Showing posts with label ImageJ. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ImageJ. Show all posts

Thursday, January 18, 2018

Non, il n'y a rien d'unique dans les soi-disant propriétés 3D du Suaire de Turin! C'est une propriété générale de toutes les images imprimées! Même les taches de sang et les marques de rousseur répondent!


Affichage en construction.

Voici une série de photographies montrant des rendus en 3D d'une gamme d'images - en commençant par des images simples créées sur un ordinateur sans historique 3D, et se terminant par celles qui le font.

Étant donné qu'il n'y a pas de différence évidente dans la réponse 3D - tous réagissent à un logiciel préprogrammé qui convertit simplement la densité de l'image (peu importe son acquisition) en hauteur sur une troisième dimension entièrement imaginaire, autrement dit la hauteur sur un nouvel axe z.  J'espère que cet article dissipera une fois pour toutes la prétention que la réponse de l'image corporelle du Suaire de Turin dans les programmes informatiques de rendu 3D est unique ou différente à tous égards de celle d'autres empreintes, ou même de peintures .

On peut spéculer sur les raisons des différences de densité d'image sur l'image corporelle TS. Bien que l'on puisse supposer ou non que l'image originale et /ou 3D ait été dérivée d'un sujet 3D par un mécanisme ou un autre (impression par contact, photographie), on n'a pas le droit de conclure que la 3D-ness alléguée de l'image améliorée dit quelque chose sur la 3D-ness du sujet d'origine.

Oui, il est plus que probable que le 'sujet' soit 3D, ou peut-être un bas-relief, mais n'a pas besoin d'être dans le but de générer une réponse 3D dans un logiciel de rendu 3D approprié qui n'a aucun moyen de connaître l'histoire du sujet, ou connaissant la distance entre l'image et le sujet au moment de la capture de l'image.

Preuve? On peut faire une image grossière de l'image corporelle TS, et montrer qu'elle répond aussi étonnamment bien au logiciel de rendu 3D, bien que l'esquisse n'ait aucune histoire 3D.

Résumé: Le logiciel de rendu 3D répond simplement aux différences de densité d'image, et ne dit RIEN sur la manière dont ces différences ont été acquises, que ce soit par simple impression par contact ou par des moyens plus exotiques revendiqués par certains en sindonologie.

Here's a series of photographs showing 3D renderings of a range of images - starting with simple ones created on a computer with no 3D history, and ending with ones that do.  

Given there's no obvious difference in the 3D response - all of them  responding to pre-programmed software that simply converts image density (no matter how acquired)  to height on an entirely imaginary third dimension, i.e. height on a new z axis above the original xy plane - I hope this posting will dispel once and for all the claim that the response of the Turin Shroud body image in 3D-rendering computer programs is in any way unique, or different in any important respects from that of other imprints, or even paintings. 

One can speculate as to the reasons for the differences in image density on the TS body image. While one may or may not suppose the  original and/or 3D-rendered image to have been derived from a 3D subject by one or other mechanism (contact imprinting, some kind of photography) one is not entitled to conclude that the alleged 3D-ness of the enhanced image tells one anything about the 3D-ness of the original subject. 

Yes, it's more than probable that the 'subject' was 3D, or possibly a bas relief,  but did not need to be in order to generate a 3D-response in appropriate 3D-rendering software that has no way of knowing the history of the subject, or knowing the distance between image and subject at the moment of image capture.

Evidence? One can make a crude sketch image of the TS body image, and show that it too responds surprisingly well to 3D-rendering software, despite the sketch having no 3D history whatsoever.

Summary: 3D rendering sofware simply responds to differences in image density, and tells one NOTHING about the manner in which those differences were acquired, whether by simple contact imprinting or more exotic means that are claimed by some in sindonology.



1. Vue dorsale frontale du Suaire de Turin (Shroud Scope) avec contraste ajouté
(Frontal v dorsal views of Turin Shroud body image from Shroud Scope with added contrast)


2. Comme ci-dessus, après le rendu 3D dans le logiciel ImageJ. 
As above, after 3D-rendering in ImageJ software


3. Retour en 2012, cet enquêteur a souligné quelque chose de totalement inattendu si l'image du Suaire était "unique" comme revendiqué. Les 1532 marques de roussissement ont également répondu au rendu 3D!
Back in 2012, this investigator pointed out something totally unexpected if the Shroud image was "unique" as claimed. The 1532 scorch marks also responded to 3D-rendering!



4. On peut utiliser un logiciel graphique pour créer ses propres images sans historique 3D. Ils répondent également magnifiquement au logiciel de rendu 3D
One can use graphics software to create one's own images with no 3D history.  They also respond magnificently to 3D-rendering software



5. Même cette peinture ancienne de l'image du Voile de Veronica répond magnifiquement au logiciel de rendu 3D
Even this ancient painting of the image of the Veil of Veronica responds magnificently to 3D-rendering software



6. Sur la gauche est une empreinte de farine rôtie d'un jouet en plastique 3D (au centre). Cette empreinte a également répondu magnifiquement au logiciel de rendu 3D
On the left is a roasted flour imprint of a 3D plastic toy (centre). That imprint also responded magnificently to 3D-rendering software


7. L'empreinte la plus simple, comme celle de ma main mouillée sur le tissu, peut générer des images 3D, en commençant par l'image négative (tonalité inversée) ou la même après conversion en positif.
The simplest imprint, like this one of my wet hand onto fabric, can generate 3D-images, starting with the negative (tone-reversed) image or the same after conversion to a positive.


8. Une empreinte de farine de ma propre main a été utilisée pour produire cette image 3D de type Suaire
A flour imprint of my own hand was used to produce this Shroud-like 3D image 



9. La farine imprimant mon visage sur le lin a produit cette image, qui a également répondu un peu à la 3D. Le nez déformé était le résultat de presser mon visage dans le linge.
Flour imprinting my face onto linen produced this image, which also responded a little to 3D. The distorted nose was the result of pressing my face down hard into the linen.




10. Un croquis de charbon brut du visage de l'Homme sur le Linceul peut être amélioré, d'abord par inversion de tonalité (négative à positive) suivi d'un rendu 3D pour produire une image sans doute avec cette apparence sereine du Linceul!
A crude charcoal sketch of the face of the Man on the Shroud can be improved, first by tone-inversion (negative to positive) followed by 3D-rendering to produce an image arguably with that serene Shroud-like appearance!



11. Même si la conférence de Pasco, aux États-Unis, a été aussi récente que l'année dernière, on continue de prétendre que la réponse de Shroud au logiciel de rendu 3D est «unique». Où est la preuve pour soutenir cette demande?
Even as recent as last year's Pasco, USA conference, the claim continues to be made that the Shroud response to 3D-rendering software is "unique". Where's the evidence to back up that claim?




12. Voici la page de titre de la publication actuelle sur mon site de blog Shroud spécialisé
Here's the title page of the current posting on my specialist Shroud blogsite

https://shroudofturinwithoutallthehype.wordpress.com/2018/01/12/how-40-years-of-pseudoscience-and-digital-tomfoolery-deftly-morphed-an-imaginative-14th-century-modelling-of-joseph-of-arimatheas-up-and-over-fine-linen-sheet-probably-intended/

Update, October 11, 2018

Here's a link to the current posting placed on my specialist Shroudie site!

https://shroudofturinwithoutallthehype.wordpress.com/2018/10/05/no-mr-barrie-m-schwortz-sturp-did-not-provide-an-example-that-future-shroud-researchers-can-use-to-carefully-plan-their-own-work-sturp-showed-how-not-to-plan-or-execute-objectiv/

(Yes, I take STERA's President to task for holding up the 1978 STURP enterprise as a model of good science! It was anything but - as a read of the inconclusive mealy-mouthed 1981 Summary will demonstrate, given its focus on the strawman 'just a painting' hypothesis, with no mention whatsoever of the unusual negative tone-reversed image. The latter should by rights have prompted STURP to shine the spotlight on imaging via direct-contact imprinting (instead dismissed in a few half-baked tests and negative conclusions).

Tuesday, August 26, 2014

ImageJ's Thermal LUT mode for generating a heat map largely rids the TS face of its alleged "banding effect", prompting reinterpretation of the facial cut-offs.

Note added October 7, 2016: Dear reader. Please be aware that my 5 year Shroud investigation has come on considerably since penning this post over 2 years ago. Indeed, one could say it's reached a conclusion - a very definite one - summed up in this recent photograph:

Centre: plastic Galaxy Warrior, approx 1/12 human scale. Left: thermal  imprint of the same onto linen, using oil/flour as imprinting medium, followed by oven-roasting of the imprinted linen. Right: the same thermal imprint after tone-inversion and 3D-rendering in ImageJ. Note the amazingly close correspondence with the original figurine, except obviouslyfor colour.


Yes, I believe the Shroud to be of medieval provenance, consistent with the radiocarbon dating (1260-1390). Moreover, I believe it to be a thermal imprint of a real adult man, obtained using the technology decribed above. A final wash of the thermal imprint with  soap and water would have removed all traces of the imprinting medium. That would leave just a faint attenuated 'enigmatic' image, a fair description one might think of the Turin Shroud. Purpose?  The latter was intended to represent what a 1300 year old body imprint (sweat, blood) would or might look like some 1300 or so years later.

See my recent Shroud posting for more details.


Start of the original 'Thermal LUT' posting:




How many times have we been solemnly assured that the sharp cut off at opposite sides of the TS image is "just a banding effect" due to yarn-to-yarn variation?  How probable is that given the high degree of bilateral symmetry, or the break in linearity at one of the cheekbones (your right)? See my previous attempts to get my head round the existing and largely unsatisfactory literature.

Don't ask (yup, there are so many things one is not supposed to ask, unless one wishes to invite ridicule - or  derogatory remarks that question one's scientific credentials).

Here's an image obtained using my new toy (hat tip to OK on t'other site) that should by rights kick that banding idea into the long grass.

Click to enlarge


(Technical note: the first graphic above was a Shroud Scope image to which I had given my customary contrast-enhancement in MS Office Picture Manager. For the Thermal image above, the input was Shroud Scope's "as is" image: the software seems perfectly happy to work on an entry-level image that is available to everyone, including those who don't wish to be bothered with photo-editing programs, and it's not a bad thing anyway to dispense with any initial image-enhancement that might risk creating artefacts, or lay one open to the charge of being cavalier in that respect).


It's been obtained by using a setting in ImageJ known as Thermal LUT ( LookUp Table) mode, available as an option on the 3D image-rendering option. It not only reads 2D image intensity, plotting that on a third dimension (z axis). It also colour-codes the gradation of image intensity - see chart on right - to create an admittedly somewhat fanciful  'heat map' ranging from blue (lowest relief) through shades of green and yellow to red (highest relief).

Straightaway one can see that the sharp cut-off at the sides of the face, aka excessive and unrealistic 'linearity', disappears almost completely.   With it must surely disappear any idea that the cut-offs had anything to do with banding. Instead, the cut-off must surely be telling us something about the nature of the 3D (or semi-3D) subject from which the (negative) imprint was taken.

(Late addition, Aug 31 : some have got the wrong end of the stick, and think I'm saying that banding is non-phenomenon. I've said nothing of the sort. Banding is a reality, though whether it's the result of yarn variation due to batch-to-batch variation in bleaching technique is another matter. See the 'new paradigm from Hugh Farey which attributes banding to interactions between the herring bone weave and mechanical bunching caused by rolling and folding etc. Nope. I'm not rejecting banding at all. I'm saying that the severe cut offs at the sides of each cheek, producing those pale largely image-free vertical bands between cheek and hair on BOTH sides, i.e. symmetrically, is nothing to do with  banding, and that other explanations must be sought. One does not need to agree with my explanation for the cut-off effect (properties of an imprinting template, not linen) to reject banding as the reason for the cut-offs.)

My own fast-crystallizing thoughts are the same as those expressed by the admirable Professor Luigi Garlaschelli, he of the imaginative and scientifically-sophisticated  reconstruction of possible medieval "forgery" technology, namely that a  bas-relief  template was used for the face, ie. a casting with shallow relief, but other possibilities are not excluded.

Here's an example of a modern-day bas relief made in bronze.  Yup, that's heat-resistant bronze. How I wish I had something similar. It would be inside my oven before you could say "negative thermal imprint" or even "scorch".


Are there other features in that 'heat map' that fit with a bas relief template? Yes, methinks there's at least one. It's the intense imaging of the beard, and (especially) the moustache. In an thermal imprinting ("contact scorch") model, it's possible that a heavy imprinting of the chin might look like a beard. But a moustache also? Wouldn't that imply a row of front teeth that were set too far forward in the jaw bone?

One wonders how the "radiationists" would try to account for the prominence of facial hair in their fanciful models, those I tag as "theo-physics".  Wouldn't any hair be instantly singed off by any radiation sufficiently energetic to leave an imprint on linen?  Heck, how come those radiationists able to get away with describing themselves as "scientists" in their 'look-at-me' press releases, the same ones who bang on about the impossibility of a forger being able to create "microscopic complexity" at the fibre level, thus betraying their total ignorance of physical and chemical principles (reminder: atoms and molecules are self-ordering, almost as if they had a "mind of their own" in common parlance, which is needless to say a consequence of those quantized electron energy levels that spontaneously generates  'microscopical complexity'. See my previous analogy with the snow-making machine, where microscopic complexity arises simply from cooling water vapour or liquid aerosols, i.e. from abstracting, not adding kinetic and thermal  energy.

It should be clear by now that I have lost patience entirely with those radiationists. They are turning science and scientists into laughing stocks, especially when they preface their remarks to MSM journalists and bloggers with "speaking as a scientist". "Speaking as a totally gormless numpty" more like it.


I'll be looking at the rest of the TS image, frontal and dorsal, region by region with my new toy in the next few days. Maybe there will be more surprises and (hopefully) new insights in store. Thanks once again, OK.

Wednesday Aug 27

Here is the region of the crossed hands (a promising one in a diagnostic sense for distinguishing between contact-only v non-contact permitted models) shown at four levels of "heat", i.e. 3D amplification:


Click to enlarge

It's that first one that I find especially interesting, one in which the "heat" has been turned down to a very low setting, such as to show small areas of blue ("very cold") which might reasonably be interpreted as the basal background value of a non-imaged area. (Reminder: it would be unrealistic to assume that non-imaged areas are totally colour-free, since the TS background colour is a faint yellow, not a pure white.)

Click to enlarge

What we see there is a clear discrimination between sizeable areas of crossed hands/abdomen compared with surrounding areas, notably the thigh (viewer's right) and the areas immediately abutting onto the crossed hands and abdomen.

Can any conclusions be drawn?

One has to proceed cautiously, in view  of the background colour problem . But here's where the ability to ramp up the "heat" comes into its own, offering a superior analytical tool when compared to standard ImageJ 3D enhancements that lack the 'tunable' colour coding.

Let me explain. In the picture above, one of the thighs (reader's right) appears to be essentially non-imaged, which initially came as a surprise to me, and made one wary.Surely a thigh would be imaged, whether the imprinting was by contact-only or not?

However, it was imaged, as can be seen by turning up the heat, and its 3D shape becomes more obvious at the higher settings. So even a raised part of a subject's relief can be poorly imaged, relative to other raised parts (crossed hands). Is that because of an air gap between cloth and subject, which may have allowed weak imaging, or is it because there was no air gap, allowing direct contact between cloth and subject, but with some other factor operating to produce weak imaging, relative to those crossed hands and forearms?

More to come (after I've given those questions some more thought).

07:50   Well, I've thought. Frankly, I cannot see why the thigh is poorly imaged in any model that allows for non-contact. Either the thigh would be very close to the subject, or would be in physical contact, so the cloth-distance measurement is small  - a matter of mm at most- or zero, and if radiation were the only factor, then thigh imaging should have been stronger. That;s assuming that the radiationists are not suggesting that contact opens the door for non-radiation physics too. What would that be? Heat conduction? But that required a hot subject - like a heated statue. It is inconceivable that a corpse could ever be hot enough to imprint an image by heat conduction.

So where does that leave us? Let's forget about radiation and focus on heat conduction, requiring direct contact. But while direct contact in that model (the only realistic model in my view) is necessary for imprinting an image, it may not be sufficient to guarantee a strong imprint.

What are the other factors, apart from obligatory contact, that make for a stronger or weaker imprint? Model studies provide immediate answers. They are: 1. temperature of the template 2. contact time. 3. contact pressure  4. curvature of the template, resulting in different angles of presentation.

Let's home in some more on the fingers. They seem to show promise as an especially diagnostic area for distinguishing between alternative imaging mechanisms (radiation projection v direct imprinting) reinforced by some recent experiments I reported using imprints of my own hand. (It wasn't the entire finger that imprinted, only the bony central spine, giving the appearance of separated fingers when  in fact they weren't).

I started using the same 4 steps as used above for the crossed hands. Here they are in sequence:



.

.







And here for good measure is a 5th in the tuning-down sequence, with plenty of blue to show we are near to background levels of image intensity.:



Interpretation?  I'll be back when I've had time to digest.

Update: this scurrilous, indeed slanderous comment has just appeared on Troll Central:

anoxie
August 27, 2014 at 4:15 am
You’ve already answered Dan. This is just another obvious illustration of CB’s bad habit to distort/select/ignore facts.


 And what' prompted it you may ask? It's on a pirated version of this very posting, yet one instance in scores of my content being used within hours or even minutes of me posting to provide instant entertainment to the bored souls who assemble at that site to be given their daily fix of pro-authenticity reassurance.




Note the item I have ringed in yellow, top right hand corner. It's a link to the second of Thibault Heimburger's pdfs ( "potpourris de fantasie" as I call them). The first, also in the sidebar, claims that scorch imprints will always display excessive contrast compared to the image TS, to which my answer is/was: "Yes, they will if you choose an unsuitable template, i.e. a sunken relief instead of bas relief".  That claim, based on an cavalier piece of experimental design is now stated as fact in the wiki entry for Shroud of Turin under the sub-heading "Bas relief". (Yes, a wiki contributor too has got it wrong too).

As for that circled pdf, the second, words simply fail me, claiming as it does that one cannot scorch a few superficial fibres in a linen thread - that it's "all-or-nothing". That's not just wrong. It's laughably and grotesquely wrong, as I have pointed out, with and without a microscope, yet the pdf is steill there, being advertised, indeed highlighted in red. I've asked Thibault Heimburger to withdraw it - he hasn't. Yesterday I asked the site's owner to at least provide a facility for attaching comments to pdfs that are otherwise closed-off to criticism, and been met with a blank refusal. Meanwhile, that same owner continues to pirate my content on a daily basis.

What am I going to do? Answer: nothing. I've spelled out clearly what is happening, so as to let folk see things for what they are. The promoters of pro-authenticity have no ideas of their own - good or bad. All they can do is grub around for other people's ideas, and then sit in their little cave gnawing away at the meat and bone until all that's left is detritus. Far be it from me to deprive them and their provider of their sad, saprophytic* lifestyle.

* Saprophyte: any organism that lives on dead or decaying organic matter.

(Yup, the second part is an apt description of what happens to my postings  in that cave, after they have been messed about to make Porter's potted versions). 

Back to the pure clean air of science: at the risk of being accused of "selecting"  data (what could possibly have been selected - or rather de-selected- in this posting?) the images above dovetail neatly with those I produced last month from imprinting my hand:

From the archives: 


It seems so obvious now (why the Man on the Turin Shroud has bony fingers and no thumbs). The image is NOT a photograph. It's an 'impactograph'.
 
from Tuesday, July 15, 2014

The conclusion I arrived at then is reinforced with the new thermal graphics, inasmuch as the latter look "bony". Now why should that be, one may ask? What is it telling us about the imaging mechanism. Leaving aside those fanciful ideas that a  recently-deceased cadaver in a 1st century tomb turned briefly into a hospital X-ray machine (yes, really!) let's ask which fits - a radiation-allowing-air gaps model or a  conduction/contact only-no-air-gaps-allowed model.

Stretch out your hand, palm down, and place the edge of a ruler across the fingers. What the greatest gap between flesh and ruler? Answer - a few millimetres at most, so any conjectured radiation has only to cross a tiny air gap, where such gaps exist, everywhere on the hand. There is little potential there one might think for getting a clear impression of fingers, much less seeing prominent joints (knuckles) or gaps between fingers.

Now consider a contact-only model, There one expects all-or-nothing imprinting, so one DOES expect to see individual fingers, through failure to image between fingers where there is loss of contact. One might also expect the central bony part of fingers and the bony joints to imprint better than the more fleshy parts. Well, that is precisely what one is seeing in those thermal images, and precisely what one is able to model from one's own hands, coated with a safe and suitable paint ( I used a well-known brand of chocolate/hazelnut spread).

Selected data? The only data I select for my science is that which puts my readers into my garage and/or kitchen so they can picture with their own eyes what I am seeing and reporting. Why would I, with a lifetime in scientific research and education, be spending all this time if it were simply to deceive people? Who in their right mind would want to round off their life's work with a reputation for lying and cheating?

The only results I hold back are the ones that fail to make a point. I don't select points according to whether they seem to fit or not fit with a preconception. Scientific experimentation  starts with clearing one's mind of preconceptions.  Only a total moron would attempt to deceive himself and others. This blogger/retired scientist may be many things, some of them possibly unflattering, but he is most certainly not a moron. At least, my wife and grown-up children say I'm not, which is good enough for me. What that troll chooses to think is her business, but she ought to be more careful about what she says about people like myself who blog under their real names with reputations at stake, while hiding as she does behind her  French pseudonym. Why does Dan Porter allow that troll to trickle her poison onto his site? Does he think it spices up the site? If so, then he is equally culpable in allowing it  to be used as a platform for making character attacks. I'm not issuing threats - simply asking for a little human decency.

Update:  12:40. Comment addressed to the toxic anoxie:


August 27, 2014 at 7:27 am
Can you provide a Top Five list of CB’s Distorted/Ignored/Select Facts? If you are going to make a claim like this you need to back it up with ‘facts’ yourself. Otherwise you are guilty of one CB claim – that you are a troll ..........................

Thanks DavidG. It's good to see there are still folk like yourself, prepared once in a while to put their head above the parapet in defence of fair play.

13:45

OK, it's time now to go back to the face (Hugh Farey having made his usual perceptive analysis elsewhere, to which I may return later) and starting with maximum "heat", repeat the same process of draining away the colour-coded '3D-ness' to see what disappears first, and what remains at the end.











I'll be back later, hopefully with some succinct interpretation, or, there again, maybe not.

14:00 Toxic anoxie is back, responding to DavidG's challenge essentially to put up or shut up with a link to Thibault Heimburger's first pdf, the one with the crazy template that I mentioned earlier.

In fact I produced critiques of that pdf in short order - in three instalments - and when they were all ignored by Dan Porter (thus giving TH an easy ride) I did a post purely to flag up the existence of my 3 postings.

Here's a screen grab from 2012:



Here's a link to that paper:

Still Dan Porter ignored my critique, so I gave up and did other things. But the pdf in question remained in the sidebar over there, gradually acquiring hits over the months, gradually improving its Google ranking, so it's no surprise (1) that wiki has made use of it, despite its flawed experimental design and invalid conclusions and  now (2) toxic anoxie is attempting to deploy it as a proxy weapon against me, presumably having nothing of her own to offer.

15:30

I briefly toyed with the idea of posting this image to Troll Central, with the caption: "Spot the bas-relief template" in Thibault's first pdf:





That's bas relief as in this wiki definition:

A bas-relief ("low relief", French pronunciation: ​[baʁəljɛf], from the Italian basso rilievo) or low relief is a projecting image with a shallow overall depth, for example used on coins, on which all images are in low relief.

"As used on coins" note. The relief rises out of the base plane. it does not sink in from the base plane. It is also supposed to have smooth rounded contours, no ledges.

A proper bas relief penetrates into linen easily initially, since the highest planes account for a small farction of the contact area. Pressure builds as more and more of the planes enter the cloth. Thibault's template encounters high resistance as soon as it meets the clothe, and it will then be harder to imprint from the lower plane. Is it any wonder that his scorches display what he called "excessive contrast". It was an even greater shame that he went on to generalise, claiming that all scorch imprints would have excessive contrast. It's an even greater shane that the pdf is still on display on the Porter site, and that it's attempt to dismiss scorching  based on excessive contrast (or colour gradation) is now being relayed to the big wide world via the wiki entry on the TS.

But as regards posting the above to that highly problematical site (in more ways that one, given its tolerance for trolls AND promotion of dud pdfs, I quickly thought better of it. Why bother? It pirates enough of my content as it  is. Why go there simply to work a treadmill, endlessly correcti g all the same old errors and misconceptions. there are folks over there who need their shroud authenticity like others need Maltesers or TV soaps.

16:40:  I have a confession to make. I've been raising and lowering the "heat level" in the TS images without saying how it was done, and/or whether it was scientifically meaningful. What's more the way I did was discovered purely by twiddling controls in ImageJ without any thought as to the underlying matrix transormations (not that I recall much about those, except from private tutoring 'modern maths' some 30 years ago.

Draft only- may be changed.
So what control was used? It's actually one I rarely of ever use.It's the "max" and "min"  slides, bottom right of the ImageJ control panel, which I usually leave set on 100% and 0% respectively.

To produce the changes you see above, I varied the "min" value between about 0% and 50%, leaving the maximum unchanged.

How best can I demonstrate to my readers what changing the min value does? For now let's do it for a home-made image from a previous posting of mine that explored  ImageJ software, one with no 3D history, but a coding for 3D as used on old-style relief maps.

Here's the inputted  image:





Here's how it responded previously  in ImageJ without the new-deployment here of the thermal/colour-coding option.







The max and min controls were set, as I say, at 100% and 0% respectively, as can be confirmed by clicking on the image to enlarge, and reading off the two slide scale values lower right.

So let's enter the 2D image into "Thermal LUT" and see what we get, starting with  the 0%  min value:


OK, compare and contrast with the preceding image. They are comparable, thank goodness, with the bonus now of ImageJ's own colour coding of relief that overrides my own.

The next step is to ramp up the min value by degrees and see what happens in the model system, hopefully to better understand what was happening earlier in my 'suck-it-and-see' MO (this being  a quirky stream-of-semi-consciousness, age-impaired  real-time investigation site - as you may realize - as indeed it has been from Day 1, back at the tail-end of December 2011.


OK, that min value is now at 14%.

The change is subtle.(I'll try to articulate it  later when there's more progression, more trend data to work with.







We're up at 33% now. The effect we are seeing seems to be one of amplifying the highest relief, making it taller, but lopping off the highest relief. That's the point where I stopped with the TS image - when I saw those flat plateaux appearing. We'll now do one more step, if only to confirm the trend.








That's now at 76%.

Methinks it time to get back to the drawing board, where I will play around some more with Thermal LUT.  I'll switch to using my contour line model  probably returning to standard settings on max and min, given the complexity and subtlety of the response to changing the "min" value. (It doesn't  matter how dramatic the effect on the TS image if one cannot adequately explain what the software is doing).

Instead I'll try altering some of the  other controls. One is on a whole new learning curve here, but definitely worth exploring further to see if the software can unmask hidden detail and differences in the TS image.



Getting to grips with this thermal software may take some time, and I don't want to waste people's reading time with any more dead ends. I'll be back once I've made  sense of it. That may take some time, days, possibly weeks. Bye for now.

Update 21:40


in response to Dan:
Can anyone explain how the image* on Colin Berry’s blog can begin to convince us that banding is not really all that real. Maybe you can understand what Colin is saying. Something about “bilateral symmetry.” If anything, it helps to convince me that there really is banding there. You really need to see it in […]
Excuse my need for a general refresher here. The banding is important because, if it exists, it is problematic for the scorch theory because there is no way an artisan could have achieved this effect, therefore it must point to some other image formation process. Is this the gist of why banding matters?
Colin’s investigation points to another possible cause for the banding effect — it not being banding at all. Anoxie is countering that the banding is obviously there. Hugh is not ruling out banding, but is not as convinced as Anoxie as to it’s “obvious” existence.
Fair summation?

This blogger's response: 

My position, for what it's worth, based as much on arts and crafts as it is on science, is that the TS face looks quite unlike a real one - it's too rectangular, too gaunt, too "gothic".

I think the pro-authenticity folk know that, and have been desperate to provide a comforting albeit distracting narrative. It's based on the phenomenon of banding - bleaching differences in the yarn used for weaving.

Nobody doubts the existence of banding, but does it provide an explanation for the rectangular face? I say it doesn't, that it's a red herring, and have previously given reasons based on (a) the improbability of the cut off being at  much the same distance on both sides of the vertical midline (b) the bulge at the cheekbone which lies across the cut-off line and (c) the baked-in neck/chin crease (an integral part of the image in my opinion)  that is also indifferent to the region of image-interruption, i.e pale areas between cheek and hair.

If it's not banding, what is it that causes the cut-off? Well, if the facial image is rather too gaunt and mask-like, then that suggests, does it not, that it was derived from a gaunt and mask-like template, which in turn suggests, after Luigi Garlaschelli, that a bas-relief template was used?

Somehow, don't ask me how,  the thermal picture in ImageJ has a blindspot for banding - the face in 3D colour-coded mode no longer looking so rectangular, having a wavy edge, with scarcely a hint of linearity or banding in sight.

It may not be clinching evidence, but it's one more nail in the coffin for the facile "banding-explains-all" cop out.

Reply:


in response to Colin Berry:
If you can spare a minute, David, scroll down to the far end of my current posting re banding (revisited) and you will see your comment (2.31pm) and a possible clarification. http://colinb-sciencebuzz.blogspot.fr/2014/08/imagejs-thermal-lut-mode-for-generating.html
A good clarification of your side of the issue. I don’t really ‘buy’ one assumption though — that the face is too rectangular, too Gothic. If anything the face looks swollen to me, which is exactly what I’d expect of a death mask. I saw my share of corpses as the son of an undertaker, and the man on the Shroud sure looks like one. We are not dealing with a painting, we all agree on that. We are dealing with a yet to be confirmed image process. Because we do not know how it works, we cannot rule out any image distortion caused from that process.
Your research is in an effort to prove that a medieval scorch theory cannot be ruled out. You’ve made some strides there. On the other hand, nothing you have discovered, to me, has ruled out a 1st century origin. I believe you’ve acknowledged this as well, pointing out that a scorch (in the broader sense of the term) theory might support a 1st century origin.
Question: a bit off topic perhaps. Can sound waves create latent images on surfaces other than liquid ones? The banding (lines) on the TS remind me of sound ripples in some pics. Too sci-fi perhaps, but could an ultra-sonic pulse have created a reaction on the linen forming an image? A Big Bang mistaken for an earthquake perhaps? Sorry, the creative writer in me is bleeding onto the page at this point.

My response: The immediate goal for me is not to try proving or disproving that the TS is first century (for that we'll need repeat radiocarbon dating, if only to dismiss the re-weaving story), It's to demolish the various dogmas still doing the rounds about the TS image being different in character to any thermal imprint, medieval or otherwise, based on dated experiments and observations, ones that look increasingly redundant with each passing day.

Contact scorches can be highly superficial, at least at the thread level, and can respond just as well as the TS to 3D rendering etc etc. However, the chief reason for thinking the TS is a contact scorch is the negative character. I cannot think of any process except contact imprinting that can produce a negative image, considering the radiation theories to be frankly barmy - pseudo-science by any other name.

Thursday: finally, to draw a line under this over-long posting (a more detailed look at that "min slider control" will be the subject of my next posting), here are two comments that have just appeared on Pirate/Troll Central, the first from the new(ish) BSTS Editor, Hugh Farey, followed by my congratulatory response.

Hugh Farey
August 28, 2014 at 3:42 am
In Shroud 2.0, longitudinal banding is very clear, and is definitely related to the pitch of the zigzag, specifically the darkness of the shadows cast by the overlying warp threads onto the underlying weft threads. Thus the entire Shroud is covered in alternating lighter and darker bands. This pattern is not seen on the Durante photo. Here the various longitudinal stripes seem to me to be much thinner, where you can see them, and appear to be related to the ‘spines’ of the herringbone ribs, which may have formed into slight ridges or troughs as part of the rolling up process. I cannot find a good positive Enrie image, but the large scale negatives, which can be found at the link above among others, show a variety of bands, some very thin and some as thick as a width of a pitch. However they are much less consistent and the thick ones do not appear to be lighting artifacts as they sometimes extend over two or three bands of alternating pitch. It is not clear in any case that the pale vertical areas defning the sides of the cheeks, or the dark vertical areas defing the fall of the hair, are due to imperfections in the weave or the lighting of a photo rather than the shape of the image model itself. As such, attempts to ‘correct’ the image by removing them are probably misguided.
August 28, 2014 at 4:09 am
Brilliant. Hugh. Possibly, nay probably the best contribution to ‘banding’ in all time.
Re my new toy (Thermal LUT in ImageJ), I have been playing around with the “min” slider control. I now believe it to be a powerful aid to TS image analysis, having figured what it’s doing using model 2D shade diagrams with no 3D history. It basically drills down bit by bit from the high points on a 3D rendering lopping off the peak value progressively as it goes, probing deeper and deeper into the lower levels of the relief. The ability to do this in degrees, comparing the TS with model at each stage, makes it, in my opinion, a valid and powerful research tool in image analysis.
I’ll post my model validation study today or tomorrow, and will then take a break for a while, leaving this vexatious site (but for you and David Goulet) for yet another cooling off period.

Thursday, June 5, 2014

Not all images that are 3D-enhancible have 'encoded 3D information'.




What was done to the Shroud image can be done to our flags too, with a few clicks in image-enhancement software programs (in this instance ImageJ).


The Turin Shroud image is famously 3D-enhancible, given the right software. Initially it was shown with the so-called VP8 image analyser that was allegedly space-age technology, and not surprisingly led to much over-hyped speculation that the TS image was different from any other. (Caveat: the article has "multiple issues" according to wiki. I would concur with that, it being less about the VP-8, and how it works, and arguably more a vehicle for "Shroudie" propaganda).

This  blogger pricked that particular balloon some 2 years ago, pointing out that the 3D- enhanced images not only brought the man's image up out of the page, but the 1532 scorch marks as well. (Wikipedia credits me with making that finding, but I'll try not to let it go to my head).

There's more talk right now about what the modern day digital equivalent to the analogue VP-8  (notably the freely downloadable ImageJ software) does or does not do to the TS image that is meaningful. In other words, what are the 'correct' settings that gives a valid image?

Again, I've expounded on that question in the past, and shown how one can 'normalize' ImageJ settings by taking a scorch imprint from a bas-relief metal template, and then enhancing it in ImageJ to get the closest possible match to the original. If one then applies those same settings to the TS image, one gets a very realistic-looking semi-3D image of a bearded man.



("Normalised" 3D-enhanced image from a 2012 posting - see link below)

But inevitably there will be those who reject that approach, denouncing it as self-serving, a means of selling my "scorch" hypothesis.

Are there other ways of deciding on the optimal settings?

Here's a simple experiment one can do that brings home the arbitrary nature of ANY settings one applies.

Select any flat, non-3D image that shows a gradient of colour intensity. The one selected here is a colour palette, aka shade chart,  from MS Paint (click on the menu's Custom colour).



Now enter that image into Image J.

Here's one result that shows a gentle 3D enhancement that reflects image intensity:





So there is no question that the 3D enhancement is entirely artefactual, inasmuch as there was never a 3D object to begin with, simply a planar colour chart.

What if the image intensity rises to a peak, and then falls back again?





Above you see the (fairly predictable) result of overlapping two shade charts, end-to-end, then 3D-enhancing in ImageJ.


Incidentally, the ImageJ settings used were approximately those that I used many moons ago to get the best match between a horse brass (a handy bas relief template) and its scorch imprint on fabric.




Left: original brass. Centre: scorch imprint (left-right reversed). Right (with artificial colour which seemed a good idea at the time): optimized 3D enhancement in ImageJ intended to achieve the closest match with original, thus establishing 'normalized' settings.


Yes, they were what I called 'normalized' settings and which later produced that pleasing result shown earlier with the Shroud Scope/Durante 2002 Man on the TS.

Link to my March 2012 posting

But those same settings can be used to endow many 2D images with 3D or, more correctly,  pseudo- or virtual 3D character.

A week ago, working at home on my main computer, I constructed the chart as a series of concentric circles, with lightest shades on the outside, becoming darker towards the centre. When entered into ImageJ the diagrams were converted to pleasing cones that telescoped so to speak out of the page. The model system allowed one to see precisely what effect could be achieved by twiddling the various controls, especially z (for more or less 3D) and smoothing (which in simple terms can be thought of as the 3D equivalent of converting a bar chart into smooth curve). The fun part was to create irregularities in the sequence of shade intensity, so instead of a smooth progression like 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8, one had 1,2,3,6,4,5,8,7.  One might have expected the relief to respond up or down with each change in shade. but that was not the case. Abrupt changes of shade in the sequence 'forced' the overall relief such that expected micro-changes elsewhere in the local topography were suppressed.  Sadly I did not save to memory/thumb stick, but will add the graphics onto this posting (and more besides) later when available.

Update: I've been able to produce the same effect on this older travel laptop in MS Paint, despite its Windows Vista having less functionality in Paint than Windows 7.

Here's a series of images that hopefully speak for themselves obtained just now when a colour-graduated series of closed contour lines are manipulated in ImageJ. (Why is it I can't get Madonna out of my head right now?)

2D image constructed in MS Paint




After applying ImageJ with low z axis value



Now with high z value



Low smoothing


Increased "lighting" (lateral, thus creating artificial shade effects)


.

Take away message for now: 3D enhancement of a 2D image does NOT necessarily mean that the image has "encoded" 3D information. It may simply have gradients or even abrupt steps in colour intensity which the program reads as more or less height on an artifically imposed z axis.

Joseph Accetta PhD, electro-optics/laser/imaging expert said as much at the 2008 Ohio Shroud conference, though you have to go patiently page by page through  his now hard-to-find Power Point presentation. See yesterday's Dan Porter posting, and an acknowledgement to this blogger for having unearthed it.

Further update:  Well, I've persevered, despite MS Paint not allowing me to create nests of concentric circles in Windows Vista, so I've had to make do with ovals. From earlier you may recall that the aim was to show the kind of anomalies that can arise when the stepped density gradient values are out of sequence.

Here's the 2D starter, with an irregular sequence of image density.



Here's the first result in ImageJ, where one sees that the program has failed to respond to the density gradient at the peak, due to there being a dominant intermediate zone of image intensity. But tweaking of settings, especially of z value and smoothing, can make the program respond to the peak, as the next graphic shows.



The peak within the 'crater' is now visible, but the overall image has a poor 3D enhancement, due to that out-of-sequence gradient of image intensity.

Late postscript: followers of this and my specialist Shroud blog will know who I believe is depicted on the Shroud of Turin via some kind of thermal imprint (maybe chemically-assisted). It's a historical figure, alright, but not Jesus Christ. Who?  Probably Jacques de Molay, last Templar Grand Master, executed on the banks of the Seine in central Paris by slow-roasting in 1314.Others before me (notably Knight and Lomas) have arrived at the same conclusion, even if their proposed imprinting scenario is totally different, involving in their case a still live subject, as distinct from bronze effigy or similar.

Here's an image of de Molay I've just found by googling, fashioned and described as a 'mascot' (don't ask me why).

Let's see how that 2D image responds in ImageJ. Does it  have what some might misleadingly describe as "encoded 3D information"? I leave you to judge dear reader:


Some of us get a feeling of déjà vu  when viewing artistic portrayals of Jacques de Molay, even modern-day ones as here.

Update: Sunday 8 June

In response to points raised elsewhere I may make additions or clarifications here, but won't be drawn into debate that has a backbiting nature, based on this free spirit being seen as one of "them" rather than one of "us". I'm only here for the science.

The question has been raised as to whether colour can endow 2D graphics with superior 3D-enhancibility relative to the TS image (the latter invariably viewed as the gold standard needless to say, whose alleged uniqueness is assumed, not posited).

I've just this minute taken one of my earlier graphics, the shade chart from MS Paint, and converted to gray scale before uploading to ImageJ. Here's the result - identical except for colour.



Now before exploring the substitution of gray scale for colour, here's a comparison which I bet you've never seen before of the behaviour of (a) the TS face in ImageJ (or similar) alongside (b) a model scorch (c) a model shade chart and (d) a painted portrait of our old friend Jacques de Molay. I'm showing it first WITHOUT and then WITH a tick in the ImageJ "Invert" box. Absence of a  tick brings up the denser image regions (seemingly) above the plane of the screen, whereas a tick in the box puts dense regions in hollows below the plane. Note especially the response of the shade chart, third from left, producing a cone without the tick, and a crater with. Click or double-click on images to enlarge.









There are some interesting differences there that need discussion, but let's deal first with the matter of gray scale, and see if that makes any difference to what you see above.

Please be patient. More to follow later today.

Resuming 12:49 pm local time:

OK, here are the gray scale versions of the two graphics immediately preceding this update.



Conclusions: both the TS image and the model scorch were enhanced better without a tick in the Invert box, such that the shade chart appeared as a peak rather than crater. But it seemed that the portrait responded better when there WAS a tick in that box. In other words, imprints, whether of 'mysterious' origin (the TS) or scorch imprints from a hot metal template seem to be qualitatively different from painted portraits in their response to image enhancement in ImageJ. (underlined words  unfortunately omitted from first draft)

All the tests so far were done on the 'as-is' images, without any prior "photographic inversion", i.e. reversal of light and dark, as per Secondo Pia. Does prior photographic inversion alter subsequent response in ImageJ, tested with an without a tick in that (somewhat confusingly named) "Invert" box. where invert in that instance means raising or lowering the vertical z axis above or below the viewing plane (something different from photographic inversion from "positive" to "negative" and vice versa.

More to come later in the day.



So, no surprises  there then. The monochrome results mirror the coloured ones, and graphics that are black/white reveresed give the same result, provided the Invert box is ticked or unticked to allow for the switch in tonal distribution.

The chief finding in these latest experiments is to confirm what I found over 2 years ago, namely that the settings in ImageJ that work best for 3D-enhancement of the TS, judged artistically, are essentially the same as those judged more objectively by matching up the 3D-enhanced scorch image with the template from which it was derived. You would not know this from reading much of the Shroud literature where, time and again, after searching diligently for the few references dealing with  model scorches, one finds derogatory references to their quality and/or response to 3D imaging, compared with the Shroud image. One also finds claims that the Shroud image is 'uniquely' responsive to 3D-imaging, which one sees above are patently untrue. There seems little to distinguish between the TS and a scorched-on image: STURP almost said as much in its 1980 summary.

Postscript: I have just this minute added a section to my earlier posting on the TS man's toes, those very elusive toes, deploying a new (desperate) ruse to improve 3D-imaging in ImageJ. It's been, well, moderately successful. 

Final gasp (on this over-long posting):  there was a curious and unexpected feature of those 3D images where 4 different images were tested together. Switching between Invert On versus Off in Image J did not produce so marked a transformation as expected (one expects the image to be turned inside out, like punching a hat to make a new one with the lining on the outside).

Here's what happens if one performs the switch on the TS image on its own:



Well, I never. The result is surely different from testing them singly. Must go and check the sequence again, make sure there's no mistake..

Nope, no mistake. On a quick glance they looked similar, especially if one holds one's laptop at arms' length. But they are clearly not.  Note the guide to "sense" in a topographical way - the convex pucker at the top of the head on the left, the indentation at the same location on the right. The ease with which the two can be confused is probably due to the relatively small z value used to get a pleasing result, giving relatively shallow relief above and below the base plane.

OK, let's compare the TS and scorch side by side with HIGH z setting to exaggerate relief, and then toggle between INVERT on and INVERT off.



INVERT on



INVERT off.

Note the identical response of the two images in Image J under these different settings. Go figure, as they say.