Thoughts on Crop Circles

User login

Deals For You

Submitted by Robert L. Mason on Wed, 09/08/2010 - 20:41

Admittedly, I am old and crotchety. I have an engineering degree but it is pretty old too. When I started college back in 1956 all freshmen aiming for an engineering degree were required to take a full year of drafting or mechanical drawing. But even earlier than that, at my junior high school, all boys were required to take a course which was half shop and half mechanical drawing. On top of all this, My father was a professor of industrial arts at Stanford University and I learned mechanical drawing at his knee. I tell you all this to point up the fact that I am a person thoroughly steeped in the tradition of drafting and mechanical drawing. Nowadays that kind of work is done by computer assisted drawing programs (CADs), but like old-timers everywhere, I feel that something intrinsic has been lost in the process.

Having established my credentials (I hope), I have to tell you that when I look at aerial photographs of crop circles it is painfully obvious to me that almost all of the designs can be drawn with the most basic of tools, i.e. a compass, a straight edge, and a protractor of some kind. This is not to say that many of them aren't beautiful, even glorious to a high degree, but there is nothing that a skilled draftsman of the human variety couldn't accomplish. There is a good reason for this type of approach. Designs that are produced using those kinds of tools are easily scaled up to much larger dimensions. A compass and a straight edge are nicely replaced by a string stretched between two points and/or pivoted from one end. A protractor is a common enough device but even that can be omitted if one has a sufficient knowledge of geometry. However, today with instruments such as laser pointers, range finders, GPS and cell phones the task has become vastly simplified.

Interestingly, these designs can be scaled down as well as up. I have reproduced a fairly complex design in walnut to create a serving tray. I originally saw the design as an aerial photograph of a crop circle on the internet. The tray may be seen at:

http://schoonermoon.com/category/gallery/3d-works-stills/ (scroll to walnut platter).

I have seen several crop circles that employ a grid to scale up the design. In fact, I seem to remember seeing a reproduction of Da Vinci's Mona Lisa done in this manner. Again this is not difficult to do. One simply lays a grid over the image to be scaled up and then lays out a corresponding larger grid in the target field. “Mission Control” then directs an assistant to go to square G-7 and stomp down the lower right hand corner, etc. etc. Very rarely does one see any design element that might be called “organic” and when you do it is usually a small piece of a larger mechanical design. Organic designs are much more difficult to scale up.

Now let me take off my engineer's hard hat and put on my artist's beret. I retrained myself at mid-life to do fine art and even ended up teaching some aspects of the subject. For the sake of argument I imagine myself as an alien artist hovering above a large field in my flying saucer. The field is planted with a mature crop of some kind. I see the field from above in the third dimension unlike an artist on the ground who must necessarily work while he himslf is located on a two dimensional surface. My “canvas” is before me. I pickup my “brush” and make a bold stroke — voila! Is there any reason for me to be restricted to the elements of mechanical drawing? Of course not! I am working directly on the original and there is no need for me to transfer from some previously conceived design. Art created in this immediate manner is bound to contain many elements that would be extremely difficult to transfer via a mechanical process and from a two dimensional prospective. In addition, because of this difficulty, it would be much more convincing as to its possible extraterrestrial origin. So why don't we see any field art of this nature?

About Robert L. Mason

Bio

Robert L. Mason was born in Corvallis, Oregon and raised in Palo Alto,

California. He holds a BS degree in industrial engineering from Oregon

State University and was a registered Professional Engineer in the State of

California for many years. Rob brings to his writing the multiple perspectives

gained from a very diverse working and personal history including roles as

naval ofﬁcer, industry executive, government administrator, small business

owner, engineer, artist, teacher, husband, parent, and grandparent. He has

served on the Board of Directors of The Marine Ecological Institute of

Redwood City, The Paciﬁc Art League of Palo Alto and The Mendocino Art

Center. Always an enthusiastic follower of scientiﬁc developments, Rob

delights in gazing at the “big picture” and thinking about the macroscopic

circumstances that shape the context of our lives.

Role
Contributor

View full user profile

Are You A Blogger or Do You Wish To Be?

Have you ever thought of having your own blog? A place to write down your thoughts. A place to vent about your student loans and how much you hate them, pretty much anything that is on your mind. A venue to share your opinions with other like-minded individuals. I have created UFO Controversy as a FREE blog for UFO Digest readers. If you have any interest in UFOs and/or the paranormal open a FREE account and ask those questions that are floating around in your mind.

To open your free account simply click on the banner.

The UFO Digest Family of Websites

• Monster Tracker • Mystical Travel • Paranormal Radio • Quest for Middle-earth
• UFO Controversy • UFO Digest Canada • UFO Movies Online

Poll

Do you believe Planet X or Nibiru will pass by the earth in 2012?

Yes

30%

48%

Not sure

22%

Total votes: 27

Login or register to post comments
Older polls

Join us on Twitter

FREE XML RRS Reader

Receive UFO Digest stories as they are added by our writers - ON YOUR DESKTOP! Download FREE XML RRS Reader for your Desk or LapTop Computer!

RSS FEEDS!

Visit a category and click on the RSS Feed icon in your browser's address bar or get all of the newest articles from all categories to keep up-to-date. Not sure how to continue?

© 1998-2010. «UFODIGEST.Com». When reproducing our materials in whole or in part, a hyperlink to UFODIGEST.Com should be made. The opinions and views of the authors do not always coincide with the point of view of UFODIGEST.Com's editors.

UFODIGEST.COM All rights reserved. FAIR USE NOTICE: These pages contains copyrighted material the use of which has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. This website distributes this material without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. We believe this constitutes a fair use of any such copyrighted material as provided for in 17 U.S.C § 107. UFODigest.com Privacy Policy.