Face in the window?

[Suzi]

Sorry!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Sam Flynn]

Hi Don-Ok what is it then?

I suppose it's too big to have been the ash-pan from beneath Mary Kell's fireplace, is it?

[Mike Covell]

There are two faces in the window, the one seen in the lower point of the corner, and the one seen further up in the window. It is quite obviously Abberline kissing Mary Kelly before she flee's to Ireland!

[Dan Norder]

It was suggested the pan was part of the photographer's impedimenta, but there was no consensus.

Considering that a number of your friends were arguing quite forcefully that it wasn't a pan at all but a hole in the ground and they claimed that position was the consensus opinion of people whose supposed expertise on such matters could not be questioned, I am encouraged to see that at least you are admitting that it is a pan. Of course if you refused to accept that and said it wasn't the consensus it wouldn't change what it really was anyway...

[Bailey]

Never heard about the frame being removed to take the photo before, Damon. Sounds extremely far-fetched to me.

It does to me, too, but I'm sure I've read it somewhere over the years, and more than one somewhere, too. Could be a case of brain failure on my part, but I'll keep an eye out for it

Developing pans were certainly needed. This is why, on plate-glass photography, you see images of guys with big black cloths over them when they take the shot. The image has to be developed under the cloth and in the box after being taken. Photographers often had to have location assistants in the same way that golfers have caddys.

Well how about that... although others seem to duspute this point further down the thread. I shall remain undecided, tho in all fairness it's hardly a point that affects the case much either way.

And you can stick your final assertion right up your Wellington, NZ. And take your Crowded House with you.

PHILIP

Crowded House my bottom. That little Finn Jr kid ruined Split Enz...

Cheers,
B.

[Supe]

Bailey,

tho in all fairness it's hardly a point that affects the case much either way.

The drip pan (or whatever) probably doesn't affect the evidence, but that it had anything to do with the photographer developing glass plates or even sheet film (which was just appearing) is almost assuredly wrong. Large developing tanks in which the plates would suspended to protect both the brittle glass and and sensitive emulsion would normally be used.

If you woulds like further information on the subject I would suggest William Michael's article "Photographing Miller's Court" in Ripperologist 80 (June 2007) in which there is a full discussion of the cameras, film and equipment available in the fall of 1888.

Don.

[George Hutchinson]

Being a postcard collector as well, I attended a long lecture earlier this year on Lloyd of Albury, who was one of the most prolific and respected postcard photographers of the early 1900s.

The information I put up here about photography is what I was told at this lecture by an early photographic expert. If he wasn't an expert, then he fooled a whole room of postcard collectors.

Of course the photographic positives are made in a dark room using the various pans, but the image had to be fixed on site.

I can easily accept that the pan there IS a drip pan though there WAS a general concensus in 2006 that it was part of Martin's apparatus. A general concensus need not be a total concensus.

PHILIP

[Supe]

Philup,

I am not suggesting the gentleman you heard lecture was not an expert, but perhaps you misheard him. As it is, for a negative (of any sort) to be fixed it must first be developed and then run through a stop bath. And that is not something easily done on site--unless, as I said earlier, he had a portable darkroom.Such a darkroom would not fit down the alley and to think he left it outsde the court with the milling crowd seems beyond belief.

Really, Mr. Michael describes the process much better in his article than I could here. But developing glass plate negatives on site in the conditions prevailing in Miller's Court that day would be unduly cumbrous and difficult.

Don.

[Fisherman]

Philip writes:

"Never heard about the frame being removed to take the photo before"

The removing of the window was reported in two newspapers. The Times of November 10 wrote "Mr. Arnold having satisfied himself that the woman was dead, ordered one of the windows to be entirely removed."

Some days later the East London Advertiser reported almost exactly the same: "The police were sent for and Superintendent Arnold, having satified himself that the woman was dead, ordered one of the windows to be entirely removed."

Whether this happened or not, or if the proximity of the wordings in the two papers point to a mistake on behalf of the Times, later quoted in the Advertiser, I don´t know.

The best,
Fisherman

[j.r-ahde]

Hello you all!

Since, like I have pointed out, the strange pattern doesn't always seem to appear in every copy, it's obviously the same kind of misprint as the "crucifix" in some copies of the crime scene photo.

However, again from the Mary Kelly introduction of this site:

"The room was approximately 12 feet square. Opposite the door was a fireplace. On the left of the door and at right angles to it were two windows, one of which was close enough to the door as to be able to reach through it and unbolt the door. To the right of the door was a bedside table so close that the door would hit it when opened. Next to the table was a bed with the head against the door wall, its side against the right wall. The room contained two tables and a chair and a cheap print entitled "The Fisherman's widow" hanging over the fireplace. Opposite the fireplace was a small cupboard which contained cheap crockery, empty ginger beer bottles and a little stale bread."

So, if there really is something it's obviously a distorted image of an item from the cheap crockery!

All the best
jukka

[Debra A]

I suppose it's too big to have been the ash-pan from beneath Mary Kell's fireplace, is it?

Sam, back in 2005 I posted a pic of an ash pan to the 'drain cover' argument thread...I thought it was an exact match for the object and at the time so did quite a few others too.

[Celesta]

Nothing more than a simulcra or matrixing.

It is lot's of randomness colliding to create a something, which is nothing.

Ought to go on the TAPS forum, Mike!! They talk lots about matrixing over there!

[Robert]

I used to believe that the photograph was taken from outside - with or without removal of window - because of this passage from Paul Begg's "Uncensored Facts" :

'After considerable delay and difficulty a photographer was brought to the scene and took photographs through the window.'

[Sam Flynn]

Sam, back in 2005 I posted a pic of an ash pan to the 'drain cover' argument thread...I thought it was an exact match for the object and at the time so did quite a few others too.

Thanks, Debs, and I can see why some folks agreed.

[Jeff Leahy]

Just a quick comment about the object out side the window.

Which appears quite large for an ash tray.

13 Millers court was probably the original kitchen before being partitioned into smaller rental space. Therefore it seems probable that the fireplace in 13 Millers court may have been larger in comparison for such a small room.

The original design of the building would have meant a larger fire place.

So perhaps your 'ash tray' is in proportion?

Pirate

PS dont believe faces on negatives/prints,,i'm a photographer, its part of the process