Douglas Trumbull's UFOTOG Resurrected?

Visual effects expert Doug Trumbull

In previous postings, you'll have seen my speculations about visual effects expert Douglas Trumbull and his supposedly shelved UFOTOG project. Mr Trumbull was kind enough to take the time out to update me on UFOTOG as it stood when I asked him about it.

My previous posts are below with the most recent first.

Douglas Trumbull's response on UFOTOG

Open email to Douglas Trumbull about UFOTOG

Still no news on UFOTOG

Well according to an interview that Open Minds (click link) was able to get with a colleague of Trumbull's, who - rather interestingly in itself - is a representative of Mutual UFO Network - Mark D’Antonio (a photo analyst for the MUFON), a new 'fictionalised' account concerning the use of the equipment featured in the UFOTOG project is soon to be released.

Whilst encouraging, this appears to be a new approach being taken with this project. It seems that rather than produce an actual documentary (yet) of Trumbull and his team's efforts to get verifiable data on intelligently controlled non-terrestrial objects; or conversely even come away with no verifiable data to support existence of the same; Trumbull is perhaps seeking to generate further interest and funding for UFOTOG by releasing this 'fictional' version of a documentary.

The UFOTOG Humvee in action

To paraphrase Mark D’Antonio from the Open Minds interview, the film will be 'A visual foray into what could be the potential reality of the project'.

I think that this is great news that the project is alive and well and that Mr Trumbull has some support in this.



It's also very interesting to see that Mr Trumbull is now apparently working with a well-known, long-standing and respected American UFO investigations body on this project.

This could be a smart way to engage more undecided hearts and minds (and potentially well-funded backers) for the project without the stigma of ridicule being attached.

We'll have to see whether this leads to an actual groundbreaking documentary in time...

Douglas Trumbull's response concerning UFOTOG

Dear All,

I've been away...

My apologies for not posting for some time. There's no excuse for this other than my having visited family and friends during the Summer and being involved in other personal pursuits.

Douglas Trumbull's response re: UFOTOG!

I can now report however, further to my earlier posts
Still no news on UFOTOG and An open email to Douglas Trumbull about UFOTOG that - after a gentle reminder - Mr Trumbull has very kindly sent a comprehensive response to me concerning his project.

For any doubters out there I have attached the full response as a JPEG (in addition to the full text) below.

As you can see I had subsequently asked Mr Trumbull if there was any part of his response he would prefer me to exclude - but have not heard back from him so far. So Mr Trumbull - if you are reading this - I hope you will forgive me if I publish your email to me in full, as I felt I could not wait longer to share its contents with readers of this blog. In any case, I judged that there was nothing sensitive in its content that warranted exclusion or (more importantly) that Mr Trumbull would object to my   
publishing.

Note that the UFOTOG project is effectively shelved until such time as sufficient funding can be found for it. I'm sure this news will come as a disappointment to all. BUT - if anyone out there thinks they may be able to significantly financially support Mr Trumbull's project then I'm sure he'd like to hear from you!

Here is the screen capture of the email as a JPEG...

...and the full text of our latest exchange:-

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[Sent to me by douglashtrumbull@gmail.com - 5 September 2012 20:16 U.S. local time]

"Hi Jonathan,

I apologize, but UFOTOG is not a priority project with me right now.

To answer some of your questions:

I have invested heavily in the UFOTOG project for many years, yet have not been able to find financing to actually hit the road and do the real research. Therefore no real research has been attempted, which could require very expensive equipment and sensors, as well as a dedicated crew to work in the field for months or years. I created the UFOTOG demo film for the purpose of raising significant money to make an intensive long term study, hopefully resulting in a feature length IMAX type documentary of the REAL THING.

Whatever that is, I do not know, but what I do know is that even if we got amazing and scientifically valid, peer reviewable, data and imagery, who do you reveal it to? The police? The military? A government agency? Don't think so. But I would want people like Stephen Hawking or Michio Kaku to comment on what we find.

Nevertheless, recent interest has been shown by some "reality television" producers, but they have a significant financial inability to pay for the expensive equipment needed. They only budget for the production, not the science. So I am not confident that anything will happen. Shows like UFO HUNTERS is what they want and expect, and that is of no interest to me.

There has been no data collected, thus no secret data or images to release.

I am very passionate about the project, and may feature elements of UFOTOG in some upcoming sci-fi film projects, and maybe that will spark some interest in moving the project forward with the funding required. Real science is expensive, but there may be money for fiction. Go figure.

I will not give up on this.

All the best,

Doug"

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[Sent by me to douglashtrumbull@gmail.com - 6 September 2012 01:00 London time]

"Dear Doug,

Thank you so much for your swift and comprehensive response to my last email. Thanks too for the clarification concerning UFOTOG which I appreciate will now be shelved for the time being.

If you are happy for me to do so I would like to publish your response in my blog. If there are any parts of this email exchange you would prefer me to remove I am more than happy to do that (so long as it's not the whole exchange!).

I can empathise and understand only too well the difficulties in securing funding for research - especially where it may be the subject of controversy. For example, in my last (UK) Government role I worked in higher education policy and am wholly familiar with the challenges now faced by established universities seeking research grants in the face of dwindling Govt support.

If there is any small part I can play to assist let me know. I am attending the annual BUFORA conference in a couple of weeks and - if you like - I can spread the word about UFOTOG there - although I strongly suspect that a) most of the delegates will already know about your project and b) you'll have much better contacts than I have!

It's remotely possible that one or more of my readers - all of whom will be sympathetic to your cause - may have useful contacts or information to further assist.

I agree that in the (what currently sounds unlikely) event that sufficient funding were to be found and peer-reviewable data was gathered, respected figures in the scientific community such as Stephen Hawking or Michio Kaku would be best placed to comment on it and lend credibility to any findings of note.

Even then getting such data peer-reviewed would be a significant challenge - especially in terms of engaging a group of eminent scientists or aviation experts - whom one would want not to be strongly biased either way on the subject of UFOs or UAP.

You mention UFO Hunters. I've watched one or two online trailers and was very quickly turned off. Sensationalist programmes like this can't even get the basics right and pander to the lowest common denominator. And I don't see any change in such programming coming any time soon.

It would be a great shame if all the effort on your part to date came to naught.

But you should know that there is an increasing number of people out there who - like me - are sick and tired of all the amateur and largely faked online footage and yearn for a true professional to show us what on earth (or off-earth perhaps?) is going on in our skies.

I know if I had several million pounds/dollars in my account I'd be investing in UFOTOG but alas...

In the meantime, I wish you all the best with your other projects and hope that a ridiculously wealthy and sympathetic benefactor comes knocking on your door soon.

All the best to you too,

Jonathan"

An open email to Douglas Trumbull about UFOTOG

UPDATE 10 September 2012

See Douglas Trumbull's response to my email to him about UFOTOG here 

In my earlier post I speculated on why there had been no news for some considerable time about the ambitious and exciting UFOTOG project being led by Mr Trumbull.

I decided to see if he would like to explain for himself why things have gone so quiet on this project - my email to him was as follows:-

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[Sent to douglashtrumbull@gmail.com - 15 May 2012 16:47 London time]

"Dear Mr Trumbull,

This is just a quick query from a long-time admirer of your very impressive work in the movie industry.

I am the British author of UFOScrutiny, a relatively new blog which aims to give an informative and impartial overview of the subject of UFOs from an (anonymous) ex-Govt official's viewpoint.

I was especially interested to see information online about your UFOTOG project which, in my view, promises to be a very welcome and rigorous field study of the UFO phenomenon using state-of-the-art technology. I personally can't think of anyone better qualified to lead this ambitious project.

I'm sure I'm certainly not the first to ask but - for the benefit of visitors to my blog - I wondered if you would be so kind as to let me know if there is any update concerning how UFOTOG is progressing, or whether it has in fact been temporarily shelved in favour of other projects?

I do appreciate that you will be very busy and will understand that a response will only be forthcoming if time permits.

Any update you could provide would be very much appreciated. May I also reassure you that I will only publish any response, or extracts of a response online with your express permission.

Yours sincerely,

Jonathan Niven
UFOScrutiny"

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So far (just over five weeks) there has been no response but you never know...

Still no news on UFOTOG

UPDATE 10 September 2012

See Douglas Trumbull's response to my email to him about UFOTOG here

In June 2010, Douglas Trumbull, the visual effects expert famous for his work on Hollywood blockbusters like 2001 A Space Odyssey and Close Encounters of The Third Kind made his UFOTOG project public via his website.

In his video Mr Trumbull explains that he is, of course, very well qualified to spot bogus or fake UFO video or photo footage given that he's been a leader in the business of visual - including digital video - effects for many years.  He then demonstrates how easy it is to fake reasonably convincing UFO footage using just cooking utensils as an example.

What really interested me was his project - presumably at considerable personal expense - to fit his own personal Humvee with state-of-the-art telescopic video cameras complete with night sight, infra-red and ultraviolet spectroscopic functions (amongst others) and computer tracking, identification and recording software. The vehicle which he dubs 'UFOTOG' could deploy in areas of reportedly high UFO activity and track the sky for anything unusual, whilst being able to filter out 'noise' in the form of all the usual man-made or natural activity.

I really liked the idea of this project potentially being able to triangulate, monitor and record UFO activity. I thought that - at last - we might be looking at a comprehensive field study of the phenomenon from individuals with extensive and industry-standard filming and video expertise (and with considerable financial backing too it seems). The hope for many would be that solid, reliable data could be gathered that could withstand rigorous scientific scrutiny which would then be the subject of a documentary or film. This would make a welcome change from the vast mass of poor amateur - and mostly fake - footage clogging up the net and lacking any serious analysis.

So I waited with baited breath to see what the coming months after the introductory video's posting would reveal.

Now I can understand that Mr Trumbull is likely to be a very busy man and may not have had much time to devote to this particular project, although I'm assuming he has various friends or colleagues supporting him in the gathering of footage and data. In addition, the project will take time to bear fruit when considering that UFOTOG has to go to various locations, film over a period of hours/days with the resultant footage having to then be analysed, filtered and catalogued.

However, so far there hasn't been a single update on this project. Not even anything saying whether UFOTOG has gone on any field visits at all. Given that 21 months have passed since the intro video's posting this seems a little odd, especially as a lot of time and effort already appears to have been invested in this project.

I've used a couple of search engines to see if there is any more news elsewhere on this but so far there is nothing.

If anyone has seen anything that suggests what is going on with this project (if anything) I would be interested to hear from you.