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Elbe Trackway

I am far from being a track expert but, the "prints" pictured were so obviously stompers that it's hard to understand how they saw differently.
 
parnassus said:
Will Cliff apologize for telling the world that the "Bigfoot" of modern folklore is a living unclassified animal, thus wasting the time and gasoline of thousands (perhaps millions) of people?
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Word! I've seen a lot of bitching and moaning about all of the effort they had to put out for this hoax (like all bigfoot stuff isnt a hoax?) yet they will try and brainwash others to believe and spend their cash on bigfoot trips and conferences. (all the while knowing it doesn't exist, wasting ppls gas money and entrance fees and such) Not to mention all of the airtime, and fraudulent statements made by them and their buddies. I'd so love for MM to "call my boss" about something like that! hahaha, so funny. (well, i work for my own company so) Sounds like harrassment to me?

Blame the guy that makes footprints, like its illegal or something to make an impression in the ground. lol? At least they arent lying, they are just making imprints. No one is saying "hey these are bigfoot prints!!!! they are legit man?!?!11oneoneoen". Whoever made the tracks simply made them. It is no crime, and the "footers" are the fools for thinking it came from a huge ape in the forest, and not from man. Blame yourselves for being stupid?

Selling bigfoot as a real animal is a little closer to fraud dont ya think Cliff?
 
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All I have to say is WOW! A lot of accusing without a lot of evidence that I've seen. I have to wonder where all the anger is really coming from; the fact that someone cried foul over a set of tracks that stole the spotlight from their own local "find", which has set off a cascading reaction like a bunch of dominoes taking a flop, or that after 45 years of relative drought in bigfoot finds has been considered by some as a hoax. If proponents want to chase hoaxers out of town, what's the saying, it might be cutting off the nose to spite the face. Eliminate hoaxes and really, what's left these days? I'm not justifying hoaxing nor admitting to hoaxing, just saying that without hoaxing the hobby as well as some people's jobs would likely dry completely up.

My suspicion is that the biggest problem has been the inability for any of the researchers to identify who within their ranks did the deed. Nobody within "the club" who did it and willing to take the fall if it eventually goes belly up. Look at the Georgia deal. There needs to be someone willing to take the fall if the jig is up, and not knowing who was behind a hoax is problematic, suspect, a possible setup. I think that might be why it was lauded over initially, and after all possible members were eliminated, it was determined to be an outside job. It had to be someone unknown and hostile because it could not be determined who on the inside did it. Because certainly those were the only two options considered by a certain few, who probably don't believe in authentic bigfoots anyway.

Does anyone think that the peeps at the top of the Scientology ladder believe in any of the OT level abilities? Of course not. They just profit from those below who do.

I think the Elbe event is imploding because the top dogs have not been able to find an insider who made them, and are beating the bushes trying to find who did. That that is probably what started things toppling.
 
I still wish that folks here would be explicit about what makes a footprint look like "an obvious hoax."

I'm a semi-intelligent human and I've read a lot about alleged bigfoot footprints. I can look at a cast and assume it's a hoax because there's no such thing as bigfoot. I can see in certain casts or photos (e.g., Shipton or Freeman prints) that the apparent shape of the "foot" that made the impression would be biologically unrealistic. Other than that, however, I have very little ability to look at a cast and declare "that's clearly faked!" the way several folks here do.

Threads like this are a great opportunity to illustrate for the curious the specific things that give away a fake print. If I can benefit from such instruction than I can only imagine that others popping in to read this thread can as well. That opportunity for learning is lost, however, with exclamations that offer little other than chiding as moronic those people who might accept such prints as authentic. On behalf of all such morons, could someone please point out the dead giveaways that reveal these footprints as hoaxes?
 
The Shrike said:
I still wish that folks here would be explicit about what makes a footprint look like "an obvious hoax."

I'm a semi-intelligent human and I've read a lot about alleged bigfoot footprints. I can look at a cast and assume it's a hoax because there's no such thing as bigfoot. I can see in certain casts or photos (e.g., Shipton or Freeman prints) that the apparent shape of the "foot" that made the impression would be biologically unrealistic. Other than that, however, I have very little ability to look at a cast and declare "that's clearly faked!" the way several folks here do.

Threads like this are a great opportunity to illustrate for the curious the specific things that give away a fake print. If I can benefit from such instruction than I can only imagine that others popping in to read this thread can as well. That opportunity for learning is lost, however, with exclamations that offer little other than chiding as moronic those people who might accept such prints as authentic. On behalf of all such morons, could someone please point out the dead giveaways that reveal these footprints as hoaxes?
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tube made a great post about these tracks about half way through the page in this thread. (i also gave my opinion right after)
 
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I guess I'm looking for a better explanation of the "monolithic margin", because I'm not sure I've got it. Can Tube or anyone else please post some photos with a nice big red line on the monolithic margin of footprints made with stompers, footprints from the Elbe trackway, and footprints from real feet (that of course, lack the monolithic margin)? That would help me a lot, and I assume others too.
 
This article he wrote is pretty good too. The monolithic margin I assume he's talking about is the spacing between the toes being very consistent, and not varied or bent as it would be in a natural living foot. (even deer hoof prints have more "spread" or splay in some individual tracks than others) A rigid prosthetic might not have a lot of variance or spread/splay differences between tracks etc where as a real foot does...
 
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The Shrike said:
...could someone please point out the dead giveaways that reveal these footprints as hoaxes?
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It might be interesting if you asked DDA/Rick Noll why he thought these were the real deal initially. Presumably, it was not the prints or trackway that indicated hoax, since DDA at first belived them to come from a Sasquatch. As did a whole bunch of other bleevers @ the BFF. So Noll should be able to point out all the things that indicate these came from a BF foot, and not a stomper.
 
The Shrike said:
I guess I'm looking for a better explanation of the "monolithic margin", because I'm not sure I've got it. Can Tube or anyone else please post some photos with a nice big red line on the monolithic margin of footprints made with stompers, footprints from the Elbe trackway, and footprints from real feet (that of course, lack the monolithic margin)? That would help me a lot, and I assume others too.
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I think Tube explains it pretty well on this page It's that the front of the toes, instead of being scalloped, becomes a straight edge as the fake foot digs into the soil.
 
The Shrike said:
I still wish that folks here would be explicit about what makes a footprint look like "an obvious hoax."

I'm a semi-intelligent human and I've read a lot about alleged bigfoot footprints. I can look at a cast and assume it's a hoax because there's no such thing as bigfoot. I can see in certain casts or photos (e.g., Shipton or Freeman prints) that the apparent shape of the "foot" that made the impression would be biologically unrealistic. Other than that, however, I have very little ability to look at a cast and declare "that's clearly faked!" the way several folks here do.

Threads like this are a great opportunity to illustrate for the curious the specific things that give away a fake print. If I can benefit from such instruction than I can only imagine that others popping in to read this thread can as well. That opportunity for learning is lost, however, with exclamations that offer little other than chiding as moronic those people who might accept such prints as authentic. On behalf of all such morons, could someone please point out the dead giveaways that reveal these footprints as hoaxes?
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I practiced in the backyard with my own foot and a cast of Dr. Meldrum's pressed in to see if I could tell a difference. I tried it in regular soil and in sand.

I once found a set of tracks down in the river bottoms below my house. My practicing helped me figure out whether something living or a hoaxer made those bear tracks.

The Elbe prints looked like my fake cast prints to me just looking at the pics, although to be sure you should always check them out in person. Tube explained it very well in the link provided by River.
 
The Shrike said:
I guess I'm looking for a better explanation of the "monolithic margin", because I'm not sure I've got it. Can Tube or anyone else please post some photos with a nice big red line on the monolithic margin of footprints made with stompers, footprints from the Elbe trackway, and footprints from real feet (that of course, lack the monolithic margin)? That would help me a lot, and I assume others too.
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Suppose you have a rigid Wallace-style prosthetic. You put in all your energy into the plantar surface, carving out the toes and such. Suppose you carve your toes close together, and don't cut spaces between the toes. This lowers the chance of a toe breaking off, as there is a great deal of leverage when the toes are leaving the track. This accounts for the "digging" seen with the toes in some tracks.

Suppose you start with dimensional lumber, which starts out life flat on both sides. Since the track information is largely created by the plantar surface, you see no need to carve or texture the dorsal surface. Couple that with no gaps between the toes, and you get a "monolithic" or unbroken leading edge of your prosthetic on the dorsal surface.

In most cases where the prosthetic does not sink deeply into the substrate, you will be fine, as were most of Ray Wallace's tracks. When the prosthetic sinks more deeply into the substrate, the UNBROKEN LEADING EDGE OF THE DORSAL SURFACE is what defines the leading edge of the track AT GRADE.

In a track made by a human, the front edge of the track will be more ~scalloped~ as the leading edges of toes are rounded, and substrate is squishing up in between the toes.

In my opinion, Ray Wallace figured out through trial and error that cuts made between the toes weaken the prosthetic, and result in toes breaking off, due to the large leverage force at push-off.

I have numerous photos and further explanation on my page found here:

http://orgoneresearch.com/2009/10/19/fake-feet-and-monolithic-margins-2/

If this explanation is insufficient, please advise, and I'll break out the red crayons.
 
If your Wallace-style prosthetic is pressed in deeply, below grade, the edge of the dorsal surface is what will define the edge of the track AT GRADE. That was a subtle "tell" that Wallace himself either didn't figure out or didn't care about.
 

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So these prints lack a monolithic margin?

I think this print looks really fake, but apparently I'm wrong about that.

Sorry if I'm being obtuse, and Tube I really appreciate your monolithic margin essay, but I've read it several times and still don't actually see the differences you're describing between footprints left by a living foot and those made by a rigid prosthetic. If crayons are what it takes, so be it, but I think one problem at the JREF is that folks will often decry things as "obvious fakes!" without specifically pointing out what they see, and such things are not at all obvious to everyone.
 
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