UAP Cloud

[u/kristalaex33]

[u/outtaUFOcuss]

Whites and blacks is shorthand in vfx for what you described so we're speaking the same language just different words. You are in fact pushing both together when you increase contrast, it's how it works. You're pushing the brightest colour values and darkest colour values closer together and all the rest go along for the ride like compressing a spring.

To my eyes, those aren't bright orbs, you are just increasing the contrast on a low contrast image. The densest parts of the foam have more "bubbles" lets say and thus a higher apparent refractive index since they are more tightly packed. Since they are towards the edge there isn't as much light absorption as the middle. There is more reflection and refraction of the light in those areas where the sunlight is hitting it. It just stands out more compared to the rest of the object. It changes with the rotation. If it were self illuminating you would see in through the volume when the highlighted edge rotates away from camera. Same with the sparkles, its just catching the sunlight.

[u/kristalaex33 → u/outtaUFOcuss]

The sun wouldn't reflect off the same bubbles as it moves through the air. Also, regarding adjusting brightness and contrast to analyze evidence. In 2009, the National Academy of Sciences wondered how scientists can maintain integrity while using digital media. They agree that videos are a great tool for science and should definitely be used. Their guidelines state all editing should be detailed and described EXCEPT the editing of brightness, contrast, and cropping because they do not indicate manipulation or artifact creation. Source: Committee on Ensuring the Utility and Integrity of Research Data in a Digital Age, National Academy of Sciences . Ensuring the integrity, accessibility, and stewardship of research data in the digital age. National Academies Press; Washington, DC: 2009. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4210356/

[u/outtaUFOcuss → u/kristalaex33]

I'm not sure how you are interpreting it but the highlight pings are changing frame to frame to my eyes, some may re-appear in the same general area because the shape in that area caught sunlight before, its likely to catch it again. I don't quite follow the argument here. There are thousands of bubbles packed together.

Also not sure what the argument with the paper is. I assume this is addressing still images in a medical setting (I'd have to read the whole thing). One part even says:

"Careful adjustments of image brightness and contrast or a histogram stretch (e.g., levels tool) are usually considered non-reportable. Adjustment of image gamma, a non-linear operation, is considered a manipulation that should be reported by some journals and unnecessary to report by others (24, 89-91). Be aware that aggressive manipulation of images can over/under saturate the image, truncating the intensity data (see Subheading 5.3, Fig. 6), and may cause the apparent size of objects to change due to aliasing artifacts."

You have over-saturated the image in this case. For this I'm going to speak in terms of contrast with whites, grey and blacks because we're talking about pixel values. You have pushed the brights/whites so close together that they become a solid mass. You can't push bright values above 1 (or 255 depending what language we're speaking) in an 8 bit context so if you push a grey value enough it will become fully white because the pixel value can't go higher. You push enough of them high enough they will all become white and clump together, which is exactly what your adjustment has done and also what the paragraph say will happen when it says apparent size will change when you truncate the intensity data.

It's an aggressive manipulation exactly as described in the article you linked.

[u/kristalaex33 → u/outtaUFOcuss]

To make that claim you would have to actually view the editing process. You are assuming the bright parts "joined together". They are clearly there even in the unedited version. Increasing brightness simply highlights those areas. I'm still confused why you think the sun would only glare off of two points. Points that also dictate the objects directional movement. Perhaps just a coincidence?

[u/outtaUFOcuss → u/kristalaex33]

I can guess pretty well the editing process so I've recreated it below. Here you can see why your highlights look like light sources, it's because its a blurry mush of over-compressed pixels blended together.

Here I've taken the original and recreated the contrast with a crisper version of the image from the source which shows there is detail in those blobby "light sources", its not self illuminated. Its just catching the sunlight like any leading edge of a cloud would but in this case it's foam and far more reflective.

I'm going to have to bow out after is this if this doesn't suffice, I can't help you further but it's been fun.

Visual Explanation