cryptozoology Cryptozoology is a pseudoscience and subculture that searches for and studies unknown, legendary, or extinct animals whose present existence is disputed or unsubstantiated, particularly those popular in folklore, such as Bigfoot, the Loch Ness ...

and

ufology Ufology ( ) is the investigation of unidentified flying objects (UFOs) by people who believe that they may be of extraordinary origins (most frequently of extraterrestrial alien visitors). While there are instances of government, private, and ...

, "rods" (also known as "skyfish", "air rods", or "solar entities") are elongated visual artifacts appearing in

photograph A photograph (also known as a photo, image, or picture) is an image created by light falling on a photosensitive surface, usually photographic film or an electronic image sensor, such as a CCD or a CMOS chip. Most photographs are now create ...

ic images and video recordings. Some

paranormal Paranormal events are purported phenomena described in popular culture, folk, and other non-scientific bodies of knowledge, whose existence within these contexts is described as being beyond the scope of normal scientific understanding. Nota ...

proponents claim them to be

extraterrestrial life Extraterrestrial life, colloquially referred to as alien life, is life that may occur outside Earth and which did not originate on Earth. No extraterrestrial life has yet been conclusively detected, although efforts are underway. Such life might ...

forms,

extradimensional In physics and mathematics, the dimension of a mathematical space (or object) is informally defined as the minimum number of coordinates needed to specify any point within it. Thus, a line has a dimension of one (1D) because only one coordin ...

creatures, or very small

UFO An unidentified flying object (UFO), more recently renamed by US officials as a UAP (unidentified aerial phenomenon), is any perceived aerial phenomenon that cannot be immediately identified or explained. On investigation, most UFOs are id ...

s. However, these artifacts appear naturally in video and outdoor photography as the result of an optical illusion due to

motion blur Motion blur is the apparent streaking of moving objects in a photograph or a sequence of frames, such as a film or animation. It results when the image being recorded changes during the recording of a single exposure, due to rapid movement or l ...

, especially in

interlaced video Interlaced video (also known as interlaced scan) is a technique for doubling the perceived frame rate of a video display without consuming extra bandwidth. The interlaced signal contains two fields of a video frame captured consecutively. Thi ...

recording, and are typically afterimage trails of flying insects and their wingbeats.

Optical analysis

Robert Todd Carroll (2003), having consulted an entomologist (Doug Yanega), identified rods as images of flying insects recorded over several cycles of wing-beating on video recording devices. The insect captured on image a number of times, while propelling itself forward, gives the illusion of a single elongated rod-like body, with bulges. " The Straight Dope" columnist Cecil Adams (2020) also explained rods as such phenomena, namely tricks of light which result from how (primarily video images) of flying insects are recorded and played back. Adding that investigators have shown the rod-like bodies as resulting from

, if the camera is shooting with relatively long exposure times. The claims of these being extraordinary creatures, possibly alien, have been advanced by either people with active imaginations, or

hoax A hoax is a widely publicized falsehood so fashioned as to invite reflexive, unthinking acceptance by the greatest number of people of the most varied social identities and of the highest possible social pretensions to gull its victims into pu ...

ers. In August 2005,

China Central Television China Central Television (CCTV) is a Chinese state- and political party-owned broadcaster controlled by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Its 50 different channels broadcast a variety of programing to more than one billion viewers in six lan ...

(CCTV) aired a two-part documentary about flying rods in China. It reported the events from May to June of the same year at Tonghua Zhenguo Pharmaceutical Company in Tonghua City, Jilin Province, which debunked the flying rods. Surveillance cameras in the facility's compound captured video footage of flying rods identical to those shown in Jose Escamilla's video. Getting no satisfactory answer to the phenomenon, curious scientists at the facility decided that they would try to solve the mystery by attempting to catch these airborne creatures. Huge nets were set up and the same surveillance cameras then captured images of rods flying into the trap. When the nets were inspected, the "rods" were no more than regular moths and other ordinary flying insects. Subsequent investigations proved that the appearance of flying rods on video was an optical illusion created by the slower recording speed of the camera.中国UFO悬案调查：飞棍出没的世界(下)SINA Technology News, "China's outstanding UFO Investigation: fly rod Haunted World (Part Two)"
/ref> After attending a lecture by Jose Escamilla, UFO investigator

Robert Sheaffer Robert Sheaffer (born 1949) is an American freelance writer and UFO skeptic. He is a paranormal investigator of unidentified flying objects, having researched many sightings and written critiques of the hypothesis that UFOs are alien spacecraft ...

wrote that "some of his “rods” were obviously insects zipping across the field at a high angular rate" and others appeared to be “appendages” which were birds' wings blurred by the camera exposure.

Paranormal claims

Various paranormal interpretations of this phenomenon appear in popular culture. One of the more outspoken proponents of rods as alien life forms was Jose Escamilla, who claimed to have been the first to film them on March 19, 1994 in Roswell, New Mexico, while attempting to film a

. Escamilla later made additional videos and embarked on lecture tours to promote his claims.

In popular culture

* In the manga and anime series '' JoJo's Bizarre Adventure'', the '' Stone Ocean'' part features a character named Rikiel with the Stand ability "Sky High" that allows him to control rods, which are described as real unidentified animals, and use them to attack his enemies by absorbing their body heat. * In the videogame '' Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow'', there is a rare enemy type called Sky Fish based on the "rod" phenomenon. Sky Fish resemble rods in appearance, and can only be defeated by slowing down time. * The 2010 '' Super Sentai'' series, '' Tensou Sentai Goseiger'' featured the antagonistic cryptid-themed monster group Yuumajuu. One of their members is Zaigo of the Skyfish, who has the secondary theme of stick insect. * In the 2015 ''

Kemono Friends is a Japanese media franchise created by manga artist Mine Yoshizaki. The first project was a mobile game developed by Nexon, which ran from March 2015 to December 2016. A manga by Furai was serialized in Kadokawa's ''Monthly Shōn ...

'' mobile game
Skyfish
appears as a playable Friend and minor character.

Explanatory notes

References

External links