orbs
Photographic Orbs - Are they Angels?
by John Edwards
Photographic Orbs are probably not angels. There is a possible physical explanation for most of them. And if you're interested, there are practical ways you can avoid them popping up and spoiling your photos.
They come in many shapes, sizes and colors - such as white circles with different patterns and different colors; some of them move; others leave a diagonal trail; others have far more elaborate shapes.
The technical photographic terms for it are backscatter, near-camera reflection, and lens flare.
In this page I'll explain some physical facts; and demonstrate how you can avoid or recreate them in your photos; then we'll conclude with some ethical considerations regarding the importance of integrity in the way revival-type phenomena is reported.
The main purpose of this article however, is not to dogmatically assert an alternative view of orbs, but to point-out that perhaps we don't have as strong a basis as some have thought that they must be angels.
I also want to say at the outset that I do believe in supernatural manifestations of the Spirit. So don't worry - I know it's important not to throw the baby out with the bath water, so to speak. I'm coming from the angle of someone who embraces the current move of the Spirit but who also wants to adorn the Gospel.
Why are they Probably Not Angels?
Because God probably isn't usually into revealing angels to digital cameras. He sometimes shows angels to people, but not usually to digital cameras.
There isn't any mechanism inside digital cameras that enables them to see into the spirit realm - it requires the gift of the discerning of spirits to be able to do that. And God usually gives that particular manifestation of the Spirit to people, rather than to digital cameras.
When God chooses to give someone the manifestation of the Spirit called the discerning of spirits, enabling them to see into the spirit world, He does so when He wills, not when we will. But orbs can be created in photos at will.
Although digital cameras cannot see into the realm of the spirit, they can sense wavelengths of light that our natural eyes cannot see, such as infra-red light. That's why light sometimes appears in our digital photos that we weren't able to see with our natural eyes.
And orbs are more likely to show up with certain types of cameras than others. This doesn't mean one brand of camera is Spirit-filled and blessed above other brands with the gift of discernment. There is a physical reason for it which usually has to do with how close the flash is to the lens.
With my first digital camera, no orbs ever appeared in any of my photos. But when we purchased our second camera, they started appearing straightaway. It had to do with the distance between the flash and the lens and the impact this had on reflecting flashlight from dust particles back into the lens.
Last time you read your Bible you might have noticed angels being described as having a head, face, eyes, arms, wings, and they talked. So angels apparently don't look anything like little white circles or the other elaborate colored patterns which sometimes show-up in your photos.
Even in Ezekiel's vision of the "wheel in the middle of a wheel" (Ezek.1:4-25), we are told that the living creatures had the appearance of men, had faces, wings, feet, hands, they had a spirit, and a body, and they were capable of running. Evidently Ezekiel wasn't seeing mere photographic orbs!
The recent increase in orb photography is probably not due to a new level of glory that is being released in some meetings around the world; rather it's probably due to the recent increase of digital camera ownership all around the world.
Incidences of orbs were much less common with 35mm SLR cameras, and there's a reason for that - which has to do with the sensor mechanism of digital cameras.
Orbs do not seem to appear more often in photos of revival meetings than they do in other settings - they appear in virtually any setting, even underwater, even in heathen nighclubs.
You can even physically create the conditions which causes them to appear in your photos. One way you can do it is to shake a dusty cloth in front of the camera lens, using a flash, with a dark background. There's a good chance orbs will appear in your photo. Allow time for the dust to settle, and this time your photo will be clear of orbs.
Almost every type of orb photograph can easily be recreated at will, and I'll show you other ways to do it too.
You will see a lot of orbs in photos of outdoor, night time evangelistic crusades under floodlights where crowds of people have stirred up dust particles from the dirt ground.
You may also have noticed that orbs appear more often when a flash has been used. This implies that the object you are seeing could be a light-reflecting object, not a light-emitting object such as an angel. What you are seeing is possibly flashlight being reflected back into the lens. Angels don't usually hide in the dark, and they usually don't need a flash to be seen.
For those of you who like playing around with your camera's settings - enhancing the 'depth of field' leads to a significant increase in the number of orbs photographed, compared to when the depth of field is normal. That doesn't mean your camera is able to electronically give charge over the angels, telling them where to be.
Some of the more elaborately-shaped, large, color patterns that appear in your photos almost always appear outdoors and with a dark background, and are very often caused by lens flare. This usually can be explained by the way your camera's lens and sensor responds to an external light source. I'll show you below how you can recreate these spectacular effects deliberately. If I had more time to pursue it, I've often thought this could be made a new frontier in art, similar to digital fractal art!
It's rare to find an orb that appears partially hidden behind an object. This suggests that the object is close to the lens. If they are angels, shouldn't they occasionally appear partially behind objects? It's also further evidence that what you are seeing is probably reflected light.
Under normal lights, a large proportion of circular orbs appear whitish in color; but when the auditorium is flooded with red stage-light, an orb can appear red. This probably doesn't mean you've captured a red angel, or that angels change color to suit their environment like a cameleon. Turn-off the red stage-light and you'll start seeing white orbs again in your photos.
What are Photographic Orbs?
All of the above suggests that orbs are probably either:
reflected light from a sub-visible solid particle, illuminated by your flash, in the out-of-focus zone close to the lens; or
it could be caused by lens flare; and
it might be able to be explained by the mechanics of your digital camera's sensor and the way light waves are represented digitally
The above phenomena can be both annoying (when they spoil your portraits) and fascinating. So we'll look at some example-ways of both how to avoid them showing-up in your photos and also how to deliberately create them for effects in your photos. Then we'll look at some ethical considerations with regard to reporting revival phenomena.
Backscatter, Near-Camera Reflection, Lens Flare
There are many sub-visible particles in the air, or on the camera lens, or even under the water, such as: dust, pollen, rain, sand, and other solid particles. Some of them move, leaving trails - and in some circumstances the behavior of moving light particles or waves can do some interesting things with your camera's digital sensor, such as lens flare, which can result in some spectacular-looking effects when it gets pixalized, that you wouldn't get with an SLR camera.
When a camera's flash is close to the lens, the angle of flashlight is such that any particles that happen to be close enough to the lens will reflect the light directly back into the lens. But because the objects reflecting the light are very close to the lens, they are in the out-of-focus zone, and therefore they typically appear as out-of-focus circles, typically usually whitish.
The borrowed picture below shows how out-of-focus objects appear as circles, usually white.
Exactly the same thing happens when the out-of-focus objects are in the foreground, close to the lens. They appear as variations of small white circles.
Why circles? They are taking-on the shape of your lens aperture, depending on how focused the objects are.
If you use a camera with a hexagonal lens aperture, the orbs will appear hexagonal in shape. That doesn't mean you've captured hexagonal shaped angels! It's the effect of your lens shape on light.
Is there really that much dust in the air? If it was your job to do the dusting at my house you'd believe that there is!
Why can't we see the particles with our naked eye? The physical sensor inside digital cameras is more sensitive to infra-red light and other wavelengths of light than the human eye.
For example, the infra-red emitter diode on my TVs remote control looks black to the human eye, and nothing is visible to the human eye when I press a button. But in the picture below, taken with my digital camera, the invisible infra-red light appears white.
This demonstrates two things:
1) digital cameras can sense light that our eyes can't; and
2) the mechanism inside digital cameras often shows infra-red light as white
Now here's a picture of the remote, taken without a flash in a dark room. The white light that appears in this photo when I pressed the remote button was not visible to the human eye, but the camera was able to 'see' it:
Now let's turn the room light on again, and this time change the angle of the remote, and see the effect we get by slightly changing the angle of the infrared light. See the elaborate, downward, diagonal shape of light?
Now let's turn the room light off yet again, with the remote still on the same slight angle, and notice what the camera senses. Again, none of this was visible to the human eye:
Quite dramatic, isn't it! Yet the natural eye saw nothing.
Notice how similar it looks to the following outdoor picture:
This is the type of picture that some are claiming is angelic. But it's probably not an angelic-being. It is probably lens flare.
These types of outdoor, night-time shots with those mysterious, large, diagonal, trailing shapes and colors are not all that uncommon. It's probably lens flare. It is quite possibly explainable by the response of your digital camera's sensory mechanism to an external light source - either a visible or a subvisible light source.
You can play around with the angle of diffraction to deliberately obtain the effect you desire. Some spectacular variations in size, shape, and color become possible.
So that explains, getting back to white orbs, how your camera might be able to display light reflected off dust particles by your flash that you can't see with your eyes.
The patterns of orbs are similar to interference fringes, causing multiple concentric circles within circles, and can be replicated deliberately by taking pictures in dusty rooms or where there is water spray.
Some people have conducted experiments and claim to have increased the number of orbs by spraying water near the lens, by selecting a dark background, or by angling the flash in a direct line.
Look at the elaborate green shape in the lower section of the picture below. If you brighten the picture, you can see even more circles of light emanating out from the green shape.
It should be obvious that the elaborate green shape with all its circles in the bottom of the picture is related to the light-source above, the bright sun. However, if the light source was not in range of the photo, and all you could see was the green shape with its circles, you can imagine what some people might tthink about it. Some pretty whacky ideas could emerge. Yet it's purely a physical phenomenon.
Some orbs and lens flares look somewhat different to other orbs, but when you enhance the image, you often find they are each very similar after all. The light could quite possibly be the optical product of small, suspended or moving particles.
Lens flare is a slightly different phenomenon, but often near-camera reflection and lens flare occur concurrently to create the types of effects you might sometimes be getting in your photos.
Lens flare is actually light diffraction caused by the sensor mechanism of the digital camera, and for that reason it only happens with digital cameras, not with SLR cameras. It probably has nothing to do with new levels of glory in someone's meeting.
If you don't want this effect in your photo, you might be able to avoid it by slightly changing the angle of your camera away from any external light sources that may be causing it, although not all light sources are visible, as illustrated by the TV remote above.
Besides backscatter, near-camera reflection and lens flare, I also have some thoughts about the possible effects of heat on a digital camera's sensor mechanism, but it's too soon for me to publish any results.
Ways to Avoid those Annoying Orbs & Flares
I have an external flash unit where I can adjust the angle. It's better to position the flash high above the camera, and on an angle, say a 45 degree angle. This means most of the particles can deflect the flashlight on an angle away from the lens, instead of straight back into the lens like what happens under full frontal light when the particle is exaggerated. This reduces the chance of having the particle show-up as an infringement in the photo.
In the borrowed photo below, notice first of all that orbs don't only appear in revival meetings: they even appear underwater. But notice also that most of the orbs in this photo appear in the top. This probably doesn't mean angels were swarming around like a school of jellyfish. It was more likely due to the angle of the underwater light.
The particles in the outskirts of the photo received the light on a different angle and were able to deflect the light away from the lens rather than directly back into the lens, therefore fewer orbs appear on the fringes of the photo, and not as brightly.
This means you might be able to avoid getting orbs by changing the angle of your flash.
To avoid lens flares, which are different to orbs, try angling your camera away from any external light sources that may be causing it.
If you are photographing an outdoor Gospel crusade with a crowd of people standing around at night on a dirt floor, there is going to be a lot of dust in the air (creating near-camera reflections, orbs) and the overhead lights with the black background of the night sky can create lens flare, appearing as spectacular diagonal, colorful, trailing shapes in your pictures.
Change the angle of the camera to the light source and you might be able to eliminate the lens flare.
There's not much you can do to avoid the near-camera reflections unless by chance you pick moments when there don't happen to be so many subvisible particles in the air near your lens, or unless you can detach the flash and control the angle.
But on the other hand, you may enjoy playing-around with lens flare and digital fraction, as an emerging art-form!
Unless you are able to reject the possibility of a physical explanation for the phenomenon, please think twice before using your orb photos to attract paying delegates to your next Glory conference.
Some say, "But we are meant to be childlike" in our acceptance of God's work. That doesn't give anyone the license to be inaccurate. More on the moral issues of reporting supernatural phenomena...
The Importance of Integrity in Reporting Phenomena
I'm not saying the above physical explanations are able to explain every occurrence of photographic orbs. The purpose of this article is not to prove an alternative point of view.
The purpose of this article is to show, in light of the above experiments, that perhaps a person shouldn't be too quick to declare that orbs are necessarily angels either. That's all I'm saying.
It's to make the point that we ought to want to check things out before we start passing them off as being supernatural. Something is wrong if we cannot tolerate reasonable enquiry.
That's the main point of this web-page: not necessarily to say that an alternative view has all the answers, but to point-out that maybe we ought to consider some things before we begin promoting the view that orbs certainly are angels.
Proverbs 18:13 says, "He that answereth a matter before he heareth it, it is folly and shame unto him".
We ought to delight not just in phenomena, but in whether or not it's actually true:
"When wisdom entereth into thine heart, and knowledge is pleasant unto thy soul" (Proverbs 2:10)
Christians above all people ought to be setting the highest example of ethics and integrity in their reporting. But sadly, some believers, even Pastors, want to believe orbs are angels and that's as far as they're willing to consider the matter. They don't even want to hear that there may be a physical explanation.
In fact, they might even commit a character-assassination of anyone who offers a possible physical explanation for it. The could label him a Pharisee, a Judas, or a Jezebel, simply for presenting something for discussion.
When I encounter someone who won't even listen to a possible physical explanation for photographic orbs, it makes me wonder what else they might be into that needs honest critique.
Like, maybe some of their prophetic words could be a little off-beam too. Or maybe some of the other phenomena they're excited about isn't verifiable either. Maybe their unwillingness extends to unwillingness in other areas, such as being willing to respond adequately when error emerges in a movement. Maybe they have a tendency to jump too quickly onto the bandwagon of certain Christian streams. Perhaps their judgement of others might also be tainted by a bias of their own which they favor. Maybe they tend towards a poor exegesis of Scripture. If their conscience isn't tender when it comes to reporting phenomena, perhaps their conscience isn't all that tender in other areas either. Maybe they have mixed motives for organizing Christian conferences with expensive registration fees.
We have to be faithful in small things if we want to be considered faithful in larger things.
I have no doubt that God can perform dental miracles. After all, our teeth are part of our body. But we ought to strive for integrity in the way we report an alleged dental miracle.
For example, I watched a world-wide satellite TV broadcast from a famous church. A woman was on the stage sharing how she'd supernaturally received a gold filling. But she admitted she couldn't remember whether or not she had already been to a dentist before the meeting and received the gold filling. If I'd been to a dentist and received a gold filling, I'd remember it, wouldn't you?
It wasn't a live-broadcast. In other words, the editors had time to decide that this was a testimony worthy of worldwide broadcast. Is that the most verifiable dental miracle they can come up with?
I've spoken to other people who once testified to receiving gold fillings, only to admit, three months later, that the teeth must have looked golden only because of the auditorium lights in the meeting. The teeth were no longer golden.
Again, I'm sure God can fill teeth. But we ought to strive for integrity when we're reporting it.
Gemstones, feathers, oil, and gold dust - if they appear in your meeting, you ought to want to have it checked out. Find out what substance it is. Try to find its origin. If someone else feels the need for evidence, at least respect their need as legitimate.
If you hear of such phenomena happening in someone else's meeting, you can't really report it with certainty unless you can vouch for the character of the people who saw it and are sure of their evidence, such as the chemical composition of the substance. Otherwise the most you can report is, "It is alleged that..."
Thankfully the Four Gospels on which our faith is based do not include mere it-is-alleged statements. Luke talked about "...many infallible proofs". The Apostles saw, touched, and heard the things they wrote about - in the presence of a multitude of witnesses.
Even those who did not believe that Jesus was the Messiah could not deny that the notable miracles which the Apostles wrote about had actually occurred.
The Apostles didn't merely believe in the resurrection - they were eyewitnesses, and so were literally hundreds of others. The Apostles never expected anyone to believe their reports as a child without presenting the evidence. That's the Bible standard.
We could probably do with a return to using the same criteria for authenticity that the Apostles used when they reported the teachings and works of Christ in the four Gospels. If a manifestation can be attested to with the same undeniable proof that Bible-miracles were, and if it's a Biblical manifestation, then let's report it confidently.
Bible-type manifestations, when they happen today, are readily verifiable. For example, if someone who was born blind is instantly healed during the laying-on-of hands, it is so easy for his family and friends who are watching to verify who he is, what his eyesight was like, and it's easy to see that no doctor slipped into the meeting and performed quick surgery on him.
Or when a young person starts speaking fluently in an earthly language which her family and friend's know she'd never learned, the supernatural nature of the phenomenon is easily verifiable by everyone who knows her, whether they're a believer or not, and we can know she is being filled with the Holy Spirit. It's a Biblical manifestion.
Joy and visions are other examples of Biblical manifestations which occurred in the Book of Acts.
In the Bible God did supernaturally cause oil to multiply. He did cause manna to fall from heaven. He did multiply the loaves and fishes. God can do whatever He wants.
But when a miracle has truly happened, even an unbeliever is able to see that something unexplainable has happened, irrespective of whether or not he is willing to accept the claims of Christ.
No-one should be afraid of honest investigation if he knows a miracle has truly occurred. In fact, he ought to welcome investigation, so that the miraculous nature of the occurrence becomes known to all!
If you see such manifestations, in the presence of many witnesses, then you can become a witness of what you've seen and heard and verified. That's what a witness is.
But when someone overseas says they got an angel feather, and you don't know them, and you don't know if they eliminated the possibility that the feather could have been placed in the room by human agency, or fallen from a feather duster, or been obtained from any known fauna on earth, then you can't be a dogmatic witness that it is indeed an angel feather. The most you can say is, "So-and-so claims a feather appeared in their meeting but I have not verified the source of the feather". That's the type of integrity a witness must have.
Or if someone tells you their walls at home are dripping oil - do you know them? have you seen it? have you heard independent witnesses? has the oil been tested that it isn't any known brand of oil? If so, then you can talk about it with certainty.
"In the mouth of two or three witnesses let every word be established".
If you can tick all of the above criteria, then you can report with confidence that the phenomenon was supernatural. But if you can't tick one of the above criteria, then the most you can report is, "So-and-so told me that such-and-such happened..."
A lie is anything that is not true. If you are not sure about a phenomenon you've heard about, then stick to reporting the things you do know and have seen and verified for yourself in the presence of witnesses. If what you are reporting is not true, it's still a lie even though you thought it was true.
Paul said he would not dare to speak of the things which God had not wrought by him. In other words, he only spoke of the things he was able to check out.
It didn't necessarily mean other things weren't happening elsewhere - just that he wasn't able to talk about them with the same authority. That's a good attitude, don't you think?
And even if phenomena is indeed supernatural and verifiable, it still does not mean it is of God. Pharaoh's magicians were able to perform miracles. Satan's ministers can perform lying signs and wonders. Even well-meaning Christian ministers can inadvertently allow a mixture of the Holy Spirit and familiar spirits in their meetings, if they're not vigilant. But we don't want a mixture. Stick to Biblical manifestations, and we'll be right.
But don't shy away from the Holy Spirit for fear of error either.
Even if we have the genuine signs and wonders, they should not become an objective in themselves; rather, as Jesus said:
"Notwithstanding in this rejoice not, that the spirits are subject unto you; but rather rejoice, because your names are written in heaven" (Luke 10:20)
And as Paul said:
"For our rejoicing is this, the testimony of our conscience, that in simplicity and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom, but by the grace of God, we have had our conversation in the world, and more abundantly to you-ward" (I Corinthians 1:12).
By all means let's pray for an increase in Biblical signs and wonders. I'm praying for it. And I'm not saying angels aren't appearing because I believe angels can be seen when God wills, through the gift of the discerning of spirits. And I'm not saying God hasn't or can't perform other miracles.
The main objective of this web page is to help promote a culture of integrity in the way we embrace and then report phenomena.
"Provide things honest in the sight of all men", the New Testament says.
"...that in all things thou mayest adorn the Gospel".
This doesn't mean supernatural things aren't happening. They may be happening. It may even be of God. All I'm saying is that we ought to tolerate honest investigation. And we ought to desire to have integrity in our reporting so that none of our words fall to the ground. We ought to want that.
"A good name is better to be chosen than great riches".
For the More Technically-Minded
The following is an excerpt from The Science of Orbs a web page explaining the physics of orb photography:
"Is it a realistic assumption that digital cameras can photograph fringe patterns from airborne particles that exist in nature that cannot be seen by the human eye?
Researchers in the field of the holography of small particles use an index called "Far-Field Number" defined as follows:
N is the Far-Field Number, Lambda is wavelength of light; z is the distance between particle and camera (*1); and d is the diameter of the particle.
It is known that when N is in the range between 2 and 8, we observe clear fringe patterns.
It is also known that:
(1) The wavelength of infrared ranges from 1 um (micron) to 1000 um (=1mm).
(2) The sizes of airborne particles, especially windblown dusts, range from approximately 2 um to 20 um.
Assuming that the wavelength of the infrared that digital cameras capture is 1 um since it is the closest to visible light. We also use N=5, which would yield very clear and "typical" concentric circles.
Given the conditions above, we can estimate the distance between the camera and the particle. Table 1 shows the relationship between the particle size and the distance from the camera.
This result indicates that in order for airborne particles to yield fringe patterns caused by infrared light, the particles must be very close to the camera. However, fine water droplets can yield fringe patterns caused by infrared light when they are a few inches away from the camera. This explains why orbs are never hidden behind other objects--except other orbs: it is because the particles are so close to the camera that there cannot be any object between the particles and the camera. It also explains why photographers do not see particles when taking photos: it is because the particles are too small for the human eye to see.
*1) The distance between particle and camera should actually be optical path length due to the presence of the lenses."
Acknowledgments & Further Reading
Wikepedia Article on Photographic Orbs
© 2008 John Edwards