A Very Odd Sky

Photo date: January 30, 2016. Photographer: Mark Mahin.

The photo below shows a bunch of mysterious orbs above a building in New York City.

A few seconds after taking this photo, I  took a photo of a piece of cardboard at arm's length. It showed no orbs.  The photo is below.

 I have tried this cardboard test 40 times (as shown here), in the middle of photographing orbs, and not once once have I seen a single orb in front of the cardboard.  This is strong evidence that what is shown is photos like the one at top is not dust in front of the camera.

There was no rain, fog, mist or precipitation on this night. The air quality listed on airnow.gov was "good."  The pollen count listed on pollen.com was very low, with a level of only 0.1. 

The Haunted Sky

Photo date: February 2, 2016. Photographer: Mark Mahin.

The photo below shows a bunch of orbs floating mysteriously above a building in New York City.

A few seconds before taking this photo, in the same position,  I took a photo of a piece of cardboard at arm's length. It showed no orbs. A few seconds after taking this photo, I  took a photo of a piece of cardboard at arm's length. It showed no orbs.  The second photo is below.

I have tried this cardboard test 39 times (as shown here), in the middle of photographing orbs, and not once once have I seen a single orb in front of the cardboard.  This is strong evidence that what is shown is photos like the one at top is not dust in front of the camera.

What also strongly indicates that we are not seeing here dust in front of the camera is that the top photo shows many orbs above the building, but none in front of the building. If we were seeing dust, we would see orbs scattered randomly around the photo area.  See here for 24 other examples of this "orb vertical bias."

There was no rain, fog, mist or precipitation on this night. The air quality listed on airnow.gov was "good."  The pollen count listed on pollen.com was very low, with a level of only 0.1. 

Moving Orb Reappears 25 Times

Photo date: November 19, 2015. Photographer: Mark Mahin.

On this night I took a series of photos that was one of the strangest I have ever taken. The series showed a moving orb that seemed to reappear about 25 different times within a series of 65 photos.

I photograph moving orbs very often, particularly in Grand Central Terminal in New York. But prior to this day, whenever I photographed a moving orb, it would be like a one-shot wonder. I would get a single photo showing what looked like a moving orb, but such an orb would not reappear in the next twenty photos.

On this day, however, something very different was going on. My photos showing what looked like the same moving orb reappearing many different times.  Here is a photo from early in the series, taken at 5:24 PM.  The camera seems to have caught two position states of a moving orb.

Here was the next photo, also taken at 5:24 PM.

Here was a photo taken in the next minute, at 5:25 PM. Note that now we seem to see not just two circular orbs within the shape, but three circular orbs.

Two photos later (also at 5:25 PM) I took this photo, showing a blank wall. Now there was no sign of the orb. This is the complete photo, without cropping.

But the next photo (also at 5:25 PM) showed the orb reappearing again.

Most of the next few photos showed no sign of the orb, including this photo of a piece of cardboard in front of the camera, taken at 5:28 PM.  This is the complete photo, without cropping.

But the next photo, taken at 5:29 PM, showed the orb back again.

Most of the next photos did not show the orb, including this photo taken of a piece of cardboard at 5:30 PM. This is the complete photo, without cropping.

But the next photo, also taken at 5:30 PM, showed the orb back again.

 There is no way to explain these series of photos through any natural hypothesis that I can think of. Each of the 25 times I photographed this orb within the same hour, it had the same position in the top right corner of the photo area (the orb photos shown here are closeups cropped from larger photos).  No insects were observed when these photos were taken, so we can hardly think that I was repeatedly photographing some insect I couldn't see with my eyes. The orbs look nothing like insects, and if it had been an insect it would have appeared at random positions, rather than always appearing in the top right corner each of 25 times. The same objections apply to a hypothesis of dust. Of course, neither insects nor dust move with even a tenth of the speed that seems to be shown in these photos, which seem to show something moving very fast.

The most workable natural hypothesis (although not a good one) is that there was some kind of smudge on my camera lens. But even that hypothesis fails for two reasons: (1) the "orb streak" does not look the same in each photo (sometimes having two internal circles, and sometimes three); (2) such a hypothesis is ruled out by the intervening photos I took of cardboard and blank walls (shown above), which did not show anything unusual.  A smudge on the lens would have showed up on all of the photos taken between 5:24 and 5:30 PM.

After taking this series of photos, I went to Grand Central Terminal, and took more than 100 photos which showed no such anomaly.

Although I have never before seen this type of reappearance with moving orbs, I have seen equally astonishing reappearances of anomalous objects, as shown in this series of posts, which include posts about reappearing giant purple orbs.

Paranormal Pair in the Sky

Photo date: October 7, 2015. Photographer: Mark Mahin.

The photo below shows two mysterious orbs above a building in New York City: one purple and one orange.

The previous photo (taken a few seconds earlier) was of a piece of cardboard at arm's length, and showed no orbs, suggesting that what I photographed was not anything floating near the camera.

There was no rain, fog, mist or precipitation on this night. The air quality listed on airnow.gov was "good," with a rating of 28.

Purple Orbs Haunt the Church

Photo date: September 23, 2015. Photographer: Mark Mahin.

The photo below shows a bunch of purple orbs in front of a church on Madison Avenue in New York. The brightest orb is a white orb that is directly positioned in front of a cross at the top of the church.

 The photo above was taken at 9:05 PM, and the next photo I took (also at 9:05 PM) was of a piece of cardboard at arm's length. As always, this test showed no orbs, suggesting that what I was photographing was not any particles near the camera.

There was no fog, mist, rain, or precipitation on this night. The air quality listed on airnow.gov was "good," with a rating of 38.

Mysterious Multitude: Visitation of the Orbs

Photo date: September 23, 2015. Photographer: Mark Mahin.

The photo below was taken of a church on Madison Avenue in New York City. We see a great swarm of mysterious orbs.

This photo was taken at 9:05 PM, and both the photo before and the photo after this photo (both also taken at 9:05 PM, from the same position) were photos of a piece of cardboard at arm's length.  As always, those photos showed no orbs in front of the cardboard.  Below is a composite image showing these two photos and the photo below. There is no way to reconcile such a series of photos with a hypothesis that the photo above was showing dust near my camera.

There was no fog, mist, rain, or precipitation on this night. The air quality listed on airnow.gov was "good," with a rating of 38.

Green Orb and Orange Orb Join the Sky Orb Party

Photo date: September 15, 2015. Photographer: Mark Mahin.

The photo below shows a street in New York City. We see a swarm of orbs in the sky.

The photo above was taken at 9:00 PM, and the next photo (taken a few seconds later, also at 9:00 PM) was of a piece of cardboard at arm's length. As in all of the 34 times I have tried this just after photographing many orbs, this cardboard test showed not a single orb, suggesting that what I was photographing was not any particles such as dust near the camera.

The next photo (taken at 9:01 PM) showed many orbs in the sky, including a large green orb and an orange orb.

There was no fog, mist, rain, or precipitation on this night. The air quality listed on airnow.gov was "moderate," with a rating of 52 that was almost low enough to qualify as "good."

A Mysterious Sky

Photo date: September 15, 2015. Photographer: Mark Mahin.

The photo below shows a street in New York City. In the sky we see many orbs, four of which are bright.

 The photo above was taken at 9:07 PM. The previous photo (also taken at 9:07 PM) was of a piece of cardboard at arm's length. As always, this test showed no orbs, suggesting that what I was photographing was not any particles (such as dust) near the camera.

There was no fog, mist, rain, or precipitation on this night. The air quality listed on airnow.gov was "moderate" with a rating of 52 that was almost low to qualify as "good."

Cluster of the Sky Mysteries

Photo date: September 8, 2015. Photographer: Mark Mahin.

The photo below was taken at 9:00 PM in front of the Schwarzman branch of the New York Public Library. We see a rich swarm of mysterious orbs. Right click to see the photo (which was uploaded directly from the camera) at its full resolution.

The previous photo I took (also at 9:00 PM) was of a photo of a piece of cardboard at arm's length. This showed no orbs in front of the camera, indicating that what I was photographing was not any particles in front of the camera such as dust.

Notice the presence of only one small orb in the bottom right part of the photo. I have seen this "orb vertical bias" in many photos that I have labeled with that tag -- the orbs appearing in great numbers above some foreground building, but almost none in front of that building (which we would not at all expect from natural particles near the camera, which would be randomly scattered across the photo area).

100+ Orb "Comet Tails" All Pointing in the Same Direction

Photo date: September 16, 2015. Photographer: Mark Mahin.

The photo below was taken in front of a building in New York City. We see a dense swarm of orbs. Right click to see the photo at its full resolution.

If you right click on this photo and open it in a separate tab or window, and then load the photo in a photo viewer allowing you to zoom in, you will discover something very unusual. The photo shows more than 100 objects that have "comet tails." You can see this very clearly if you use your photo editor to make a negative version of this image.

What is remarkable is that all of these many "orb comet tails" are all pointing in the same direction. It is as if the photo has captured a great body of objects all moving in a south-westerly direction.

Below is a closeup of part of the photo (I used the IrfanView "Auto-adjust colors" menu option on the closeup).  You can see here two larger orbs with "comet tails." But if you look closely you can also see many other much smaller objects (or more distant objects?) that also seem to have "comet tails."  They all seem to be moving in the same south-westerly direction.

The top photo was taken at 10:44 PM. The next photo was the photo below, also taken at 10:44 PM. I photographed a piece of cardboard at arm's length to see whether my previous photo might have been showing particles near the camera. As always, this "cardboard test" was negative, showing no orbs in front of the cardboard -- thereby indicating that the previous photo does not show particles such as dust near the camera.

There was no fog, mist, rain, or precipitation on this night.  The air quality listed on airnow.gov was "moderate," with a rating of 52 that was almost good enough to qualify as "good."  I noticed nothing unusual nearby, and did not see a single insect on this night.

A photo similar to the top photo (and one that is even more dramatic) can be seen here on  Yvonne Scouller's site. That photo also shows a dense swarm of moving orbs, with larger moving orbs outnumbered by smaller moving orbs.

Pink Orbs and Their Sky Swarm Pals

Photo date: September 8, 2015. Photographer: Mark Mahin.

The photo below was taken at 8:59 PM in front of the Schwarzman branch of the New York Public Library. We see an astonishing swarm of orbs. Right click to see the photo (which was uploaded directly from the camera) at its full resolution.  We see here pink orbs, purple orbs, blue orbs and yellow orbs.

The next photo I took (also at 8:59) was of a piece of cardboard at arm's length. As in each of the 30 times I have tried this test while in the middle of photographing great numbers of orbs,  this test showed no orbs in front of the cardboard, indicating that what I was photographing was not any type of particles (such as dust) near the camera.

There was no fog, mist, rain or precipitation on this night. The air quality listed on airnow.gov was "good," with a rating of 50.

Is This Big Orb the Leader of the Orb Swarm?

Photo date: September 8, 2015. Photographer: Mark Mahin.

The photo below shows the Schwarzman branch of the New York Public Library,  We see a vast swarm of orbs floating above the building. Near the left edge is a large orb that is 11 percent of the original photo height. Is this big guy the leader of the pack?

Once again, we see a strong "orb vertical bias." There is a dense swarm of orbs above the building to the right, but we can see almost no orbs in the bottom fifth of the photo or the bottom right fifth of the photo. That's not what we would see if this photo was showing natural particles floating near the camera (such particles would be randomly scattered around the photo area).

The photo above was taken at 9:00 PM. The next photo (also taken at 9:00 PM) was of a piece of cardboard at arm's length. As always, this "cardboard test" showed no orbs, indicating that what I was photographing was not any particles (such as dust, pollen, or water vapor) near the camera.

There was no fog, mist, rain or precipitation on this night. The air quality listed on airnow.gov was "good," with a rating of 50.

A Sudden Swarm of Orbs

Photo date: September 8, 2015. Photographer: Mark Mahin.

The photo below shows the Schwarzman branch of the New York Public Library, and was taken at 9:01 PM. We see the sky above it packed with orbs.

This swarm appeared suddenly, as the previous photo (taken at 9:00) showed relatively few orbs.

The next photo taken after the first photo (also at 9:01 PM) was of a piece of cardboard at arm's length. As always, this cardboard test showed no orbs, indicating that what I was photographing was not dust or any other particles near the camera.

There was no fog, mist, rain, or precipitation on this night. The air quality listed on airnow.gov was "good," with a rating of 50. There was nothing unusual nearby that I could see with my eyes or smell.

Colorful Sky Orbs Make It an Empire State OMG

Photo date: September 4, 2015. Photographer: Mark Mahin.

The photo below shows the Empire State Building in New York City. We see a swarm of orbs around it, including a green orb, a blue orb, and an orange orb.

Below is a closeup showing a blue orb and a green orb. Do we see a face or two here?

The photo at top was taken at 9:18, and also at 9:18 I took the photo below, of a piece of cardboard at arm's length. As in all of the 27 times I have tried it, this test showed no orbs in front of the cardboard, indicating that what I was photographing was not any particles (such as dust) very near the camera.
 

There was no fog, mist, rain, or precipitation on this night. The air quality listed on airnow.gov was "good," with a rating of 35.

Glimpse of an Unfathomable Reality

Photo date: September 8, 2015. Photographer: Mark Mahin.

The photo below was taken at 8:59 PM in front of the Schwarzman branch of the New York Public Library. We see an astonishing swarm of orbs. Right click to see the photo (which was uploaded directly from the camera) at its full resolution.

A photo of a piece of cardboard at arm's length taken a few photos earlier (also at 8:59 PM) had showed no orbs.

A photo of a piece of cardboard at arm's length taken a few photos later (at 9:00 PM) showed no orbs

 These tests clearly indicate the first photo was not showing any particles (such as dust) very near the camera. The same thing is indicated by the fact that we see a dense swarm of orbs above the building in the top right corner, but almost no orbs in front of that building. If I had been photographing particles very near the camera, they would have been distributed evenly across the photo area.

There was no fog, mist, rain, or precipitation on this night. The air quality listed on airnow.gov was "good," with a rating of 50. There was nothing unusual nearby that I could see with my eyes or smell.

Orbs Hang Out Near Some Classic Architecture

Photo date: August 24, 2015.  Photographer: Mark Mahin.

The photo below (taken at 9:52 PM) shows the top of the famous Chrysler Building in New York City.  We see quite a few purple orbs floating near the building.

The previous photo (also taken at 9:52 PM) showed a yellow orb floating near the same building (a yellow orb not seen in the photo above).

The next photo taken after the first photo (also taken at 9:52 PM) was of a piece of cardboard at arm's length. This showed no orbs, indicating that the anomalies photographed above were not caused by particles floating near the camera.

There was no fog, mist, rain, or precipitation on this night.  The air quality listed on airnow.gov was "good," with a rating of 39.

Orbs of Light Surround the Empire State Building

Photo date: September 4, 2015. Photographer: Mark Mahin.

The photo below was taken on 9:13 PM, and shows the Empire State Building in New York.  We see a swarm of mysterious orbs, which have a variety of colors, including orange, purple, blue, and green. Right-click to see the photo at its full resolution.

Below is a closeup of the orange orb. It has a feature that looks a bit like some strange face, but it is too hard to see the details.

The next photo, also taken at 9:13, also showed various colorful orbs.

The next photo, also taken at 9:13, was a "cardboard test." As I so often do when I am photographing many orbs, I took out a piece of cardboard and photographed it at arm's length, to see whether I would see any sign of particles in front of the cardboard. No such orbs appeared in front of the cardboard. This test has never shown any orbs during any of the many times I have tried it, which is a strong indication that the orbs I was not photographing were not dust or any other particles near the camera.

There was no fog, mist, rain, or precipitation on this night. The air quality listed on airnow.gov was "good," with a rating of 35.

Spooky Swarm: 7 Photos of an Orb Storm

Photo date: August 24, 2015. Photographer: Mark Mahin.

The photos below were all taken at 10:00 PM on August 24, 2015.  Although the results will look quite similar to what was shown in this previous post, these photos are from one week later.

Below is the first photo in the series, which shows not very much going on. We see the Chrysler Building, the Met Life Building, and Grand Central Station.

The next photo in the series shows a huge swarm of orbs.

The next photo in the series also shows a huge swarm of orbs.

The next photo in the series shows a piece of cardboard I photographed at arm's length, to verify that the orbs I was seeing were not natural particles near the camera. As always, this test showed no orbs in front of the cardboard, indicating I was not photographing natural particles (such as dust) near the camera. (See my 23 posts labeled "cardboard test" for other similar tests in the middle of photographing many orbs, none showing any orbs in front of the cardboard.)

The next photo in the series shows a huge swarm of orbs.

The next photo in the series shows a huge swarm of orbs.  Notice how some of the orbs seem to form a kind of angle shape that is rather similar to the triangular top of the Chrysler Building.

 The next photo in the series shows a much smaller number of orbs.

 The last photo in the series shows quite a few orbs.

 

Notice how this series of photos shows more than 500 orbs above the building at bottom (Grand Central Station), but we see a total of only about 7 orbs in front of that building (all of which are very small).  This overwhelming "orb vertical bias" is very strong evidence that we are not seeing any type of natural particles (such as dust) floating near the camera. If these photos showed natural particles near the camera, such particles would be randomly distributed around the photo area.

In the posts here, here,  and here we also see equally strong evidence of this "orb vertical bias." In all of those posts, we see a series of photos in which there are hundreds of orbs floating above a building at the bottom of the photo, with almost no orbs in front of that building.  Such observations very strongly discredit any theory that natural particles near the camera are the source of the orbs in these photos.

There was no fog, mist, rain, or precipitation on this night.  The air quality listed on airnow.gov was "good," with a rating of 39.  The photos showing orbs in this post were all uploaded directly from the camera, without any cropping or changes of any type.  You can right-click on these high resolution photos to see them at their full resolution.