. The photo is a one dimensional image, but the shadow representation is that of a three dimensional scene. If one cannot think three dimensionally, they will be confused by the shadow representation in a one dimensional photograph. All the items on Roger's body have a role to play in the shadows cast and the direction of the sun is consistent with all the shadows. You have multiple surfaces casting shadows and they are of different sizes and they cover different amounts of area. Shadows can be deceiving when you have a one dimensional view of a three dimensional scene.

Both the nose and the cheek are in play with the shadow. This goes back to my last post and surface reflectivity.

Dan

If you want to talk to someone else about what you think I am thinking, try a PM .


Then I'm sure you can show us exactly what is happening with a ray tracing analysis.

I'm not an artist and I don't draw cartoons.


Dan

At 3:45 P.M., the altitude of the sun would have been 17 degrees .. ( azimuth 238, so your N - S line is pretty close if it was indeed Oct 20th .. )
You might see how that fits with the shadows ..

Was the tree line pretty short SW of where Roger is, in this Film ?

Greg,

I'm not sure of the exact location of the spot where Patterson cast the prints and its relation/distance to the tree line, but I scanned p.132 of Byrne's book which has a map of Bluff Creek.

Byrne states on p. 120 that the stream bed itself was probably 100 yards wide above Notice Creek (near bottom of map); that P&G where riding north in the stream bed, and that the large log pile that P&G rounded surprising Patty was 100 feet in width and fifteen feet in height.

Hope this helps.

Roger

Monkey's Uncle is on the right track, but the length of the shadows isn't as significant as their direction. We can determine the precise time interval when Patty laid down the tracks and when Roger cast them if we know 2 things:

1) The direction angle of the trackway w.r.t. North
2) The time that Patty laid down the tracks

But even without knowing this info we can still estimate a minimum time interval between events. First assume that it was 1:30pm when the tracks were laid down. Now let's estimate Patty's direction of travel. From the shadows at this time of day she appeared to have travelled North East. Roger P appeared to be facing almost due North when he took the footage. As long as we can assume that the sun was over Patty's right shoulder we can establish a minimum time frame.

Frames 413 & 426 from the PGF show shadows across Patty's back cast from the trees between her and Roger. Here's an overhead diagram from Roger's POV showing where the sun must have been to cast these shadows.



Now that we have a rough idea what direction Patty was travelling w.r.t. the sun, her actual direction of travel depends on what time of day it was that would place the shadows in this alignment. Regardless of the time of year the sun's highest point in the sky is at 12:00 noon (except for daylight savings). The sun moves east to west and at noon the sun is in the south and casts shadows due north. Since we are assuming the PGF was filmed at 1:30pm, the sun was casting shadows at 22.5 degrees east of north (1.5hrs/24hrs*360deg). So if the sun was directly behind Patty, she would be travelling at 22.5 NE. But the sun was over her right shoulder so she must have been travelling > 22.5 degrees east of north. With this information we can use the shadows to measure the relative time between events.



I superimposed a sundial at the intersection point that Monkey's Uncle established, which was a line thru the shadow on the left of the frame and another line thru the trackway. I used this as a clock center for measuring sun angles. The shadows travel clockwise On this sundial as the sun moves from east to west. The sundial represents a 24 hr period. We know the sun was over Patty's right shoulder so let's place our sun angle for 1:30 approx 20 degrees to the right of the trackway angle. Now let's rotate the sundial to approximate 1:30 for this sun angle. The sundial shows that Roger cast the track at approx. 5:30pm. This is 4 hours later. But even if we didn't know what time of day Patty made the track, we know the sun was over her right shoulder. If the sun was directly behind her we would rotate the sundial to align the 1:30 mark along her trackway. This would place the shadow on the left at approx. 3 hours after the tracks were laid. But the sun wasn't directly behind her so the time interval was > 3 hours.

IMO, there is little doubt that at least 3 hours transpired between the footage of Patty and Roger casting her track. A refined estimate would likely put this interval at greater than 4 hours. In which case the time line works for me.

Small problem with your picture above ..

The Sun set at 5:27 PM .. ( 123.7 degrees West, 41.43 degrees North Oct 20, 1967 )



Here are the numbers ..

I used the time of 3:45 that Roger ( Monkey's Uncle ) postulated .

Based on the LAT/LONG that Mangler provided, the vector of the long shadow will be ~238 degrees . ( The azimuth of the Sun, at that time on that date )

The altitude of the Sun at that time would be 17 degrees above the horizon ( at sea level )..

Based on the map that Roger provided , ( think 238 S/SW ) it looks like the sun should be dropping below some tree tops, if not the
rise above the creek banks by 3:45 .


Roll number two doesn't appear to me, to have the lighting conditions I would expect , at that location, on that date, at that time.. ( after 3 PM )


If the long shadow is being cast by a ( relatively ) short object, where is Patterson's long shadow along the same vector ?



P.S.

Here is where I'm getting all that nifty azimuth/altitude stuff...

http://aa.usno.navy.mil/data/docs/AltAz.html


Wish I could say I was doing it all in my head ..

You mean this isn't right?

The GPS coords of the PGF film site are 41N 26.301' 123W 42.357'

Here's the view of the sun for Oct 20, 1967 at that location at 5:30pm.

Click to view attachment

Frickin forum just ate my post.

I guess this will be the condensed version. At 4:30pm the whole basin would have been in the shadows. For the days/evenings events to fit, certain things had to happen at certain times. Sighting, gathering horses, a lame but time consuming attempt at tracking, returning to camp for casting materials, back to site, casting, allowing casts to dry a bit, returning to camp, getting organized, leaving for Hodgson's store, meeting with Hodgson and others, airport, finding a pilot willing to fly off into a fairly nasty low pressure system . . . I find it foolish to make assumptions when we do not even know for sure what time the film was shot. If it was shot at noon there really is no problem with the timeline (or the sun), if it was shot at 1:30pm the timeline becomes very, very tight.

I went to Bluff Creek in the early 80's and have always thought that I new the exact location, but after listening to all the people who have been down there since I'm not so sure anymore. Maybe DDA could pin point the site location on this map and then I'll go from there. I hate to make myself look more stupid than I actually am (I'm kind of funny that way).



m

Where's my map?

m

Tour de force, man. Great post.

One thing that we may not have considered here is that in 1967 the creek area P&G worked in that day had been scoured out by tremendous rains and flooding in the previous year. I can't recall at the moment, but it was either 1966 or 1965. In fact, if you go to Willow Creek, you'll see a large section of the mountainside above the town where the forest is all a uniform height. That area slid down into the town in the year of heavy rain, so we're talking about a lot of water. Bluff Creek today is very different than it was in Patterson's film. Today, it's hard to find the film spot and the trees and brush don't allow you to see anything like the distance they could back in 1967. My point is, yes they were in the mountains and would have been in shadow earlier than sunset, but that could easily have been mitigated by the lack of trees and other vegetation on the creek bottom.

I don't know greg...but with the angle of the object's shadow to Patterson's fore, one would expect the majority of his shadow to be on the other side of his body and since the photographer is standing at an angle with the sun over his or her shoulder, the camera wouldn't see the majority of the shadow hidden by Roger's body.

Of course this rodeo clown knew all of this when he hoaxed the whole thing.

Dan

I guess your post got mangled.

I stated that the time of the 2nd reel footage was entirely dependent on knowing the time the PGF was shot. Anywhere from 12:00 to 1:30 would work. Just rotate the sundial to whatever time you want. Even if the PGF was shot before 1:30, it doesn't change the 4 hour difference between events. The relative difference on the sundial between events is independent of the time of day.

The PGF location is known accurately enough so that the time of sunset can be established with confidence. As you suggested, only the topography could affect this time. However, since the creek runs west/east at the PGF site, the sun could set between the walls of the basin without getting obscured by them. Also, as Bibto suggested, the area looked quite different in Oct 1967. I'm not sure how you can assume that shadows would cover the basin by 4:30pm. Not saying you're wrong, but how about demonstrating this on a topo map. If someone knows the precise direction of the print that Roger is casting or the exact time of the PGF this discussion would be moot. I think we're quibbling over the start time anyway. Either way 4 hours seemed to have been enough time. IMO, speculating on hoax scenarios seems like more of a stretch.

A according to The U.S. Naval Observatory it's not.




Is your information based on DST ?

Was DST in effect ?

( EDIT: )
In your image the sun is about 17 degrees above the horizon so that jives with 1630 PSDST .. Not 1730
I suppose the USNO info could be wrong.. I'd like to hear a reason why I should think it is ..




Let's assume your sunset info is correct .. ( DST was in effect )

Let's say ( just for calculation purposes ) the highest point of Roger's hat is 2.5 feet from the ground .

How long would his shadow be with the Sun at an altitude of 17 degrees ? ( keeping in mind it should line up with the vector of the
long shadow we have been looking at )






While we are having fun ... During what month would you guess this picture was taken in ..
( Hint: Don't let the jacket throw you .. )

The red lines should help in estimating the angle of the sun ...

I'm not quibbling over the start time; I'm quibbling over when the alleged 2nd Roll was shot ..


We can show where the Sun was at any time, on any date you choose, and calculate the length of shadows .

Your sun dial picture and explanation above, is in error .. It doesn't show the true azimuth of the Sun at 4:30 PST or 5:30 PSDT.. ( based on the long narrow shadow )

You are being misleading to point to that diagram as an accurate analysis of the time frame that footage was shot in .

SG;

How did I know that you would incorporate that picture into this discussion? I would have bet bank on it.




m

Gigantofootecus;

NASA tells me the sun is behind the ridge at 4:30pm.

m

Now at 3:30 there is plenty of sun. BTW the cross is close to site location, I think.

m

I am kind of pressed for time right now so I wont go into much detail. I threw this together using some modeling software.

This is the image I get using these numbers ( decimal ) at 4:30pm:

Location: 123.7 degrees West, 41.43 degrees North
Date and Time: 1967/10/20,16:30 , -8hr from GMT
Twilight: Morning -6 degrees, Evening -6 degrees
Altitude:8.81 degrees
Azimuth:247.52 degrees
Morning Twilight : 6:04
Sun Rise: 6:32
Midday: 11:59
Sun Set: 17:27
Evening Twilight: 17:55


You will just kind of have to trust me that this is the site location. My info for modeling comes from the FTP directory /srtm/version2/ at e0srp01u.ecs.nasa.gov
I have checked my numbers with NASA, NOAA and a couple other places, so unless I am way off base this is how it looked at 4:30pm Oct. 20, 1967.

BTW the camera is heading 52 degrees with a minus 41.8 degree pitch.


m

Gigantofootecus,

Here is your sun dial overlaid on the map Monkey's Uncle provided..





It look likes the Sun would be shining down the canyon at that location around noon.

It also looks like there would be a lot of shade, not long after that . Even more so in the fall..

Mangler,

Your modeling is very interesting and elucidating. I'm just trying to ascertain which time values are used/expressed in your modeling software and whether you used Standard or Daylight time values.

On the U.S. Naval Observatory's site Altitude/Azimuth Table, "the altitude and azimuth values are tabulated as a function of the standard time of the place requested (daylight time is not used) on a 24-hour clock."

On the "Sun and Moon Data for One Day" table, Daylight time is used and was in effect on Friday October 20, 1967. Changeover to Pacific Standard time took place on Sunday October 29, 1967:

The following information is provided for Redding, Shasta County, California (longitude W122.4, latitude N40.6):

Friday
20 October 1967 Pacific Daylight Time

SUN
Begin civil twilight 6:58 a.m.
Sunrise 7:26 a.m.
Sun transit 12:54 p.m.
Sunset 6:23 p.m.
End civil twilight 6:50 p.m.

Thanks for your efforts and keep up the good work!

P.S.

From what I can tell, California should have been on DST in 1967. It would have ended on the last Sunday in October.

So our Sun observations should be GMT -7 ..


The figures I was giving above for 3:45 PM, would have been 4:45 PM locally ..

The 238 azimuth in the overlay above would have been ~ 4:45 local...

I'll work up a chart of what the azimuth & altitude of the sun would have been from 11:00 am to 5:00 pm.

I will also show how shadow length would have changed during that time.


Meanwhile, at noon on 10/20/67 , the Azimuth was 162.4 and the altitude 36.4 ..

From some rough work I have done, the 36.4 is close to what I am coming up with, looking at shadows in the Patty footage..

So, based on that, a noonish shooting for Patty time seems reasonable ...

Monkey's Uncle;

Yup, that's my error . . . F-


m

Yeah, right. The time frame is accurate. The only thing in dispute is the time the PGF was shot, within 1 or 2 hours. I told you the sundial was based on knowing the time of day that the PGF was shot. You seem to be focused on the azimuth of the sun that day. This angle is too difficult to determine with the reel 2 shot. I wouldn't trust any estimate. Nor is it necessary. The angle of the shadows tell the tale. My sundial shows the relative time between events, which is 4 hours. If you have a better idea when the PGF was shot, then rotate the sundial and place it at the 1:30 mark. But there's nothing wrong with the sundial itself. You certainly can't overlay an oblique image onto an overhead view and deduce anything from it.

You are right that DST would have been in effect Oct 20, 1967. Since we fall back to Standard time at the end of October, a 1:30pm local time was actually 12:30pm PST. This puts the 2nd reel photo at 4:30pm. This time estimate should address the sunset issue.

MANGLER, are we facing East in your Google Earth shot? And are you referring to a West facing ridge that obscures the sun? Of course this might not matter if the PGF was shot at 1:30pm DST when chronologically it was 12:30pm. This puts the 2nd reel shot at 4:30pm. Regardless, the time between events was 4 hours.

............ And at 4:30 , Patterson's shadow would have been well over 8 feet long (if you allow 2.5 feet for his height in the picture ) ..

It clearly isn't ..

I do not comprehend your failure to address this.


_________________________________________________


I have a question about this frame, captured from the ' Mysterious Monsters ' copy of PGF..

It looks like the light source is coming more from the right, than it was in the ' Turn & Look ' ..

Is the large log the same one seen in ' Turn & Look ' ?

It appears that Patterson crossed over the log, then turned over 90 degrees in order to shift the light source that much ..

I edited the picture above to include my Sun angle and time-of-day estimate..

Gigantofootecus,

I dont use google so I can not be certain which image you are referring to. The first two are from worldwind, looking 66 degrees on the map overlay and 56 degrees on the sat overlay. The third (with shadow) I modeled looking 52 degrees.

I think Greg is right in questioning the length of the shadows, but not knowing the exact timeline of the events in question it's all speculation. But hey, that's never stopped us before.

m

Alright already. I'll address the "altitude" of the sun for that time of day. The azimuth is what I've been addressing with the sundial. Let's get in agreement 1st. The altitude of the sun at 4:30pm PST Oct 20, 1967 for the PGF site was 9 degrees 16.816 mins (9.28 deg) above the horizon. The azimuth was 247d 10.785' (247.18 deg) or 23 deg S of W. The azimuth right at sunset was 256 deg 2.824 min (14 deg S of W).

So the shadows aren't long enough for your liking, due to the apparent height of the sun. My initial response was that the altitude would be more difficult to determine than the azimuth. We need to see the sources of shadows for reference and correct for foreshortening. The oblique angles made by the sun and camera complicate the problem significantly. And photos compress the foreground to background. Those shadows may be way farther back than you think. I'll have a look and get back to you. And if you're right, I'll say as much. Geez this is seeming more like work all the time.

In the MM frame you posted above Roger P did indeed change position by frame 710 to get a better line on Patty. It looks like he moved 10 feet NNW.

Looks like you dropped DST ..


With the Sun at an altitude of 9 degrees, the shadow of a 2.5 ' tall object would have been about 16 ' long.


If we use DST and say it was 4:30 PSDT the altitude was 19 degrees, and the azimuth was 235.8 ..

At this time, a 2.5 foot object will have a shadow about 7.26 ' long.


Click to view attachment

Of course there would be some foreshortening, perhaps someone has the 3D tools to apply it to this image and see what the effect would be.

But first I think we would have to show there was any direct sunlight striking that canyon floor, at that time, on that date.




If you want to work up something with the sun at 9 degrees, we can see how that would look ..




P.S.

My earlier calculations, with the shadow over 8 ' , was based on a time of 4:45 and an altitude of ~17 degrees ..