How Did This Happen?

Low light and slow shutter?

Cheshire cats have been known to do this.

Yes it's just digitally combining the shots...

Two separate exposures for a single frame.

Does the camera have a burst mode to allow continuous shooting?

There might be a feature to allow multiple exposures for a single shot that caused this.

Or, perhaps there was an address error and the camera wrote two successive exposures to the same address.

Her camera doesn't have the burst mode.

I think it was some kind of error in the camera or software and have been unable to reproduce it.

I'm not very familiar with the inner workings of the smart phone camera so your guesses are probably better than mine?

Rixter,

Fantastic article.

It explains it perfectly.

Yes, Chunji rolled on his back from left to right as she was taking the picture. I knew that his movement was the cause but the resulting picture was a really cool whoops.

I had no idea that the CMOS cameras (or some of them) used a rolling shutter.

That explains it perfectly.

Thank you!

Bryan

And you got a really cool picture!

I beg to differ. If you envisage the camera scanning line by line and look specifically at the line with the tip of the left ear, that point appears first on the left of the picture and then on the right of the picture. In order to achieve that Chunji must have turned like lightning during that scan line, rested until the scan spot had moved back to the beginning of the next line, and then moved even faster to the original spot, matching the original posture precisely for the next scan line.
No, that picture is the result of a double exposure, however it was achieved.

The logical explanation is a write address error of two subsequent shots at the same address in memory.

The slice in the mirror is another odd artifact that looks like address shifting, but not the whole scan line is shifted, only a portion along the horizontal scan. The rest of the image to the left is normal.

Given how blur-free the rest of the image was it would seem that the shutter speed was probably better than 1/30th of a second, perhaps twice that.

I'd really like to see the EXIF data.

If you believe the principle of a rolling shutter the picture is the result of many, many exposures.

But, only the cat's head moved during that sequence of multiple exposures.

A rollling shutter is simply a slit that moves in the vertical direction across the sensor.

It moves very fast. If the shutter time is 1/60th of a second, then that slit transverses the vertical height of the sensor at that rate.

The slit opening is relatively small.

For a single frame there is no way to get the effect seen in the picture in the original post as the shutter slit only sweeps by the sensor once.

However, for video the shutter sweeps repeatedly and that is what gives you the dissociated objects when the rolling shutter speed matches closely to the subject's motion.

Unless the phone was recording in video mode, the shutter was not the culprit here, but some other error with the device or the picture was post processed (i.e., Photoshopped).

So, I would agree, this looks like the effect of two or more exposures written to the same address in the phone's memory.

Another great mystery of life in the modern era.

I rescind my comment - I think you are right as the mirror at the lower left is sliced in the frame.

The camera in that phone has both a 'tracking' mode and an 'HD' mode of operating. What probably happened is your girlfriend's hand, or the cat, moved slightly as the photo was being snapped. The camera actually took two or more shots. The camera then automatically stiched the combined exposures into a single frame.

This is the second of nine stitches in time.

Remember, "A stitch in time saves nine".

Actually yes.

Until 18 months of age a feline is still considered a kitten. When the picture was taken, they were still considered kittens.

You should see his brother Pierre. He's about 1.5 times the size of Chunji.

Their Momma cat is about 3/4 the size of Chunji

Momma - Shadow - 7-8 lbs

Chunji - 11-12 lbs

Pierre - 18-19 lbs

As for the Poppa cat? I'm sure he was a feral Tom. We never saw the male.

We rescued Shadow from the streets, very pregnant and she birthed the kittens 2 weeks later. Two of the kittens were adopted to loving families and we kept Chunji and Pierre. Momma cat is an 1% indoor / 99% outdoor cat. She isn't fond of enclosed places!

All of them are spayed and neutered and have up to date shots!

And they are all micro-chipped too!

My girlfriend and I volunteer with the animal rescue foundation "Heaven Can Wait". We foster rescued animals to get them socialized and also do feral trap / spay-neuter / release where the area can support a feral cat colony.

Good for you and your girlfriend.

As with some children, it isn't the cat's fault that they are here in our world.

Lyn,

Thank you.

We feel that way too!

We truly believe humans are the ones to hold responsible for the overpopulation of unwanted or homeless animals.

Dogs are a different story than cats as they are easier to catch.

Cats can have 2-3 litters a year with their litters ranging from 2-6 (typically 4-6 kittens if there is a good food source) kittens with the sexes being somewhat equally divided.

Do the math where there are 2-3 female cats that can start breeding at approx. 5-6 months of age and after ~ 2.5 months after birthing they are in heat again. There are some really crazy numbers out there like one that says one fertile female feline can be the start of 470,000 cats in a 7 year span. Others say approx. 100 cats in a 7 year span.

My numbers, I believe are much more realistic. From what I have personally seen, I approximate about 70 kittens born on the street from one Momma plus the exponential growth from her offspring in a one year span.

When we had our current batch of foster kittens spayed and neutered, "Heaven can Wait" holds a monthly spay and neuter clinic.

There were 192 cats and kittens completed in that one day. There were 7 veterinary surgeons that donated a 10 hour day each!

This was a larger batch that usual but their largest one day cat and kitten only clinic was 359 cats and kittens spayed and neutered in one day!

This is done all by volunteers and donations! Not one had to pay for the surgery!

Did you ask Del yet?

No..... I thought he was neutered!

Ouch!

No hard feelings towards Del The Cat. He really meows his business!

And by the way.....

Does anyone want to adopt a kitten?

We have 5 kittens that are 3.5 months old and are ready for adoption.

I'm only going to post one picture to show the size of them.

Here is the one female. "Nala"

Can't afford to feed something that size, looks like it'd eat you out of house and home! Just joking, I would if I would could. By the, how much would freight cost for shipping across the states? I probably could 't afford that either, (thanks to the ex's)

And your OP pic still looks mirrors and smoke, but a pretty cool looking Oops!

dj95401

I wish I was that good at Photoshopping digital pictures.

I guess I have gotten in the habit of throwing out "Want to adopt a kitten" to just about everyone that I talk to.

It never hurts to ask, my comments were just joking, your volunteer work is very commendable, we need more people like you in this society, may be we wouldn't have as much useless killing in both humans and animals!

But the size of those Lion's (defined by physical size) would cost an arm and leg + the extra paw to ship across country! They're huge.

Oh yeah, don't don't let the cat out of the bag, but I like Kitty's too

Dan

This proves the big issue all cat owners experience: cat have multiple personalities.

Two heads are better than one!

How did THIS happen?:

http://www.cadillacnews.com/news_story/?story_id=1828637&year=2015&issue=20150812

This is a basic physics phenomenon known as the "Stroboscopic Effect", as described as follows:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stroboscopic_effect

OK, here's another one for the group.

My wife took this with her I- phone 4 today.

This parakeet comes and poaches Nyjer seeds from the Goldfinch feeders.

Wow. The bird is nearly transparent. I can see the palm tree through its wing.