UFO filmed over Jerusalem.

[barracuda]

Minor issue: in the third video, the object doesn't evidence a lens flare like every other light in the picture. Reaching a bit now, but I suppose this might be attributed to some aspect of the source.

Edit: sorry, I see Nordic already covered this.

[tazmic]

"You can hardly look at it."

Didn't they say that in the first videos I posted about Ball Lightning UFO's?

BLUFO's?

[brainpanhandler]

You bring up some good points Nordic.

The first two vids look and sound completely real. If it's fake, whoever faked it managed to use completely different types of "motion blur" for the end, when the thing takes off. In the first one it's a streak, as you'd have with a film camera, or with a video camera that's got a sorta normal shutter speed to it, and the second one shows the stuttery stop-action look of many new video cameras, where they sample at a higher rate. So if it is fake, they went to a lot of trouble to fake that.

OK

Of the third vid:

There's no traffic lights moving

You mean cars? I don't know. That doesn't bother me.

the light flares don't move

Should they? You mean like some sort of parallax effect?

there's nothing twinkling through the atmosphere

I don't think the background is a still image.

if it's really that zoomed in, while are the moves so smooth? To have such smooth moves like that so zoomed in, one would have to have a really nice fluid tripod head. Most tourists don't even know what that is.

Agreed, but I would imagine that many American tourists probably visit the Holy Land as part of a packaged deal that probably includes a guide that would be more likely to have good equipment. It is suspicious though. Funny. I'm always wishing people had tripods when they took these videos and now that someone did I'm suspicious, cause they had a tripod.

Then there's no flash

See barracuda's response.

the ball itself doesn't have any glow around it, which would be natural given the way the other lights flare in the lens and the atmosphere.

Agreed. That is odd, but then again the ufo appears to have a smeary overexposure about it which one would expect.

Also, the ball itself is too small compared to the balls shown in the first two vids.

It seems to my eye to fall within a range of believable scale. Very hard to say.

Then there's the cheesy voiceover, with people going "ooooh!" like it was a fireworks show or something.

I dunno. Frankly if I was directing these people I'd be fairly pleased with their performances. From all the other voices, some of them not speaking in English, I assume they are on some sort of public observation deck or at least the makers want us to believe that. Maybe we can find pictures taken from the same vantage point?

Why would somebody fake a third video?

That is of course a very good question, given the context.

[MacCruiskeen]

Wiki has a fairly good overview of "ball lightning". This is just the introductory paragraph (emphases added):

Ball lightning is a proposed atmospheric electrical phenomenon of which little is known. The term refers to reports of luminous, usually spherical objects which vary from pea-sized to several meters in diameter. It is usually associated with thunderstorms, but lasts considerably longer than the split-second flash of a lightning bolt. Many of the early reports say that the ball eventually explodes, sometimes with fatal consequences, leaving behind the odor of sulfur. There are records of free-floating glowing balls that occur in total absence of thunderclouds. This occurs commonly in the valley of Hessdalen, Norway.[1] One recent theory suggests that these light balls (Hessdalen Lights) are produced by the ionization of air and dust by alpha particles during radon decay in the dusty atmosphere.[2]

Laboratory experiments have produced effects that are visually similar to reports of ball lightning, but it is presently unknown whether these are actually related to any naturally occurring phenomenon. Scientific data on natural ball lightning are scarce. The presumption of its existence is based on reported public sightings, and has therefore produced somewhat inconsistent findings. Given inconsistencies and the lack of reliable data, the true nature of ball lightning is still unknown.[3] Until recently, ball lightning was often regarded as a fantasy or a hoax, but some serious scientific discussions and theories have attempted to explain it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ball_lightning

[tazmic]

"Laboratory experiments have produced effects that are visually similar to reports of UFO's, but it is presently unknown whether these are actually related to any naturally occurring phenomenon. Scientific data on natural UFO's is scarce. The presumption of their existence is based on reported public sightings, and has therefore produced somewhat inconsistent findings. Given inconsistencies and the lack of reliable data, the true nature of UFO's is still unknown. Until recently, UFO's were often regarded as a fantasy or a hoax, but some serious scientific discussions and theories have attempted to explain it."

[barracuda]

Ball lightning may exist, and it may act in mysterious ways, but I think it can be pretty safely assumed that it doesn't hover directly over the spire of the the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem. Whether fake or not, the positioning has intent behind it.

[justdrew]

3rd video cropped/zoomed and with frame-by-frame slowmo when it takes off.

Other light-sources demonstrate ghosting too as the camera vibrates, but I'm not sure about the trails the thing leaves, should it?

[tazmic]

"the positioning has intent behind it."

I think I'd expect the behavior of ball lightning to be somewhat related to that of lightning, which I'm told is rather partial to spires.

[tazmic]

"You can hardly look at it."

Didn't they say that in the first videos I posted about Ball Lightning UFO's?

No they didn't. You read it here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/strassenbelag/3297079633/

And conveniently edited your memory.

[barracuda]

In that video from justdrew, I can see some lens flaring from the object. The slight pairing of the trails as it leaves says video frame interlacing to me. You'd expect that in a real video of an object, but I don't know if it would be different in a CGI creation.

I think I'd expect the behavior of ball lightning to be somewhat related to that of lightning, which I'm told is rather partial to spires.

That's a good point, as it is reported that the Dome of the Rock was set on fire by a lightning strike in 1447.

[tazmic]

"It is reported that the Dome of the Rock was set on fire by a lightning strike in 1447."

Maybe that's why the ball lightning aborted it's attack? It had to get close, but then sensed that this one had already been 'done'. Whoosh!

Should we expect the lighting of the spire to be effected by its presence or not?

[MacCruiskeen]

I think I'd expect the behavior of ball lightning to be somewhat related to that of lightning, which I'm told is rather partial to spires.

That's a good point, as I it is reported that the Dome of the Rock was set on fire by a lightning strike in 1447.

Is "ball" "lightning" (whatever that is or isn't) particularly "partial to spires"? Not that I know of. From all accounts I've read, it behaves very differently indeed from the thing commonly known as lightning.

On Edit: For instance, a bolt of real lightning discharges when it hits a spire. It doesn't hover over it, bounce off it and then dance around in the air with its pals.

I'm not being pedantic with the scare quotes. Whatever "ball lightning" is, it is not lightning as we know it. I'd say "ball lightning" is not just a misnomer but a pseudo-explanation designed to forestall inquiry.

[barracuda]

The wiki article on ball lightning does document several cases in which the phenomenon seems to favor churches and ships' masts:

The Great Thunderstorm of Widecombe-in-the-Moor

One of the earliest descriptions was reported during The Great Thunderstorm at a church in Widecombe-in-the-Moor, Devon, in England, on 21 October 1638. Four people died and approximately 60 were injured when, during a severe storm, an 8-foot (2.4 m) ball of fire was described as striking and entering the church, nearly destroying it. Large stones from the church walls were hurled into the ground and through large wooden beams. The ball of fire allegedly smashed the pews and many windows, and filled the church with a foul sulfurous odor and dark, thick smoke.

The ball of fire reportedly divided into two segments, one exiting through a window by smashing it open, the other disappearing somewhere inside the church. The explanation at the time, because of the fire and sulfur smell, was that the ball of fire was "the devil" or the "flames of hell". Later, some blamed the entire incident on two people who had been playing cards in the pew during the sermon, thereby incurring God's wrath.[7]

The Catherine and Mary

In December 1726 a number of British newspapers printed an extract of a letter from John Howell of the sloop Catherine and Mary:

As we were coming thro’ the Gulf of Florida on the 29th of August, a large ball of fire fell from the Element and split our mast in Ten Thousand Pieces, if it were possible; split our Main Beam, also Three Planks of the Side, Under Water, and Three of the Deck; kill’d one man, another had his Hand carried of,[sic] and had it not been for the violent rains, our Sails would have been of a Blast of Fire.[8][9]

The Montague

One particularly large example was reported "on the authority of Dr. Gregory" in 1749:

Admiral Chambers on board the Montague, November 4, 1749, was taking an observation just before noon...he observed a large ball of blue fire about three miles distant from them. They immediately lowered their topsails, but it came up so fast upon them, that, before they could raise the main tack, they observed the ball rise almost perpendicularly, and not above forty or fifty yards from the main chains when it went off with an explosion, as great as if a hundred cannons had been discharged at the same time, leaving behind it a strong sulphurous smell. By this explosion the main top-mast was shattered into pieces and the main mast went down to the keel. Five men were knocked down and one of them much bruised. Just before the explosion, the ball seemed to be the size of a large mill-stone.[10]

[tazmic]

I'm not being pedantic with the scare quotes. Whatever "ball lightning" is, it is not lightning as we know it. I'd say "ball lightning" is not just a misnomer but a pseudo-explanation designed to forestall inquiry.

Like this terrible bit of science in action:

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/05/19/ball_lightning_actually_magno_brain_images/

"powerful magnetic fields created by ordinary lightning affect the brains of humans nearby so that they see things which aren't there."

[psynapz]

For instance, a bolt of real lightning discharges when it hits a spire. It doesn't hover over it, bounce off it and then dance around in the air with its pals.

Right. I can't conceive of a scenario where ball lightning would organize loosely and imperfectly into a circled-wagons pattern and then either rotate around the center space and/or alternate between luminescent and invisible (e.g., blink on and off) in a chaser pattern around said wagon circle. I count at least four apparently-individual participant light sources after the first source rapidly ascends to -- presumably -- "join the others" (not to anthropomorphize unduly) for some rope light lasso show before ultimately disappearing.

If that were intelligently-controlled or otherwise generated, what would be the point, given the context? Or irrespective of it, other than the fact that there were bound to be lots of witnesses, some of which with imaging equipment already running, just statistically speaking, assuming said hypothetical intelligence could study tourist behavior to know this.