Muchmore: Brake Lights On?

[Tracy Riddle]

The much missed Jack White did some work years ago about the yellow stripes that were painted on the curb on the driver's side of Elm Street. The "Kill Zone" for Greer?

Stan, somewhere in my collection I have a mid-60s photo taken from the southern end of the Plaza, and it shows the same yellow stripes on Commerce St. in the same places. They were put there for some kind of traffic purpose.

The only way Greer and/or Kellerman were involved is if they had been told a simulated assassination attempt was being conducted. A drill that turns into the real thing.

[John Mooney]

David,

JFK was shot in the back.

Connally was shot in the back.

The Tague wound was from a bullet from the rear.

Some people think there were shots through the windshield. If not then bullet fragments just missed Greer's head.

Greer was absolutely 100% in the line of fire from all angles.

I simply can't see how he was "in on it".

[Steve Minnerly]

Arent trained professional security people suppose to behave different than the average joe. Yeah in a cofusing situation i might hit the breaks or turn around.

But the top of the hierarcy in the security profession who are suppose to be protecting the most important person in the world should not be acting that way. On the first shot he should have had the pedal to the metal.

They were keystone kops that day and i dont think that was an accident

[John Mooney]

Humans are not robots. All the training in the world can not guarantee what happens in real time.

Greer could have died very easily.

What I want to know is, what happened to JFK's rear bumper SS cover, but that's another subject.

[Steve Minnerly]

You might be right john.

But there was other suspicious activity by the ss. Calling them off the rear of the limo as they were leaving the airport. The film of that is one of the most viewed jfk assassination videos over at youtube.

The drinking and partying until early morning hours the night before the assassination. It all stinks to high heaven. Too many coincidences.

[Albert Rossi]

You might be right john.

But there was other suspicious activity by the ss. Calling them off the rear of the limo as they were leaving the airport. The film of that is one of the most viewed jfk assassination videos over at youtube.

The drinking and partying until early morning hours the night before the assassination. It all stinks to high heaven. Too many coincidences.

I suggest you read Abraham Bolden's book. Among other things, it gives the lie to that crap Blaine would have us believe about how the SS was "demoralized" concerning JFK's escapades.

And, whatever you might choose to believe about his flip-flopping and over-enthusiastic accolades about every new JFK assassination book on the market, I think Palamara's Secret Service work is extremely important.

[Jeff Carter]

This is my first post on this forum, so as a quick intro: I have been working with Len Osanic this past year on the 50 Reasons video series. I've been fairly immersed in the assassination and related issues and I've referenced this and other forums through the year. I've developed some opinions related to this particular thread so thought I'd hop on. Beyond the assassination I have great interest in many parapolitical topics, and, for example, try to read anything by Peter Dale Scott and also think the Levenda "Sinister Forces" trilogy is outstanding.

I think the limo slow down is visible in the Zapruder film, most clearly in the frames after the vehicle has passed Hill and Moorman. What hinders the recognition is that the background is mostly green lawn without any other figure to serve as a referent. Once I first noticed it, the limo slow down is apparent every time I see the film - but I do not know the degree to which this is a subjective observation (that is, not everyone may also see it).


Thoughts on Zapruder film alteration: I lean towards the authenticity of the Zapruder film. I have worked with aerial optical printers, the equipment necessary for alteration, including with 8mm film, and in my opinion the claims of complete alteration - whereby people, signs, etc have been added and subtracted within the frame - are impossible. The 8mm frame is too small to do that work, and the generational loss would be too obvious. A simple rectangle matte within an 8mm frame is a challenge. However, alteration involving the removal of frames is possible - although it would result in a generational loss and, because of the size of the 8mm frame, generational loss would become visibly noticeable by the second pass.


Some movements within the Zapruder film are indeed extremely quick. This might be the result of frame removal, but an alternate explanation can be found in the mechanics of Zapruder's camera. I believe it was spring-wound, and as such would not necessarily be filming at a consistent rate of speed. That is, while an average frame rate can be established (18.2 fps in this case), that rate would not necessarily be constant as the film passes through the gate. I have worked with films exposed in spring wound cameras and found frame rates to be variably inconsistent. This can explain the observable phenomena in the Zapruder film, and the effect is more pronounced at 18fps than it would have been at, say, 24fps.


Greer and Kellerman: Pat Speer, over on his website, has done a thorough job breaking down the eyewitness reaction and recognition of shots fired. Many many people did not recognize the first sound as gunfire - then there was a long pause, then a quick sequence of at least two shots. During the pause Jackie Kennedy is not acting like she knows her husband has been shot, she seems rather confounded by her husband's actions. It is certainly possible that Greer and Kellerman were responding to a commotion by their passengers without recognizing what it was about or that gunfire had been directed into the vehicle. Their reactions went against their training, but could well be simple human reaction. Greer was apparently quite distraught afterwords.

[Albert Rossi]

Jeff, thanks for your input, and, quite apart from the discussion at hand, thank you (and Len) for your efforts on the "50 Reasons" series. Well done.

[David Josephs]

John...

While I hear what you are saying... I can't put myself into Greer's mind. And I've tried to stay away from conclusions just because "I" don't understand the "HOW" or "WHY"...
Greer stared at JFK while he was slowing the car AFTER shotws had been fired, he saw his head blown off and then lied to the WC about it.... but he was not in on it...

Not the conclusion I draw.

Either
1) he was put into a position where he HAD to slow/stop the limo at a certain place, or else OR
2) he did it by accident at the worst possible moment (he heard a shot at z220 yet this was not enough to cause him to accelerate away?) OR
3) he did it on purpose but for some other reason (shots coming from the front that he did not want to ride into??)


Albert... GREAT question and what I;ve been working on for quite some time...

We must assume that the in camera original had intersprocket images....
After the film is altered (frames are removed and a handful are painted over) we are left with 486 frames from the original film that are photographed in sequence onto Kodachrome II film
- the Assassination film in the Archive does NOT have 0183 on it. PERIOD. There is simply no way to connect the in camera original to the first day copies since the "original" in the Archives does not match the supposed first day copies...
(this again ihas to be THE SINGLE MOST IMPORTANT PIECE OF EVIDENCE supporting alteration. Without 0183 on the extant original film... that it matches what we see on the COPIES is once again not evidence that what we see was what was developed IN TOTAL from that camera.)

When the "original" frames are copied to the film Homer sees, the IS images are intact and match from frame to frame... HOW?

2 theories:

1 - the IS area was added in - either when altered or at some later date,
2 - MY THEORY is that a section of the film, from about 133-385, was filmed at 48fps. That the splice after the 6'3" and 2'7" sections of the assassiantion footage is followed by 19 feet of BLACK film which is PHYSICALLY CONNECTED to the original film via a splice. Why splice after the assassination only to add back 19 feet of Black film other than to support the story that "the rest of the film was run off".... The math is pretty straight forward as well:

Assume for a minute that the Zfilm was really 16fps.
Let's say we have 144 frames at 48fps - total 3 seconds of film in SLO-MO
If we remove 2 of every 3 frames we are left with 48 frames at 16fps = total 3 seconds of film REGULAR SPEED
Since every third frame is kept and represents the same movement IN TIME, the IS images are very, very close, we only lose 2/48th of a second's movement by removing two sequential frames.....

It is my opinion that enough frames were removed to change 48fps to 18.3fps.... and this constant disregards the winding mechanism and the natural 16fps speed of the camera. If anything as the spring winds down the rate would SLOW, not speed up. Now some quick math

z385-z133 = 252 frames at 18.3 = 13.77 seconds of film
48/18.3=2.623
2.623 x 252 frames = 661 frames at 48fps = 13.77 seconds of film

There was well more than enough film (with the 19 feet supposedly blank) to have taken the entire motorcade at 48fps...
Each frame is .149" high. 19 feet plus the 6'3" and 2'7" = 334 inches / .149 = 2241 frames from start to finish of the assassination and black film that is spliced to this section
We only needed to keep 486 of them and not remove so many as to have a huge jump in the IS area...

The smoothness we see as we watch the limo moving, to me, shows an effort to create a fluid motion in the altered film by removing enough frames to even it out.
The STOP was reduced to a severe slowing down (proven by a number of means - see Twyman's Bloody Treason) and could not hide the rapid head movement of Greer and others in frame (man falling to the ground)

There are no movies that give us all the info.... WHEN Hill leaves the Queen Mary is not shown in a film of photo... One of the people closest to the limo at the time was Brehm... it was his impression from no more than 20 feet away that the limo slowed to a stop or very slow crawl... enough so he felt that it moved a very short distance between z224 and z313.

Finally, I believe it was Muchmore who tells us she did not film the limo as she moved from her original position toward the GK.. so who knows whether that sequence is from her or not....
=====


I came to this theory after realizing that if filmed at regular speed, the process of removing info could not be accomlished unless the IS area was added after, and even then the finished film would appear to jump from frame to frame.

It's the theory I am working on and working with... and seems to be IMO, one of the easiest ways to accomplish what was needed...

If someone has info from the handful of people who saw the film pre and post alteration... I'd love to hear it... as I understand, other than mention of the red halo over JFK's head... the only MAJOR differences are recorded by those who saw a differet version of the film. NONE of the people from that weekend offer insight into whether what they see now was the same as that weekend.

DJ

[David Healy]

...

Thoughts on Zapruder film alteration: I lean towards the authenticity of the Zapruder film. I have worked with aerial optical printers, the equipment necessary for alteration, including with 8mm film, and in my opinion the claims of complete alteration - whereby people, signs, etc have been added and subtracted within the frame - are impossible. The 8mm frame is too small to do that work, and the generational loss would be too obvious. A simple rectangle matte within an 8mm frame is a challenge. However, alteration involving the removal of frames is possible - although it would result in a generational loss and, because of the size of the 8mm frame, generational loss would become visibly noticeable by the second pass.

...

Hold it there Jeff, all theories rendered in the past concerning Zapruder Film alteration possible use of mattes/glass artistry optical-aerial film printing of the "alleged 8mm in-camera Zapruder film, the 8mm film needs to be bumped to 35mm 'before' the optical-aerial film printing phase. Moe Weitzman did this very 8mm-35mm bump himself. LIFE magazine wanted a 35mm blowup of the Z-film (Weitzman's film lab, NYC iswhere Groden got his Z-film dupes/material. Groden worked in Moe's lab). That's the way Z-film alteration been presented and discussed (by myself) since the 2003 Zapruder Film Symposium at the Univ. of Minn.

Any talk of optical film printing at the 8mm level is pure nonsense... As I have reminded and corrected Roland Zavada and countless others. And the beat continues.

Here's a quick question for you Jeff, can you or anyone else reading this thread, can you prove that the alleged in-camera Zaprduer currently stored at the National Archives is in fact the Zapruder in-camera original (first generation) film? If so, the indicators, please. Glad you're here, and nice job on the Black Op series, btw....

--David Healy