Psychic photography is a phenomenon as old as photography itself. In the early days of photographic development, photographers noticed bizarre smudges and markings on some of their films, odd impressions in the mercury developing plate that seemed to take recognizable form all too often. Also referred to as ôSpirit Photography,ö psychic photography is, in essence, the practice of capturing ethereal life forms and auras on film.
One of the first cases of psychic photography, now widely believed to be a hoax, involved two English sisters who presented to a local paper photographs they had taken of each other on their palatial country estate. The pictures clearly showed the girls seated among some of the statues and fountains littering the grounds of their home with ôfaeriesö seated on their shoulders. The case became quite famous, attracting the attention of noted British author L.M. Shrewsbury, a self-styled Mystic and a member of the same Society of the Golden Dawn as W.B. Yeats and Aleister Crowley. Shrewsbury studied the photographs and proclaimed the young girls, now known as ôThe Miraculous Hedge Sisters,ö genuinely psychic. Later, the girls revealed that the figures in their photographs had not been ôFaeriesö but their midget brother Myron, dressed in ôthose clothes he wears when he thinks no one is looking.ö Shrewsbury became a laughing-stock and was booted from literary circles, but he maintained until the day he died (from acute acne in 1853) that the photographs had been genuine. And so do we.
Psychic photography is alive and well, thanks to modern photographic techniques. With todayÆs high-speed exposures and cool zoom lensesùto say nothing of video recordingùit has become as simple a matter to photograph a grinning Irish Shrub-Sprite as an obnoxious uncle in your living-room. The world is alive with the spirits of nature, the essences of loved ones since passed on, and Gene ShalitÆs body odor, all of which have some semi-physical property which allows them to be photographed under the proper conditions. At Hillhouse, we have made a careful study of these conditions and have perfected several techniques which make psychic photography not a chance occurrence but a controlled science. Namely,
*We always use a #7 Hepweiller Flash with our cameras (for some reason, spirits are attracted to the number seven)
*We leave a few of those little, fluffy, yipping, white dogs lying around the site. Generally, spirits will try and pet the dogs, and then . . . WHAM!!!
*We photograph in the nude.
So if you suspect you being haunted by a particularly vain ghost, or if you believe your crops are blighted because you have failed to include a local Dryad in your family photo, give us a call! We can be on the scene within days to photograph your offender, and we even throw in 20 free wallet-sized portraits! Call Hillhouse now!