Is NIST Faking it?

[Gravy]

arie from Loose Change produced an interesting PDF on this, which appears to show that in the NIST photographs the lower floors of WTC7 appear to curve upwards. I haven't had time to do my own analysis yet but it looks pretty thorough:

It appears to me that the "upward bending" is simply a perspective illusion of floors that are bent inwards (to the east), seen from above, then severely skewed when arie manipulated the photo, combined with the fact that the floors above it are bent downward somewhat.

 

[e^n]

It appears to me that the "upward bending" is simply a perspective illusion of floors that are bent inwards (to the east), seen from above, then severely skewed when arie manipulated the photo, combined with the fact that the floors above it are bent downward somewhat.

I had this idea too, but unfortunately there's little evidence for it in any of the other pictures, his purely skewed image shows the extent of the bending. It is very strange and I think that if we had a million bux it would be worth some serious investigation.

It's certainly on my 'unanswered questions' list.

 

[Pardalis]

Does somebody have the original full scale picture? It's not a good idea to focus so much on a blowup.

 

[Caustic Logic]

Hey! This was on the page assigned to me, and i noticed it's partly about me. I'm the guy Coughymachine was debating with over this [ATS link in OP]. I was pretty sure Zafar's pic showed intact wall where NIST's has it clearly all gone. Looking at it again, I'm just getting brain freeze, so I dunno... Maybe he was right.

But here's how that thread went: The OP and several members originally saw just that difference and decided NIST had faked their image. I saw it and jumped in with the idea that one image was fake, but i wasn't sure which. NIST's corner damage was confirmed with other photos brought in by Coughymachine. The claims of NIST fakery started petering out. Then everyone but me and Coughy dropped the issue and we were in a 1-1 disagreement. He said illusion, I said

I mentioned it in a thread here, and a few people agreed it was an illusion, while no one agreed that Zafar's photo was altered. As it stands, Coughy seems to win.

Extenuating circumstances I considered: Zafar claims he lost his original negatives in a mishap.
He told Coughy this photo was taken like 2:00 or 2:30, when light told me it was more like 5:00 (there was a possibility raised of damage after Zafar's photo, even though NIST's seems to be earlier)
Other Zafar photos have been used for other unusual claims, the concrete "spires," and fires in the WTC7 before the collapses.(all from memory, sorry if i goofed anything).

I don't trust Zafar's photos. But as a big issue, eh... the damage down the middle is still there, the building was damaged, NIST decided it wasn't much of a factor anyway... If anyone wants to take another look, I think there may still be something interesting here. Or just me being an idiot.

Oh, and on Arie's explanation, i didn't like his analysis either. here's a graphic:

I forget exactly what i was saying there, but if you check the PDF it should become clear
http://zapruder.nl/images/uploads/corner_controversy.pdf

OMG, someone dedicated a whole one-shot blog to the corner controversy:
http://wtc7corner.blogspot.com/

 

[Mashuna]

Holy thread resurrection, Batman!

 

[Caustic Logic]

Holy thread resurrection, Batman!

Yes indeed. Apologies to the extent they're due. But this one was never cleared up.

Pardalis had been looking for a high-res original. I'll check my files for the best I have of both Zafar's and NIST's.

What I was saying with Arie's graphic is that he did it wrong. At left is him showing the photos he accepts, including Zafar's, and the resultant damage area in red. Middle is how I would have put them together. That corner is intact all down there until the view is blocked. At right is how i would do an analysis of photos I accept - all but Zafar's. Damage profile makes the most sense of the three.

Anybody want to show how this is wrong?

ETA:

 

[e^n]

Courtesy of NISTs latest report:

 

[Caustic Logic]

Thanks, e^n! I haven't looked at the new report, at least not enough to notice this was a different shot. It offers a view from an angle showing more floors, all the way down. It's closer to parallell with the west side, however, so the angle/illusion issue is even worse here. Are there intact members just around the corner that, seen from the southwest, would like like an intact corner? The new shot doesn't help, but in either case, such structures would need to be back there a bit.

But it does show differences in the smoke that are small enough to be clues. It looks like the newer (to me) shot was taken a few moments before the other. This would mean the helicopter was moving west, away from WTC7, and the camera looking back at it.

The lighter smoke is top layer stuff, and it is ambiguous if there's something just perfectly hidden behind it, or if it's blocking a clear view through. Some if its clearly skimming over intact wall. But the darker patches are back there, under the general haze, in the shadow realm. There is no building between the camera lens and the ground in these spots.

Considering what would be the building edge, every patch of dark smoke to the left of the yellow line here means no building left on the west or south face along that line of sight.

So what and where is that stuff in Zafar's photo that happens to line up so well with expected corner line, window frames, outer wall color, etc, that it LOOKED at first like an intact area there? It seems to me if optical illusion is to blame, it'd have to be a cluster of odd illusions all lining up just right

ETA: Zafar photo The best resolution I have anyway.

 

[A W Smith]

you can see the outside corner column is missing in the Zafar photo, what you do see is a column from the opposite corner of that bay. but the granite clad spandrel is still there. judging by the the direction the photo was taken possibly the spandrel folded into the collapsed bay. Which is why you don't see it from the NIST photo.

 

[gumboot]

The appearance of upward bending floors is a result of skewing the image. Adjusting artificially like that does not take into account perspective.

 

[Caustic Logic]

you can see the outside corner column is missing in the Zafar photo, what you do see is a column from the opposite corner of that bay. but the granite clad spandrel is still there. judging by the the direction the photo was taken possibly the spandrel folded into the collapsed bay. Which is why you don't see it from the NIST photo.

Bay? I guess that means the hollowed-out area. Well, I meant to look at the column layout to see how much sense that makes, but meh. It's just not as clear as it could be, and I'm probably just wrong. Internal columns etc. are probably responsible for the appearance of walls and windows that aren't really there.

So, other question I had had on photos on his page that Truthers used. Early Fires in WTC7 I thought I'd seen, but the closest I see now is this and shots like it:
http://www.amanzafar.com/WTC/wtc-30_1_small.jpLooks like some kind of lights or reflections on the roof of the Winter garden. Flaming jet fuel stuff? I dunno. Any thoughts?

Some other discussions I found - Arie was looking at some video for this early fire case, and then decided it was illusion. Video and photo both pulled so I can't see what he meant.
http://www.911blogger.com/node/7250
So where's the idiots who were using Zafar pics for this? Cannot find right now.

e^n at ATS, 9/20/08:

There's a couple of Aman Zafar pictures showing some sort of light in the lower floors of WTC7, but it doesn't seem to be anything to do with a fire.

On the "spires" issue, which I'm not up-to-date with, Here is Zafar's photo of "part of the frame" of the north tower still erect during collapse. What's the deal with this?
http://www.amanzafar.com/WTC/wtc-73_1_small.jpg

 

[A W Smith]

I was thinking the vertical element visible in the Zafar photo was column 83. but it is too far back into the core to be visable as the damage does not go that deep

 

[technoextreme]

It appears to me that the "upward bending" is simply a perspective illusion of floors that are bent inwards (to the east), seen from above, then severely skewed when arie manipulated the photo, combined with the fact that the floors above it are bent downward somewhat.

From my opinion by not even looking at the pictures it sounds like optical distortion not an illusion.

 

[Caustic Logic]

I was thinking the vertical element visible in the Zafar photo was column 83. but it is too far back into the core to be visable as the damage does not go that deep

[qimg]http://i294.photobucket.com/albums/mm89/AWSmith1955/column63.jpg[/qimg]

Yep, that's what i was gonna do, but in 3-D somehow... Clearly you mean 63, not 83, and wow, I didn't realize how far back from the wall all the columns were.

I just don't know what to make of this anymore, my brain freeze is getting to be compound. Either Zafar altered his photo or not and this was all a misunderstanding based on an illusion i still don't get. But what else is new?

Anyone else who wishes to dig deeper, feel free.

And on the curving floors issue, call it illusion or distortion, I'm guessing the outer wall was pushed in a bit, and it's probably not a sign of fakery on NIST's or whoever's part. This is claimed by people who want to prove a faked photo of damage that wasn't there. AFAIK, NIST never even attributed the collapse to any such damage, so either their plans fell through or there were no such plans.

Peace.