Equipment
Methods of Paranormal Investigation
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igital audio recorders are very helpful in capturing EVP’s (electronic voice phenomena), because the recorders can pick up noises or disembodied voices that our ears cannot hear sometimes, especially if the noise or voice is extremely quite. Capturing an EVP can help with the evidence process, especially you keep catching the same the disembodied voice because it shows there could be something paranormal in the area and whether the entity is residual or intelligent.
Still photographs can be a great method to use, bu
t capturing something on the actual photograph can be quite hard to get. You usually have to take numerous shots to get something interesting on the film, but even by doing that you may not catch anything. If you are lucky enough to get something on the photograph that is like a treat in itself and can help a great deal with evidence of the location.
EMF meters (electromagnetic fields) detect change and possibly unexplained electromagnetic fields. EMFs are usually generated by household or industrial appliances. An EMF meter measures AC electromagnetic fields, which are usually emitted from man-made sources like electrical wiring. The Gauss meter or magnetometer measure DC fields, which occur naturally in the Earth’s geomagnetic field and are emitted from differing rocks and interaction between charged particles from the sun and the magnetosphere.
Digital video cameras help the paranormal field a great deal. Being able to capture something on video is almost the best evidence of all. It shows what happened at that specific time, what was captured, and how it could be paranormal. Video evidence can particularly help support claims by providing what they saw and how it looked.
IR lights (infrared) are just as important as the video camera. It lightens up a dark room, as if you were using a flash light, but we cannot see the IR lights with our own vision, instead the camera can pick it up because the film or image sensor used is sensitive to infrared light. Wavelengths used for photography range from around 700 nm to 900 nm. Usually an infrared filter is used; this lets IR light pass through to the camera, but blocks all or most of the visible light spectrum, which makes the filter look black or deep red.
Digital thermometers measure temperature using Blackbody radiation, usually infrared energy emitted from the object. The most basic design consists of a lens to focus the infrared energy on to a detector, which converts the energy to an electrical signal that can be displayed in units of temperature after being compensated for ambient temperature variation. If you get a spike in a certain area with the thermometer and it’s not due to any natural causes like wind or man-made objects like air conditioners and/or heaters, this may be paranormal. Most thermometers only measure the temperature of the object it is pointed at, such as a person or wall. So getting a thermometer with a protruding measuring rod is must, this will measure air temperature instead of the object temperature. Keeping a note of occurrences during the investigation is also good practice.
A new piece of equipment that is becoming very popular for paranormal investigators is the Full-spectrum camera or video camera. The full spectrum camera is incredibly beneficial because it captures images reflected within both ends of the light spectrum from, ultraviolet, visible, and near infrared light. The full spectrum shows us a broad range of color and light, which can help us to better see and/or analyze the recorded evidence on the film during the investigation.
This is not all equipment used, such as the Thermal Imager which we use and spirit boxes that channel through hundreds of radio channels every second. New devices are invented everyday, some are weird and simple, some are complex computer devices, all in the attempt to prove life after death and communicate with the dead.
Many other paranormal devices include simple equipment such as old copper dowsing rods, crystal pendulums, and the infamous Ouija Boards are used widely throughout the paranormal field. Our group and many others choose not to use these techniques often due to the lack of science put into these methods. Some scientific methods like motion sensors are used, these are used often with a camera filming the equipment to help validate that what caused the motion sensor to go off was not of natural occurrence. We personally do not use motion sensors, any movement from the building or anything in the house can cause the sensor to go off. For a valid sensor reading to be proven as paranormal would have to be coincidental, as in hearing disembodied footsteps then the motion sensor going off with the steps. Mediums, automatic writing, and psychics are being used less often with these new scientific methods about in the ghost community. Though these methods have proven to be useful in the past, today’s skeptics do not except theses techniques. Validity needs to be proven by video and recorders today to even get a small anchor in our society, validity of hear-say is rarely excepted as paranormal evidence by the skeptical audience of today’s world.
