Fibres are brilliant at producing supposedly ‘paranormal’ effects on photographs, a prime example of which is given in Image 1 on the right. The image is a view of one of the windows of Houghton House just north of Ampthill and was taken at night using the camera’s flash. For a larger view just click on the image (this applies to all green bordered images). There appears to be a white streak above the window. At the time the air was very full of moisture, as it was a misty night, but the streak does not look like a moisture effect, especially as there is a central bright patch fading out towards the edges. Could this therefore be paranormal, is it a spirit in motion, or the other popular explanation an energy line or ley line? Sorry, but it is none of these and the give-away is the fact that it fades towards the edges. It is a fibre!

If you look at Image 2 below you will see a similar streak, again with a bright central region and fading towards the edges. This was taken in indoors and is in fact a hair (belonging to my daughter). The hair was photographed using the camera flash and with the hair placed closer than the minimum focal distance of the camera. The hair was in fact about three centimetres from the lens (which can focus down to thirty centimetres). The bright central region is caused by the hair being slightly curved so that only one area reflects light directly back into the camera lens. The other areas of the hair reflect light away from the lens and hence appear darker. This hair was a black one but thinner or lighter hairs would vanish at the edges of the bright area. By far the best for this effect is spider's web as it usually gives a bright streak fading to nothing at the edges.

The third image on the right (Image 3) shows the same hair but photographed slightly further away so that it now appears as a string of orbs. You can get virtually any pattern you want from fibres so you should always be very suspicious of linear anomalies. This is especially true when baby spiders are leaving their nests as a lot of them fly away on long strands of silk which are carried by the wind, instant anomalies in the making. The conclusion of this is that you shouldn’t always believe what your camera appears to be telling you.