Orbs reconsidered...
On Monday I took some visiting friends round a few tourist places here in Liverpool which I've never visited before myself. These included a wander inside the monumental St George's Hall - which in its Victorian heydey served rather randomly as a concert hall/ballroom and court/prison cell - and Western Approaches, the underground system of bunkers and war rooms from which the allied naval campaign in the second world war was secretly run. And other places in between.
I took pictures - over 80 all told, and once the useless, repetitive or unfocused were discarded 66 were posted on my Facebook.
3 of the images from inside St George's had an individual "orb" in each one. (I'll not attach them here as there's nothing spectacular to see.. you all know what one looks like) Each time it was in a different location in the scene therefore not on the lens itself. I would not for one fleeting second interpret such banal features as supernatural ...and every fool knows, surely, that they've long been explained in terms of flashlight on dust particles. It explains it on wikipedia and there's a very large article on the FT archives here disposing of the ghostly fantasy once and for all.
When I posted them however and someone immediately commented "there are orbs in these pics" I stopped myself short from pointing out that, even though I've never in my life before,as far as I recall, had the problem appear on my own photos, the camera is new, which would explain it, and they only appeared on the photos in an old and therefore doubtless dusty building..no mystery here. I say stopped myself because the "orbs" only appeared in 3 specific photos - 2 in the court room and one in the basement cell below the dock - and I decided to google...
I was aware a local ghost tour company includes a tour of the Hall so there must be some claim about it, but beyond that had no knowledge or expectation of it being "haunted" whatsoever. This is what google found: ""The condemned cells, the court rooms, the lower floors and the air ducts, which were used by the hall's workers, have all been mentioned as areas where supernatural activity has happened. Many high profile cases have been heard in the courts over the years, and it is said that the old cells still feel the ghostly presences of all those convicted souls that were condemned to death." and "The basement is suspected of being a key area of poltergeist activity."
This is amusing and titillating...that my first and only "orb" photographs appeared only in the specific rooms of the specific builiding which are, unbeknownst to me, reputed to be haunted.
There was a flaw to undermine any excitment though. They were not in fact the only pictures among the 66 to have orbs after all. 4 of the photos taken at Western Approaches - 2 in the main war room, and two in adjoining spaces - also contained single orb artefacts. The fact that this building isn't exactly ancient and was a place of safety and security not death would seem to herald the triumph of the "new camera/dusty underground" assumption. But just to be sure.....I googled again.....
"And, like all places worth their salt, it's reportedly haunted. A woman fell from a ladder in the war room and shattered her skull on the concrete beneath and, of course, some say her spirit stalks these gloomy winding corridors to this day"
No pictures taken in any other rooms or any other building, nor outside, during our day of sight seeing contain these pesky little marks. Only those in the - it transpires - allegedly haunted rooms.
How annoying.... :/