Sepia Saturday 350 : Who Is That Over Your Shoulder?

Sepia Saturday presents us with a challenge this week by featuring as its theme image, a photograph within a photograph. A selective enlargement (on the left) of the main image (on the right) reveals a man precariously balancing on the ledge of a window. I decided to look through my box of unloved and unknown photographs to see if I could identify anything of a similar nature - and the best I could come up with was this photograph of a young girl sat on a bench within one of those municipal shelters you often find in parks and gardens in rain-soaked Britain.

The photograph within this photograph is the mysterious head that appears within the lower left frame of the window behind the shelter. Could this, perhaps, be a sibling who had been forced out of this photo opportunity, but was intent on leaving his mark on recorded history nevertheless? 

Digital scanning technology allows us, of course, to selectively enlarge that area of the original print that we are interested in, in order to obtain more clues as to who this interloper may be. An initial scan provides us with few clues - merely an out-of-focus shape, reminiscent of a human head. Technology, however, is nothing if it is not smart these days, and there are many software programmes available that will automatically enhance images of such poor quality. Making use of one such programme - I recently obtained from a Russian supplier - I came up with a rather surprising conclusion to my investigation. I will say no more.

If you would like to see more photos within photos then take a trip to the Sepia Saturday Blog and follow the links.