Nick and Emily discovered a ghoulish secret while perusing the latest edition of the Victoria's Secret catalog: a disembodied hand resting on the shoulder of one of the models. Very creepy. Either the model has a hand growing out of her shoulder, or there was originally someone standing next to her in the picture. The question is, was the hand left in there by mistake, or was it left in there on purpose... the mischievous signature of some disgruntled photo retoucher?
A photo of a curious fish with one head but two bodies has been doing the email rounds. Is it real, or is it Photoshop? It's real, if the Texas Reptiles website can be trusted (and they sound like they know what they're talking about to me). The picture shows a siamese Northern Pike caught by Donald Tayer on the Ottertail River 
Kristen sent in this picture of a Kern County police car bearing a decal with the motto, "We'll Kick Your Ass... And take your doughnuts too." The picture is doing the email rounds (it's been doing them for about a year) accompanied by a caption that explains: 
From the Hoax Forum: Gutza has submitted this suspicious goof from the movie Troy, which shows an airplane flying behind Brad Pitt (Achilles) as he stands in front of the Temple of Apollo. I saw this movie just a week ago, and I don't remember seeing a plane in that scene. You'd think it would have been pretty obvious. More significantly, the movie sleuths over at moviemistakes.com don't seem to have noted this either, even though I'm sure they'd be falling all over themselves to point it out if it actually was there. The picture, of course, could be a still from the set. But it's most likely just photoshopped.
Here's a picture of some more weird clouds, sent in by Darren McEwen. I've got absolutely no information about where or when this picture was taken, or if it's real or not. I'm guessing that it's real because it looks to me like some of the scenes we saw during the forest fires here in Southern California last year. But the time stamp on the picture says it's from 2002, so it can't be from the 2003 fires.
If I just saw this picture randomly out of context, I'd swear it was fake. After all, I've never in my life seen clouds that look like that. But according to the Astronomy Picture of the Day site (which I trust), the picture is real. They're Mammatus Clouds that appeared over Monclova, Mexico. Apparently such clouds sometimes form in turbulent air near thunderstorms.
Is this a photo of Britney Spears naked (not safe for work) taken for a top-secret, yet-to-be-announced Playboy feature that she was paid $40 million for? It looks a lot like her. A whole lot like her. But it's not Britney. It's Emmie (also not safe for work). Normally I don't post much, if at all, about fake porn images. After all, there are so many of them (most of them so obviously fake), and the 'fake porn detective' has that area pretty well covered (for bandwidth reasons he requests that people don't link directly to his site, but if you're interested it's http://www.fake-detective.com/). But for Britney, I had to make an exception. Although I suppose this image isn't actually a fake. It's just a case of a remarkable look-alike.
A remarkable photograph reveals archaeologists unearthing a massive (and when I say massive, I mean massive... we're talking a 50-foot behemoth here) skeleton at a site in Saudi Arabia. Of course, the Saudi military is keeping this all very hush, hush. The public couldn't handle knowing about such a remarkable discovery. If you get your news from The New Nation, 'Bangladesh's Independent News Source,' you might think this was an actual piece of news. But of course, it's totally false. The picture comes from a Worth1000 photoshop contest. The original, undoctored source of the image was a Cornell-sponsored dig of a mastodon in New York. Somehow the picture escaped into the alternative reality of email, accompanied by a bogus caption claiming that the picture was taken in Saudi Arabia, etc., etc. Apparently The New Nation received this email (forwarded to them from an anti-Muslim group that takes it upon itself to hoax Muslim papers) and fell for it hook, line, and sinker. The historically minded will note the long-standing popularity of Giant hoaxes, going all the way back to the 18th century where we find Commodore Byron's tales of Patagonian Giants, or the amazing popularity of giants, such as the Cardiff Giant, in the 19th century. (via Liquito and Apothecary's Drawer)
This is good. Some guy has created a program that lets you put whatever text you want on the sign held by those kids posing in the desert with an American soldier. 
About a month ago a photo began to circulate around the internet showing an American soldier posing with two Iraqi boys. One of the boys was holding up a sign that read, 'Lcpl Boudreaux killed my Dad, then he knocked up my sister!' Needless to say, the photo caused a lot of outrage. The Council on American-Islamic Relations complained to the Pentagon about it. And it received coverage in publications such as Islam Online. According to the Marine Corps Times, "Investigating officers have spoken with Boudreaux and are working to determine whether the claims on the sign are true and what, if any, charges to bring against him." In the meantime, a second, more innocuous version of the sign began circulating that read, 'Lcpl Boudreaux saved my dad then he rescued my sister.' Everyone immediately assumed that this was, in fact, the real picture, and that the initial one had been a hoax. But this may not be the case, because even more versions of the picture are on the loose, including one in which the sign is blank. And then there are the inevitable spoofs of it. It's hard to know what the reality is here. We'll probably have to wait for the Marine Corps investigators to report before we find that out. But one observation to make is how easy it's become to photoshop text onto signs. As a consequence, this seems to be the latest trend in photo hoaxes. (via Balloon Juice)
I remember seeing the issue of Star Magazine with Demi Moore and Ashton Kutcher on the cover, both wearing white, as I was standing in the checkout line at the supermarket. It had big headlines about their rumored engagement. Turns out they weren't actually wearing white. Demi Moore was wearing a brown dress and Ashton Kutcher was wearing a pink suit. But the editors of Star digitally changed the color of their clothes to make the image fit in with the whole wedding theme. In the thumbnail you can see Demi wearing the faux white dress on the left (on the Star cover), and wearing the same dress in its true brown color on the right. The Wall Street Journal has an article about this. Meanwhile, editors of rival magazines are clucking about how they would never stoop so low, conveniently forgetting that they stoop this low all the time.
Recently a four-eared cat named Lilly has been in the news. Lilly and her four ears are quite real. They're the result of a genetic defect. By contrast, the four-eyed kitten shown in the thumbnail to the right doesn't seem real at all. The top set of eyes is exactly identical to the bottom set of eyes, indicating a cut-and-paste job. (Thanks to Alicka for the picture).
Alex Knight sent in a link to this picture from Yahoo! News, which is one of those images that looks fake, even though it's real (warning: the full-sized image may definitely make you cringe). It reminds me of the 'finger through the nose and out the eye' picture which was going around about a year ago, and which was definitely fake.
Back in 1987 'Baby Jessica' became famous when she fell down a well and was saved following a dramatic rescue operation. Stuff Magazine is now featuring a photo of 'Baby Jessica' all grown up and posing by a well, but is that really Baby Jessica? Makeup and lighting will do a lot (as will digital touch-up work), but the woman in the photo doesn't look that much like Jessica as she appeared a few years ago in this picture. Here's a link to a hi-res scan of the Stuff article. Note that they refer to Baby Jessica as Jessica McClain, even though her actual name is Jessica McClure. Innocent mistake, or not? (via Jessica's Well)
Stephen Wagner, over at About.com, is sponsoring a contest to create a paranormal photo hoax. You have until April 30 to submit your entries. The prize is a copy of Monsters: An Investigator's Guide to Magical Beings.
If spiders scare you, then definitely look no closer at this picture of some spiders that a soldier in Iraq found in his sleeping bag. Yes, despite their size and ugliness, they're real. They're Camel Spiders.
Inspired by an entry I wrote last year about a growing trend in Italy of taking fake vacations (i.e. people can't afford to go anywhere, so they just tell everyone they went away, while they really spend the whole time at home), Michaela Eaves has created this Fake Vacation Photo Generator, to help people embellish their fake vacation stories with fake vacation photos. Thanks, Michaela. This will come in handy on my 'trip' to Hawaii later this year.
This picture is going around via email. It's not really a hoax at all. Just a joke. But since it's about Southern California, I couldn't resist sharing it. Here's the text that accompanies the email:
