Ufology vs The Digital Age

You see it. You have no idea what it is, but you heard about this. It might be, it could be, it is! You are witnessing a UFO! You can't believe it, no one would. But wait! You just happen to have your trusty digital camera with you! You get some of the best pictures of what seems to be an alien space craft. It hovers silently, not one sound, over your head. Then as suddenly as it appeared, it shoots off at impossible speed. But you have the proof! You have clear pictures!
Unfortunately, those pictures you took of your experience will come under the utmost scrutiny BECAUSE they are digital. While digital photographic technology is convenient, it is also easily manipulated as most people know by now. At a glance they are very hard to tell from the real thing and therefore will be highly suspect no matter how factual they are. And with the advancement of technology in the field growing exponentially, even the experts find it hard to tell the difference.
In ufology, the burden of proof is often found in photographic evidence for lack of any other. Digital technology, often along with such internet visual forums as YouTube, has become the bane of legitimate and serious ufologists the world over. One widely distributed set of photos on the internet, what has become known as the CARET Drones, has set off a flurry of debates as to authenticity.
CARET stands for Commercial Applications Research for Extraterrestrial Technology and was said to have been fronted by the US Department of Defense according to an individual who only gave his name as Isaac. When the drone pictures, like the one in this article, began surfacing on the internet, so did Isaac. It was his claim that these drones were manufactured using alien technology and could appear and vanish due to invisibility secrets obtained from them.
Among those who believe that the photos are genuine are Emmy Award winning investigative journalist Linda Moulton Howe and Whitley Strieber, best known as an abductee whose story was told in the motion picture "Communion". However, a preliminary investigation by MUFON has shown these photos to be CGI fakes.
"In one of the images, you can see that the faker used something called 'radiosity' to render the images. The technique allows for more realistic images and makes things look very good, as if lit by the sun in this case. You can see classic radiosity render artifacts in the dark shadow areas of the CG craft. They show up as mottling in the shadows instead of smooth transitions", says Marc D'Antonio, a CGI expert with FX Models Inc.
Kris Avery, also an expert in the field of CGI and with Kaptive Studios, says of one of the photos, "...the spires have a very jagged edge only observed as the result of 3D rendering, never on a photo...it is a combination of high light levels, angle of light and very thin geometry."
Will ufology survive the digital age? Yes, as long as there are checks and balances in the technology, I believe it will.