PRESS RELEASE - Friday, March 11, 2005
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New Analysis Confirms Second Face
on Shroud of Turin and Raises Questions About Other Images
NEW YORK, March 11, 2005 -- Skeptics and people who believe the
Shroud of Turin is the genuine burial shroud of Jesus have always shared one
common perception: they thought they knew what the man on the shroud looked
like. Now, new computerized image analysis suggests they may be wrong.
Results of this analysis suggest that many characteristics of the images on
the shroud are optical illusions caused by random plaid patterns in the
cloth. For instance, because of these patterns, the face of the man on the
shroud appears gaunt and the nose abnormally long and narrow. By using image
enhancement technology to reduce the effect of the variegated patterns, the
shape of the face changes significantly. The face takes on a broader look
and the nose becomes realistic looking.
Shroud researchers have discovered that these patterns are caused by
alternating bands of darker and lighter threads in the cloth. Ancient linen
was often manufactured by bleaching the thread in batches before weaving,
thus producing nonuniform whiteness in the cloth.
The Second Face
The plaid patterns are also cloaking details. Last year, two researchers,
Giulio Fanti and Roberto Maggiolo of the University of Padua in Italy,
reported finding a faint second face on the backside of the cloth. They
published their findings in the peer reviewed scientific Journal of Optics
(April 14, 2004). Though the facial image was confirmed scientifically, it
was not easy to see. However, by filtering out the plaid background with
software developed by Robert Doumax, an expert in computerized image
analysis, the second face becomes visible.
The second face was an important find because it virtually eliminates
artistic methods while giving credence to a hypothesis that a natural
amino/carbonyl chemical reaction formed the images. (See:
Why No One Can Fully Explain the Pictures on the
Shroud of Turin )
The Shroud of Turin is a fourteen-foot long cloth with front and back images
of a man who appears to have been scourged and crucified. The shroud is
stored in St. John the Baptist Cathedral in Turin, Italy.
Since the mid-1970s, the shroud has been the subject of many scientific
investigations. In 1978 a team of researchers found that the images were not
painted and the bloodstains were genuine. Scientists also showed that pollen
and limestone dust on the cloth may be from the region around Jerusalem.
However, in 1988, carbon 14 dating of a sample cut from a corner of the
shroud indicated that the material originated between 1260 and 1390.
Undaunted by the carbon 14 results, scientists continued to try to explain
how the images were formed. The images consist of caramel-like substances
thinner than most bacteria. Historians pieced together records that
suggested the shroud was the famed fourth century, or earlier, Cloth of
Edessa that disappeared from Constantinople when the city was sacked in
1204. Researchers M. Sue Benford and Joseph Marino, working with several
textile experts, determined that the Shroud had been expertly rewoven in the
precise location from which the carbon 14 sample was taken.
We still don’t know how the images were formed. But we are well past
thinking the shroud was painted or that it is a medieval fake-relic.
Chemistry proves that. We can make a good case that it is a burial shroud of
a crucifixion victim. With some historical reasoning we can infer that it
might have been used by Jesus.
Earlier this year, chemist Raymond Rogers, a Los Alamos National Laboratory
chemist, showed that the sample used for carbon 14 dating was indeed from
discrete reweaving of the cloth. By examining remaining material from the
carbon 14 sample, he proved that what was tested was chemically unlike the
rest of the shroud. Rogers found splices and dyestuff used to make the
reweaving discrete. He also found chemical evidence that the cloth was at
least twice as old as the carbon 14 dating had suggested. He published his
findings in the peer reviewed scientific journal Thermochimica Acta (Jan 21,
2005, Volume 425 Issue 1-2). John L. Brown, a retired Georgia Institute of
Technology scientist, independently confirmed many of Rogers’ findings.
Casually accepting what we think we see on the shroud is one of the greatest
pitfalls in shroud research. People see all sorts of things like teeth or
skeletal features that may simply be different patterns in the thread.
Not seeing things is a problem as well. It took chemical and microscopic
analysis to reveal the discrete patch that was used for carbon 14 dating. It
took advanced image analysis to find the second face on the backside of the
cloth.
Comparing Blue Backside to B&W Front Side
Notice in particular:
- Hairline corresponds. This
is particularly noticeable on the left side of the face (your left).
- Eyebrows curve visibly.
Eyebrow on left side of face is higher than eyebrow on the
right.
- Right side of face is
darker. The darker region extends downward from the
hairline, along the nose on the left, to the top of the mustache. Correspondingly the left
side of the face is lighter.
- In the blue backside image,
a bright cross-like shape is
visible midway horizontally and about two-thirds of the way down from the
top. This cross corresponds exactly with the tip of the nose in
the front side image.
- The bright spot in the
middle of the backside image (filtered out in figure 5
above),
corresponds with an apparent protrusion on the
nose just below eye level.
- In the backside image the crease that passed through the beard is barely visible on the bottom edge. In the front image a forked beard that starts just above the crease is very evident. There is some indication of the fork in the backside image exactly where it is expected.
Shroud of Turin Story - Guide to the Facts Home Page
© 2004, 2005 Daniel R. Porter, Bronxville, New York
