HOPPS Ghost Hunters

Investigative Errors (Some 101 Suggestions)

1. Placing audio/video recorders near intermittently running appliances –can cause distortion and/or unnecessary background noise.

Solution –unplug appliances or relocate recorders away from such devices. Video recorders can pick up on electromagnetic pulses and create distortions which you might believe to be an apparition when it is simply a mechanical distortion picked up by the circuitry in the camera.

2. Talking throughout the investigation –personal stories should not be related in length near recording devices –this causes faint whispers (normally what we pick up as EVPs) to be obscured.

Solution –keep chatter to a minimum, or wait to talk when not investigating the area.

3. Not waiting for responses. –Constant bombardment with questions will normally not yield results. It irritates the listener, so it probably irritates whomever you’re trying to communicate with

Solution –wait at least 30 seconds between questions, and only one person asks questions at a time. There is no need to comment on questions others ask.

4. Whispering throughout the investigation –not necessary as you’re not hiding from anything, you’re trying to be heard.

Solution –become aware of whispering, humming, making unnecessary noises. If you make a noise or hear an extraneous noise, state clearly that it was cause by you or another investigator.

5. Relating too much information to other investigators when you perceive something not visible, or audible –can create an atmosphere closely resembling mass hysteria and makes others feel the sensations involuntarily in conjunction with the sensory depravation (it’s dark). Your brain is trying to gather information and seeding it with an idea something is there will result in the feeling something is there.

Solution –train yourself not to ask “Do you feel that?” Simply ask your investigative partner to step where you feel the sensation and watch for their reaction. After a few seconds, you can then relate what you sensed. Simply state “I feel something”, but never tell them exactly where or what it is. The person feeling it first should step from the area and call the other investigator to them, so they pass through the area. If there is no comment from the second investigator (such as “cold spot”, “goosebumps”, or the “air feels thicker or different”, then likely, it is not there or just an experience you had yourself.

6. Camera Use –often times the camera operator will state they see something, but the camera never pans to the area (we miss a lot this way)

Solution –train yourself to point the camera in the direction you’re facing. If you move your head left, turn the camera with your head, don’t rest it on your shoulder. The best way to do this is to turn your whole body toward the direction of the action and the camera will follow without thought. Also be aware that filming the floor and using the camera as a means to see where you’re going yields nothing of use.

7. Assuming every picture with a spot on it is an orb

Solution –First check your cameras for dust on the lenses (internally and externally). If you don’t know how to do this, then you don’t know the equipment well enough to be using it effectively. Check your shutter speed –very important when seeing streaks of light as this is normally caused by prolonged shutter exposure, much as in the case of “night shot” on digital still cameras. If you don’t have infrared illumination on your camera, you don’t have true night shot capability and the effect is achieved by keeping the shutter opened longer (this magnifies the effect of movement, making the light streaks you may see). True orbs are much less than 1% of your encounters and are usually visible to the naked eye, self illuminating, and can move with purpose, not just floating by with the prevailing air movement of the room or area being investigated.

8. Hearing a noise and not investigating it’s source –If you do not attempt to isolate the source, then you’re not investigating, you’re simply observing.

Solution – You need to get closer to the source and determine if someone has placed a recorder or receiver device in the area to spoof you. Walkie talkies, Ipods, tape recorders are easy ways to make it appear there is activity in an area. My suggestion is if you find this, terminate the investigation as the effects are being created to make you look foolish. There are much better things you can be doing with your time.