Real or fake??

[winwintoo]

This has been a very bad year for forest fires in the western states and provinces and there have been many pictures posted showing the destruction. I've had this one sent to me by several people but I'm not sure it's ligitimate.

What do you think??

See it here

Margaret

[roger_ele]

Hi !

I don't have a clue, I took a close look and the lighting looks pretty convincing. The only area of lighting I question is the grasses on the left have a soft light coming from the right instead of from the direction of the fire. But if there was sun filtered through clouds of smoke that was bright enough coming from the right it would make sense, and the dark area in the bottom right corner would be consistant with that.

So I am left with a question - with the noise of a fire, would deer stand in the middle of a stream and just watch (they look like they are looking towards us, but is just my sense - I can't really tell which way they are looking.

Roger

[KevinBE]

It looks like a great shot if it is real. I looked at the histogram on it and it seems normal. So it is either a real good shot or a real good manipulation. I don't know.

[jeaniesa]

Margaret,

As far as I've been able to determine, this is a real photo. It was taken in the summer of 2000 though, so if you've gotten e-mail indicating otherwise, that info is probably false. Here's a couple links about it:

http://www.firefightersrealstories.com/montanafire.html

http://www.nifc.gov/gallery/

Roger, that first link mentions something about animal behavior during wildfires.

Jeanie

[winwintoo]

Thanks for the information Jeanie!

I thought it odd that the deer would just be standing there, but I guess they know what they're doing

Take care Margaret

[boingo82]

I know this thread's old and your image is no longer hosted, but I'm guessing you're talking about this: http://www.snopes.com/photos/deerfire.asp#photo

[winwintoo]

That is the one - I had found some indications that the picture was real, but didn't see the write-up on Snopes. Thanks for the link.

Margaret

[Eric Polsinelli]

Just for interest, here are larger versions... copies of the originals the site says.

http://www.paul-jones.org/ElkBathPix.html