Modelling two distinct types of BAKED-IN crease in the still-enigmatic Shroud of Turin, ones that provide important clues to the image-imprinting mechanism.

The iconic Shroud image, Durante 2002/Shroud Scope after 3D enhancement in ImageJ. Note the prominent twin-track feature at chin level, the main interest of this and two previous postings.

This is the third in my series of postings on a feature (or rather, features) of the Shroud image which may tell us a lot about the way the image was created. The first was on this site, over two years ago:



Monday, February 6, 2012

Why does the Turin Shroud appear to have scorched-in crease marks? Tell-tale signature for medieval forging?

 I am more than ever convinced that the answer to the question in that title was a resounding YES! The creases or, rather, some of them, contain imprinted MEMORY of what was happening to the Shroud at the instant it received its 'body image' (Blood arguably came later as a part of an extensive re-invention exercise - see my other site).

Later, I did a second posting on that specialist Shroud site after being made aware by IT expert Mario Latendresse of his now invaluable Shroud Scope tool, and learning to adjust contrast to facilitate interpretation of small detail.

Shroud Scope 4: No matter what process mysteriously produced a negative ‘snapshot’ of the Man on the Shroud, it captured that of creases in the linen too. Why?

Posted on June 15, 2012 by colinsberry
 


I refer to what previously I have referred to simply as "creases". In view of comments made elsewhere, some helpful, some less so, I shall now have to be more precise in my nomenclature.

First. let me state an article of faith, one that will not be shifted unless evidence to the contrary is placed in the public domain (Shroud Science Group insiders' references to what one has shown another cannot be given serious consideration on this, an open-access website, where total transparency is everything).

I believe the sepia coloration of the crease marks under consideration, largely indistinguishable from body image, means they are essentially part of the image, sharing the same provenance. They are NOT handling creases that have arrived later, not even with the 1532 fire and its creation of burn holes, scorched edges etc etc. That is why I now refer here to "baked-in" creases. As will be seen, one can model two situations, one in which there were pre-existing fold marks in the linen, rectilinear along obvious short and long axes, as with sheets stored for future use in one's airing cupboard, and secondly (and more importantly) creases that were generated as an "accident" of the image imprinting process and immediately baked in as a kind of memory, even if the fabric has since been smoothed out. The memory is still there, if one knows where to look, and HOW TO INTERPRET what one sees based on the model (we scientists like our models, even if at times we sound as if we regard them as fact- as distinct from working hypothesis. Don't be deceived. It would be tedious to have to keep repeating that the model is merely a mental aid to interpretation that could be promiscuously dumped for another any time it ceased to be of value in interpreting new data).

(Double click on this and other images to enlarge)
White rectangle - site of a "Type 1A crease, with 'baked-in' appearance and presumed to be such pending firm evidence to the contrary.  A cryptic Type 1B crease is probably present in corresponding area on right hand side (with ridge rather than furrow type fold ) which failed to "bake in" at time of image imprinting.  Type 1 creases were present before image imprinting, due to way fabric was folded initially. Yellow rectangles: sites of Type 2 creases, baked-in S-shaped infoldings of linen, that are  presumed to have been created during the imprinting process due to mechanical ruction and entrapment of linen.

Here's a Shroud Scope close up, intermediate magnification, of the highly conspicuous crease at the base of the chin.  Note the twin track appearance, the subject of my first of 2 postings on creases, here over 2 years ago. What I failed to comment on before, having spotted it just a week ago, is the suggestion of there being more "baked-in image" above rather than below the central pale area, perhaps better seen on the right than left half. The asymmetry appears to be a real effect (see what follows) and is easily modelled.

This is a close up of the left half above,  with added contrast  (MS Photoeditor). While there is ample pigmentation/imaging above and below, the upper band could be described as  more discrete, regular  and concentrated than the lower.

This is the right hand side of that chin-level crease. Here the asymmetry is plain for all to see. Is the effect unique to this particular crease?

Here's a similar Type 2 crease from the dorsal side of the Shroud (inverted figure).  It's from the small of the back (note signature 'blood belt' for that location. While the imaging of the crease is primarily discontinuous - a series of blotches - note the asymmetry, with most blotches below the central crease line.

So far, the focus has been on Type 2 creases - which I consider 'tell a story' about the manner in which the Shroud image was imprinted by forcible application of a heated solid template to linen, sufficient to cause distortion of the fabric, and thus mechanical entrapment of invaginated folds. What about Type 1 - preexisting folds that were also baked-in by the thermal imprinting process.  This is a handy photograph, showing the intersection of Type 1 and Type 2, horizintal and vertical respectively.

It's a lot harder to discern a Type 1 midline fold on the dorsal view (see bloodbelt and that blotchy Type 2 crease at left). In fact, I'm inclined to the view that the midline baked-in crease is exclusively a feature of the frontal side of the Shroud only, disappearing in the region between the frontal and dorsal images of the head. Modelling provides an explanation for this added asymmetry that I don't recall having ever seen commented on before (which means little, given the vastness of Shroud literature, much in conference proceedings).

Modelling of the more important Type 2 creases. Look carefully at the upper half, and you will see how the fabric was folded to create an intucked fold, such that there were THREE layers of fabric above the crease. When the hot template was applied, there was more intense scorching of the three-layer sandwich than of the single layer (for reasons that merit further investigation). When opened out and flattened one sees an asymmetrical  twin track arrangement, i.e. VERY DARK- LIGHT- DARK which matches that of the transverse Type 2 creases on the TS, the ones I consider were acquired at the moment of imprinting.
The lower half was a control, with the the same triple sandwich folding, but in the opposite direction.  It is still the triple sandwich side that acquires the more intense scorch.

Here's a schematic diagram, hastily put together with MS Paint, to summarise what happens when a hot template is placed across a Type 2 crease.

Explanation for the asymmetry of the twin-track of a Type 2 baked-in crease.

OK, I've been a bit naughty. I have discussed Type 2 before Type 1. That's probably a give-away to my sense of priorities. It's those Type2 creases that have captured and retained for posterity the genesis of the Shroud image from Time Zero (ignoring the history of the Shroud linen prior to imprinting). But it did of course have a pre-imprinting history. A 4.4 x 1.1m length of linen needed to be folded compactly before being pressed (or unpressed) into service as burial shroud. Given there were pre-existing folds (unless rolled up)  and even creases how would they respond to having hot template pressed against them?

 Here we see what happens when one imprints across a simple opened-out fold, either as a concave furrow, ie. V-shaped in cross section, or as a convex ridge (inverted V). The creases were ironed-in, to increase the odds of getting a result. Well, as you see, we got a result, indeed a striking difference between the two types of crease, Type 1A and 1B (furrow v ridge).

Modelling of a Type 1A  baked-in crease,

 Note the  narrow region of linen at the base of the V that has escaped being scorched, due to imperfect flattening-out of the linen for the brief time (a second or so) that the hot template made contact with the fabric.  Late edit: This is a match for the long axis midline "fold" that one sees on the TS frontal side - a twin track, pale centre, left and right rails of the same intensity. But I say it's a baked-in fold, or in current jargon, a Type 1 crease. 

If folk wish to provide a different provenance, based on those other imaginative models (radiation, gaseous diffusion etc) then fine, let's be hearing it, but I'm the one right now who has the experimental  AND theoretical model that together "tell a story". What's more, scorching by contact produces an image, and it's a negative, and it's 3D-enhancible, and , given the nature of thermal energy, it can be as intense or as superficial as one wishes. One does not get a third  degree burn from brushing lightly against a hot iron, painful though it may be. I say he contact scorch theory (that would include Luigi Garlaschelli's contact acid/thermal scorch) are scientifically coherent, if not down to the very last detail (some of which could be age and/or technique-related). But I would go further: all other rival models LACK SCIENTIFIC COHERENCE, with huge chunks missing, like failure to generate an image.


Now repeat the experiment, but with the creased linen turned over so that the V is inverted in cross-section. One has a ridge instead of a furrow in the linen:

Modelling the reasons why a Type 1B crease does not leave a baked-in image.

Note that with this reverse configuration there is scarcely if any interruption of imprinted image along the fold line. I would expect to have attracted much scepticism had I  tried to claim otherwise,

Type 1A (concave furrow) above - allows a symmetrical twin-track baked-in crease.
         Type 1B (convex ridge) - does not allow twin-track imaging.

                    

Speaking of the 'eye of faith' which (if one's honest) can all too often be influenced by prior assumptions, including one's latest brainwaves, I said earlier that I could only see Type 1A twin-track on the frontal side of the Shroud. Having failed to see it on the dorsal side, or at best the tiniest hints thereof, I'm now going to stick my neck out (or place head on the block) and suggest that it's absent because the dorsal side is a Type 1B crease. In other words, it's a ridge, not furrow, and so has failed to capture the imprint from a heated template as in the experiment and diagram above.

If one takes a length of paper to represent a Shroud and its two images, it's easy to see how reversal of fold sense comes about. If one wants a midline furrow for the entire length, one fold along the long axis first, then across the short axis. But doing a long fold is awkward. It's more natural to fold across the midline short axis first, before folding along the long axis that is now half its original length. Do it that second way, and one finds, maybe with a little application of  a hot electric  iron to reinforce crease lines, that the sense of the  fold reverses at the midpoint. If the frontal side is a furrow crease, then the dorsal side is a ridge, The apparent loss of that frontal side midline crease, just above the head, is now entirely explicable. But let's not lose sight of the main point, that I'm certain will be contested by those who have no time for the  (contact) "scorch" hypothesis. While those folds were there originally, they are no longer simply ancient folds that are visible for mechanical reasons only (bending/kinking of threads). They are visible as part of the sepia Shroud image because they were baked in by the hot template at the time of image imprinting. Sorry to have to repeat myself, but this blogger/science bod does not wish to see two years of research and thinking about those crucial Type 2 creases being scuppered by inappropriate comparisons with the more mundane Type 1 variety. Indeed, far from weakening my case for Type 2 creases being template-inflicted, so to speak, they strengthen it by my discovery that Type 1A folds, while not template-inflicted, were template-boldened-up by acquisition of twin-track scorch marks. The fact that the Type 1A pattern is not visible (that I can see) on the dorsal side, consistent with modelling, inspired by theorizing AND  plain common sense, greatly strengthens in my view the credibility of the contact scorch hypothesis.

Methinks that is enough for now. I had originally intended to finish on a polemical note, deploring what I consider the pseudoscience that is deployed in so-called "sindonology". The best indicator for pseudoscience is the instant dismissal indeed contempt that can be elicited by mere reference to the word "scorch", even without the qualifying "contact".  One may be an enthusiast for all kinds of alternative hypotheses for image formation, based on exotic types of radiation (uv laser generated, corona discharges, neutron fluxes etc etc) or the so-called naturalistic hypotheses based on chemical emissions from a real corpse. But what one cannot do is dismiss contact scorching out of hand, or expect to fob off this 'enthusiast' for scorching with tired old checklists that substitute anecdotal hearsay for hard experimental data. I shall not mince my words. The rejection of the scorch hypothesis by almost the entire community of 'sindonological*' investigators, including those with fancy titles, puts almost all of them firmly within the realms of pseudoscience, and deserving of my favourite tag : Mickey Mouse scientists.

As I say, I'd better stop right here, before I'm tempted to name names, or especially egregious instances of so-called 'scientific research' displaying one or more blind spots for physical, chemical and biological principles, and all too often designed to grab media attention.


*Unfortunate choice of term one might think.

 "Sindonological research" = SIN. DO NO LOGICAL RESEARCH.

Late addition: Have just discovered a third posting I did on that chin crease a bit more than a year ago:

Title:  Could this be clinching evidence that the shroud image is a contact scorch?

Second addition:  Here's a comment (below) that appeared a few days ago from someone who signed himself off as representing a "Sindonology" institute (I've withheld his name, preferring to stick to the issues). The contempt I mentioned earlier is clear. Well, I take a pretty dim view of  his idea of science as well, especially the selective quotation of the bits that suit one's case, so that commentator's pitch will be the subject of my next posting on this site. (Yes, I now regard sciencebuzz as my main site, feeling this particular topic is now less about the Shroud of Turin in particular, and more about the generic issue of pseudoscience and the manner in which it is propagated in the media, with dissenting voices rarely getting heard - far less consulted - even when they set up blog sites!)

Oops.  The quoted comment has disappeared, maybe a glitch of copying/pasting from one site to another. I'll try again later.,

Update: 25th March

Here's an interesting comment that has appeared elsewhere from a newcomer. I'll respond to it in my next posting here, as well as the Shroud 2.0 pictures that have just been posted.

Steve Hammond

March 23, 2014 at 4:49 pm | #9

First post here from someone who has been fascinated for years by the shroud. I’ve been catching up on old posts here and on Colin’s blog. I am a physician (gastroenterologist) so no particular expertise regarding the shroud, but of course familiarity with science. I lean toward the shroud being authentic, but I applaud Colin’s probing endeavors and research and think it serves a valuable purpose.
That being said, I don’t yet buy that the creases he points out are “cooked in.” I see lots of creases on the Enrie and Durante images on Shroud Scope. Many of these are far from image areas and should be very different from the neck and head creases Colin points out as they should not be “cooked in”. (It would be interesting to see the enhanced images in these areas.) Also, I find it interesting that the neck crease crosses the lower edge of the non-image area lateral to the face, which is,according to Colin, an area of non-contact with the bas-relief. I find it hard to believe a crease could be “cooked in” in this location under Colin’s scenario.
Just some thoughts…

Last time I cut-and-paste from that site, the item had disappeared by the time I next logged on. Let's see if Steve's comment sticks. While it's here, click on the blue hash 9 (comment number) to be taken to the (vexatious) thread in question with site proprietor in full interventionist club-wielding mode.

Update: New comment added to same site by Mike M, who posted the Shroud 2.0 pictures:

Mike M commented on Pictures to Consider for the Posting: “Baked-In Creases. Really?”.

in response to Dan:

Mike M sent these along to go with Baked-In Creases. Really?  . They are from his iPad. I will leave it to him to explain them in comments. (You should be able to click on the pictures and get larger versions): Sorry, Mike, for the delays. #1 #2 #3 #4

Thanks Dan,
This is further to the previous post where it is claimed that the double track creases (with a clear centre is evidence for a scorch. Although, as you have indicated they can be caused by any image formation mechanism (natural or supernatural), checking them in Shroud 2.0 shows those double tracks off-image thus they can’t be produced by the hot statue as Colin has postulated (check the legend on the top right corner for the location of the crease). Furthermore, The crease below the chin shows the image continuous, so the colourless middle is not really that colourless.

See my next posting Mike. (Is he aware I wonder of my image re-invention hypothesis,that attempts to explain the curious testimony (April 14, 1503) from Antoine Lelaing, one that I have previously interpreted as an attempt to artificially-age the Mark 1 Shroud, not efface it as Lelaing supposed?).

I have responses prepared in rough outline for both Steve H and Mike M, but will hold off posting for a bit, maybe a day or two, while waiting to see what if any other points are raised.

Latest comment into this running archive:

Mike M commented on Pictures to Consider for the Posting: “Baked-In Creases. Really?”.

in response to Mike M:

Thanks Dan, This is further to the previous post where it is claimed that the double track creases (with a clear centre is evidence for a scorch. Although, as you have indicated they can be caused by any image formation mechanism (natural or supernatural), checking them in Shroud 2.0 shows those double tracks off-image thus [...]

Colin, I realize you never claimed images # 3 & 4 were a double track creases. How could you when they are clearly off-image. # 3 sure looks like one though, lighting factors applies for all the creases not just the off-image ones. I included #4 because Hugh referred to it, IMHO it doesn’t look like a double track crease, there is an interesting double line to the right of it (at an angle) that looks like an imperfection in the weave, may be Mario was referring to that? The main point is; 1-the creases you mentioned extend off-image & 2- the middle line below the chin contains image information

Update: Some one (naming no names) has tried to question the validity of my contrast-enhanced images, It's odd he should choose to do so now, given I did over a dozen postings in 2012, showing the extra discrimination that could be achieved, e.g. between body image and bloodstains, without ever making claims that accompanying colour differences were real. In other words, the contrast control was used purely as a aid to visualization and discrimination within a particular image, not to make any extraordinary new generalist claims. It's what scientists do - we twiddle with the controls to see the subject more clearly, to make a better photograph.

Anyway, here's a graphic I have just added to one of those 2012 postings to show the modest changes that accompany step-by-step increases in contrast, after first making a minor adjustment (downwards) to brightness.

Shroud Scope/Durante 2002 TS face with step wise increase in contrast.The accompanying colour changes are incidental.

Oh, and here are some new settings with the same maximum contrast, but decreased brightness, showing one end of the chin crease where it crosses the hair.

Click to enlarge

Update: here's a photo-edited picture of the TS chin crease from Shroud 2.0, copied/pasted from shroudstory.com, with altered contrast/brightness (done in two steps).

Shroud 2.0 photoedited

I say that the "baked-in" look is still there, and feel justified in homing in on this particular feature. One needs only one baked-in crease to sustain the case for a mechanical element in the imprinting process of the Shroud image to give enhanced imaging on a raised feature (like an S-shaped Type 2 crease!)

And here's my new high contrast/low brightness settings applied to the chin crease. Wow!

Click to enlarge

Update: new posting: "Dear critics. Please be on the lookout for a new Mark 3 model etc"

Forget those miraculous flashes of ultraviolet light - was the Turin Shroud produced simply with medieval technology - heat conduction and scorching?

Could the Turin Shroud have been made in medieval times as a hoax or fake, simply by scorching an image onto linen, say from a 3D representation of the crucified Christ? 

Could the latter have been a ‘bas relief’, i.e. a raised image on a background, comparable to a medallion say (albeit much larger) or even an intact statue, fully in the round, so to speak?  Was the bas relief or statue heated and then draped with cloth to produce a scorch mark corresponding with the relief (thermal imprinting).  These were questions that John P Jackson of the STURP team addressed back in the 1980s.   

 John P Jackson

Here from Stephen Jones’s splendid site is an account of Jackson’s work, shorn of references to keep it uncluttered, which I have interrupted and annotated to insert my own sceptical views (in blue).

John P. Jackson:
"Heated Bas-Relief/Scorch Theory Another possible image-forming mechanism similar to that proposed by Nickell involves pressing a stretched cloth over a heated bas-relief. Such an idea was first proposed in 1961 and tested, with limited success, by placing a white handkerchief on top of a heated small medallion that bore a carving of a horse. This theory is more intriguing than most because the Shroud image does appear to have many of the physical and chemical properties of a light scorch.  STURP scientists Jackson, Jumper, and Ercoline tried to duplicate the image on the Shroud by testing the scorch hypothesis more fully. To accomplish this, they heated a full-size bas-relief model of a face and stretched over it a linen cloth of a thickness similar to the Shroud.  The ... resulting image lacks the high resolution and sharp focus found on the Shroud.

 Later, John Jackson (kneeling) used real human models, at least those with a passing resemblance to YKW...

High resolution? Sharp focus?  I doubt whether those viewing the Shroud up to the end of the 19^th century would have described the image in those terms, indeed modern day viewers too. It was not until  the first photographs were produced that the friendlier “positive” image became available. 

The very first negative-to-positive transformation of the Shroud image (1898)

The subsequent 110 years or so have seen progressive advancements in imaging technology, bringing ever greater resolution, clarity, (claimed) realism etc. But how much is electronic and digital tweaking to produce the best picture, regardless of the information content of the faint sepia image with which scores of generations had to be content.

“While the bas-relief method seemingly yields a respectable three-dimensional image, problems are evident in the accompanying VP-8 relief of this image.

 VP-8 image-analyser

Hollow spots below the eyes, next to the bridge of the nose, below the lips, in the beard, and on the forehead are all noticeable ... . Further, a slight plateau is visible on the high spots of the VP-8 relief, similar to those produced in VP-8 analysis of results from experiments with direct-contact methods.

A respectable three-dimensional image?  I raise my hat to Jackson – those are words you will rarely see in the current Shroud literature that holds the image is genuine 1^st century AD, indeed the actual burial shroud of Christ.. Most are dismissive, indeed comtemptuous of any modelling with bas-relief etc, claiming that those techniques fail to produce ALL the characteristics of the Shroud image. And what tops the list time and time again? Yes -  you guessed it – those  claimed “3D-encoded characteristics” 

 3D image of Turin Shroud from VP-8 image analyser

Yet here we see Jackson conceding that an inanimate bas-relief produced a 3D image on cloth by simple heat conduction (”scorching”).

So the image of that bas-relief was deficient in some respects (hollow spots below the eyes etc)  Yet for centuries,  sorry to repeat myself, the eyes on the Shroud were little more than white hollows, but now, with the technology at our disposal,  it is the photographic positive (naturally) is now being held up as the gold standard!  “A slight plateau on the high spots” ? Did Jackson not consider modifying the bas-relief template, which was maybe too flat, or ringing the changes any other the other numerous variables that might have been tweaked to get a better image?  Science is about establishing principles, not replicating every tiny detail of the arts and crafts, especially as the materials used were unknown. Science needs cues if it is to make a contribution. Science cannot be expected to travel back in time to discover precisely what materials and techniques were being employed. Science  is a method, an approach, not a magic wand. Science has its limitations...

"Even though the heated bas-relief produced better three-dimensional information than other methods, Jackson and colleagues concluded that this process could not encode many of the necessary Shroud image characteristics. For example, regardless of the temperature of the bas-relief, thermal discoloration appeared on the back side of the test cloth within several seconds after being placed on the hot bas-relief. Thus, the superficiality characteristic is violated because the image could not be encoded only on the topmost fibrils of the linen."

A thermal discoloration on the back of the cloth? Would that by any chance be the “faint reverse side image” that we are told is one of the unique characteristics of the Shroud that no one has replicated, or can ever hope to replicate?

But the main characteristics we are told is the highly superficial image on the front side, so superficial as to defy modern science. Yet Raymond N Rogers provided a simple explanation for the superficiality, based on his crucial observation that the image could be stripped off with adhesive tape. The image is not on the cellulose fibrils of the actual cloth he said, or,  if it is, only on the most exposed ones. The image is formed on a layer of adhering carbohydrate that is not cellulose, but something chemically more reactive, more prone to dehydration and scorching. The latter is a matter of  speculation  –  it could be starch, simple carbohydrates, saponin  etc, all of which have been proposed, either acquired adventitiously, e.g.in linen weaving and manufacture, or purposely as a known thermo-sensitive substance that would brown on exposure to heat (think invisible ink, think gravy browning etc.). Either way, there is a COMPLETE explanation for a faint image forming on both surfaces, but not the intermediate (bulk) cellulose fibres. Cellulose, as we know, is highly resistant to degradation by heat, oxygen etc on account of its highly ordered crystalline nature -  a function of the multiple hydrogen bonding interactions between beta-linked glucose molecules. 

Here is a scorch image I produced on cotton using simply powdered charcoal as a thermo-sensitizer and heat from a 60W lamp ( photographed after washing out the charcoal). Think how much easier it would be to scorch a surface layer of more reactive carbohydrates (fruit sugars such as glucose, sucrose etc)

Other carbohydrates, e.g. starch with its alpha-linked chains in amylose and amylopectin are less stable, and simple mono and disaccharides more so, especially the reducing sugars like glucose. Simple sucrose, which easily splits to glucose and fructose, can be the agents for easy caramelisation (browning) when exposed to heat.

“The researchers tried to circumvent this problem by wetting the cloth, thereby extending the scorch time. When this technique was tried, new problems appeared. The image's contrast was reduced, causing more severe distortions in the three-dimensional analysis and resembling images obtained from direct-contact techniques ... In addition, because the cloth was essentially flat when the image was encoded, tests of this image-forming method failed to generate an image that contains the subtle lateral distortions that are consistent with the cloth-drape effects found on the Shroud."

Again,  these difficulties are less to do with science, and more to do with technology, indeed arts and crafts, difficulties that can or could have been be overcome by trial and error. Mimicking “subtle lateral distortions” may require nothing more than a stretching and/or ironing technique, instead of simply draping cloth over a hot template.  

These are the Italian scientists who think you need high energy ultraviolet light to scorch an image onto linen (at a distance, focusing system  unspecified). 

  and this is their equipment for modelling a 1st century miracle (leaving a superficial scorch mark on cellulose)

Returning to Planet Earth: what about Jackson's Hot Statue method?  Critique to follow...

Effect of twiddling the gain control

This I believe to be the way to go (but replace the person with a bas relief template or statue): and spend time on ringing the changes with those critical experimental variables, too numerous to mention:

..

The Shroud of Turin - think of it, if you will, as a medieval EuroDisney, designed to attract thrill-seeking tourists, oops, sorry, devout religious pilgrims...

Here are (sorry) 38 points to consider regarding the Shroud of Turin. I may add some more later. I will discuss details and/or objections on this blog (comments premoderated) and nowhere else.

Comments that accuse me of being an internet  troll or similar will not be published. Kindly read my credo, in place since I began "Science Buzz". This blog is primarily about my scepticism re media-hyped gee-whizz science, especially 'pseudo-science', as previous postings will demonstrate, NOT religion...

1.The Shroud was produced by heat-imprinting onto linen, the latter having been coated or impregnated accidentally or intentionally, probably the latter, to make it weakly thermo-sensitive. 

2. The imprinting was done from a template that could withstand heating. It was neither realistic fully-rounded 3D, eg not a statue, nor even a mummified cadaver, except possibly the hands  – as I suggested previously - nor was it 2D (obviously).

3. As many before me has suggested, it  was probably a shallow bas-relief that was created on soft stone or perhaps a soft metal by chiselling, sanding, engraving, gouging etc.

 A  shallow-cut modernistic bas-relief of the crucified Christ 

 Here is a more deeply recessed bas relief

Such objections as I have seen that attempt to dismiss bas-relief do not stand up to close scrutiny. 

4. The relief depth may have been at most a few cm, possibly as little as a cm or less.

5. Dorsal and ventral imprints may have been obtained from two different templates.  Some claim dorsal and ventral images are not consistent. A quick play around with my laptop would suggest as much.

Size disparity - dorsal and ventral images on two halves of Shroud

6. Separate templates may also have been used for the head and rest of the body. Some say the head is too small.

7.The hands and fingers especially were poorly executed, being far too long, and too bony. If really indicating an “X-ray” like quality to the shroud, then why is there not more of a skull-like quality to the head, say, or to the ribs, pelvis, feet etc?

8. Given the skeletal appearance of the hands, with the metacarpals easily mistaken for finger bones, it would be unwise to attach too much significance to a single blood stain indicating the site of a nail puncture being allegedly through or out of the wrist. 

9.  Flogging. marks were carved/gouged onto the template. The pattern looks too regular and systematic . Given the comprehensive nature of the flog markings, flaying might be a better description. It seems improbable that an individual would have survived long with that degree of trauma and rupture of skin capillaries. Fluid loss, dehydration, shock and probably death would have rapidly ensued.

10.The impregnation of the linen was inspired by the phenomenon of “invisible writing”.

Lemon juice and heat from a 100W light bulb

In its simplest form the latter requires writing on paper with lemon juice, allowing to dry and then heating. A sepia brown image is formed.

11.Probably more involved technology was used for the Shroud, e.g. by impregnating linen with one of more components like starch, simple reducing sugars  such as fruit sugars, proteins etc, that are more heat-sensitive than cellulose, but which also have the properties of turning brown when exposed to heat. 

12.There are indeed references to starch on Shroud fibres, and of the colour being confined to a superficial layer:    

13.The template would have been heated, and when at a suitable temperature, probably equivalent to a modern-day electric iron on its highest setting, the linen would have been draped on top, maybe pressed lightly, e.g. with a roller, and removed at the first sign of an image appearing on the top side (i.e. the one that is the reverse on the Shroud).

14.Some say that pressing a cloth over a real person to produce an imprint would leave a distorted image when the cloth has been removed. That opinion was  comprehensively  dismissed in the case of a cloth lightly draped over a person to give partial conformity with natural body contours. See Mario Latendresse (pdf)

15.If the model was a bas-relief then the cloth could have been pressed against the hot template more tightly without fear of noticeable distortion.

16. There is some evidence that it may have been pressed with a board or batten placed lengthwise.

Darker band in central rectangular area, allegedly due to weave

See sharp demarcation between light and dark. Some attempt to explain this away by claiming that it is batch variation in the yarn used for weaving. But the demarcation line is not perfectly straight on the right side (see cheek bone) which is inconsistent with the latter theory. However, there could have been pressure applied briefly at the margins too, to produce a softer image, less like printing, more like a painting with a gradation of tonal contrast.

17. Produced in this way, by thermal imprinting, the image would have been a negative, with most prominent features, i.e. proud of the surface in the bas relief template making greatest contact with the linen. 

18. Thus there is no need to invoke early “photography”, for which the technology did not exist, at least not one that was capable of producing a final “positive“ image which did not happen until 1898.

 Negative v positive

That “negative” image seems to have been the starting point for much of the supernatural hype, especially when the alleged “encoded 3D” claim (see later) was added later.

19.The image is formed only in the superficial thermo-sensitive coating, not on the underlying cellulose itself – except perhaps for the most superficial fibrils. That explains why the Shroud of Turin image can be stripped away with adhesive tape, as demonstrated in the generally impressive studies of Raymond N. Rogers.

20. Further evidence of the superficiality – and easy detachability  - comes from looking at midline of Shroud, which shows a white stripe with no image. The Shroud has clearly been folded along that axis, as evident from symmetry of the 1532 burn marks.

See my earlier post, showing how this  reconstruction was produced by folding and cutting

Folding has probably caused the overlying film with image to strip off.   http://www.theblaze.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/jesus-christ-shroud.png     see white vertical lines. 

21.The method of contact printing explains why the Shroud image has no features that resemble those of a painted image, i.e. no adhering artist’s pigments of the era, no brush marks, no directionality as regards alternation of light and shade.

22. The observation that brown fibres and white fibres are seen side by side under microscope is suggestive of highly localised heating by contact and conduction, as distinct from high energy radiation.

The highly localised "scorching" is highly suggestive of  imprinting by close contact (heat conduction rather than radiation)

(There is another lower-magnification image that makes the same point better, which I have mislaid).

23 .A second factor may operate to produce selective fibre scorching. As soon as a fibre turns brown due to contact heating, it will then tend to absorb appreciably more energy in the form of infrared radiation from a hot template as well. There is then a positive feedback effect.

24.The half-tone effect, i.e. intensity of colour due to number of coloured fibres rather than density of colour, might suggest that the limiting factor in the pigmenting was the availability of thermo-sensitizer. If the latter were limiting, there would tend to produce an all-or-nothing half-tone effect.

25.Whether considered as a fake or the genuine article, advocates from both sides are agreed that the image is in the superficial coating and that the latter is a carbohydrate that is more reactive chemically than cellulose. There is the saponin theory, the latter being used in early linen production and which contains pentose sugars. Alternatively, reactive sugars could have been added immediately prior to scorching, even something as common as sucrose which splits easily into the monosaccharide sugars glucose and fructose - both of which are easily dehydrated by heat and then prone to caramelisation (browning reactions).

26. Is there any evidence of detail in the parts of bas relief that are furthest from a cloth laid over? If yes, it speaks of photographic imaging, e.g.  with a lens or concave mirror.  If not, it suggests thermal contact printing with no sharp image focusing, indeed no depth of field at all, sharp or otherwise. Indeed there does not. Look at the sharply demarcated boundary between dark and light on both sides of the face. There is no suggestion of ears for example, lurking in that deep recess.

 No obvious ears 

An absence of any detail in the lighter portions suggests contact printing rather than image-forming at a distance. 

27.Others have commented on how the hair looks straight and lank as one would expect from a vertical subject. The template for the head may have been modelled on conventional images of the crucified Christ while still vertically on the cross. 

28.Blood may have been applied to the template when cold, then apposed to cloth before heating. Less probably, blood may have been applied to hot template immediately before draping the linen but that would have risked having some of the blood drying and chemically decomposing immediately. There would be no image under the blood marks, the latter having protected the thermo-sensitive coating from heat. Indeed that observation alone would tend to rule out high energy radiation (uv, soft x-ray etc) since the latter tends to be highly penetrating and would have reached the linen through the blood.

29 .It is not clear why blood would transfer so readily to a burial shroud hours, possibly days after being shed, especially from a crown of thorns (which the Gospel writers say was placed in position before crucifixion). It is a characteristic of blood that it coagulates to a solid, horny clot on standing, and ceases to be a liquid, except for the exuded straw coloured serum fraction. The red blood cells that contain the red pigment haemoglobin become entrapped within a network of fibrin fibrils, forming an essentially solid clot.

30. So-called 3D-encoded information is an artefact of the computerised imaging – which explains why the 1532 burn marks appear as a hologram-like 3D as well as the image itself.

Note 3D appearance of 1532 burn marks (at shoulder level) as well as the figure

It is redundant to ascribe “encoded” information to the image if the same 3D-transformation can be achieved on burns acquired in 1532.

31. With a permanent heat-resistant template it would have been possible to experiment with the same template and more than one sheet of linen to achieve an optimal end-result.

32. There can be little or no bilirubin on the cloth, even after days and weeks, never mind centuries.  Bilirubin is sensitive to light and oxygen, being easily bleached and chemically-degraded, even in vivo (as in the phototherapy of neonatal jaundice).

Bilirubin undergoes photoisomerism and then photooxidation on exposure to light resulting in more polar, readily excretable end products. (This was sciencebod's first research interest while employed as Research Specialist at the University of Pennsylvania Hospital Medical School, 1970-72)

A colorimetric test and other incidental “quickie” spot and tests does not suffice to identify bilirubin, nor is the pigment bright red, as claimed (it is orange). Nor do people become highly jaundiced as a result of trauma: distance runner's foot-strike haemolysis of blood cells (with consequent degradation of haemoglobin-derived porphyrins to biliverdin and bilirubin) produces mild not gross hyperbilirubinaemia, insufficient to alter the colour of blood.

33. Invoking bilirubin appears to be a means of evading the observation that the so-called blood stains would have long ceased to be intact haemoglobin, and are now “haematite”, which is iron(III) oxide, Fe2O3, probably hydrated with one or molecules of water. One would indeed have expected blood to degrade over centuries to inorganic constituents, aided by microbial action in moist air. 

      34. Reports that the blood is type AB, or have markers for male chromosomes, or genes for globins etc etc appear to be at best anecdotal, possibly apocryphal. DNA cloning by the DNA polymerase assay is notoriously sensitive to contamination with recent DNA, e.g. from sweat, fingerprints even,  with a few shed skin cells.

 35. Re hair: any high energy radiation capable of scorching either cellulose or a carbohydrate coating would have degraded hair as well – the latter being keratin, which is a protein. Hair is easily singed. The hair on the Shroud shows little by way of fine detail. Indeed, but for its location, it might not have been easily recognizable as hair.

36. Hungarian Pray manuscript. Said to show same L-shaped pattern of burn holes in the burial shroud. The cartoon-like line drawings show shroud immediately after the Resurrection. There is no emphasis given to holes – they are largely lost among the other markings gs.

The holes could just as well have been a nominal attempt to portray blood spots. The biblical account makes no mention of burn holes. If the creator of the Pray manuscript had meant those few holes to represent burn marks, would he not have added flames or wisps of smoke? 

37. There is much else said about the images on the Pray manuscript that has “the eye of faith”, e.g that Christ shows the same epsilon-mark  on forehead, as distinct maybe from an indistinct squiggle  or that the artist has attempted with his fat “plus signs” to portray a herring-bone weave. One can read far too much into a sketch that gives little if any indication that it was intended to be heavy on symbolism, especially when those alleged symbols like burn marks form no part of the biblical account, and which modern day observers and interpreters  intend merely to buttress speculation about the Shroud of Turin.

38. Conclusions so far:

The Shroud is too elaborate, contrived and stylised to be anything but a medieval fake.  Why have a magically-produced imprint of a crucified man energetic enough to chemically degrade cellulose and/or other cloth constituents, yet also replicating a checklist repertoire of scourge marks (overdone)  blood flows, crown of thorns,  nail exit wounds, etc etc.

It is incredible that modern man should be be speculating and/or fantasizing about miraculous flashes of intense high-energy electromagnetic radiation, indeed coherent laser-beam ultraviolet light . What started this nonsense? Answer: 20th century computer games (converting  faint 2D markings to 3D hologram-like images in what might be called upmarket computer games) together with "revealing" details (nails through wrist etc)  regardless of whether they agreed with the Biblical account or centuries of received wisdom.

It simply beggars belief that folk should fall for this combination of digital jiggerpokery and special pleading. The Shroud can be viewed as a medieval forerunner of Euro Disney – inspired by the same motive to create a spectacle and through it to flog a dream - and about as genuine as the latter’s ersatz fairytale castle.