|
 |
|
|
| The Crop
Circle Community |
|
 Crop Circles news, views, gallery and archive brought to you by Weird Wiltshire Introduction Latest News News Archive Community Hoaxing Opinion Forum Gallery 2003 Gallery Calendar Postcards Wallpaper Circle Designs Milk Hill Alton Barnes Barge Inn Signs Movie Links  |
One fact stands tall and true amid this mysterious swirling of the corn: the two sides of the crop circle argument are subject to a bitter war of words. Both sides are extremely hostile to the other's views and vigorously protective of their own. Suffice to say there is no love lost between crop circle-makers like Matthew Williams and the Circlemakers, and crop circle investigators such as Professor Glickman. Indeed, the battle between crop circle-makers and crop circle researchers is almost as intriguing as the circles themselves. For the full story, check out our crop circle News Archive. Meanwhile, here are a few familiar faces from crop circle dramas of recent years:  Professor
Michael Glickmanis a trained architect and has worked in engineering and industrial design. He became interested in the crop circles some years ago and now lives and works in California, spending every summer in the wheat fields of England. He hopes to demonstrate a mathematical relationship between shapes within the circles and between the circles and the surrounding countryside, especially at Silbury Hill and Avebury stone circle. He agrees that all is not well in the world of crop circles research: "It is a very fraught and embittered community, which is in many ways shocking." Although he has been quoted as saying he believes a "federation of intelligences" has been responsible for the formations, he admits he still does not have a definitive answer. He said: "It is very difficult. I would say that I am right but there is a certain amount of arrogance in that as a lot of people would disagree with me. It has taken a lot of years, but I know have a very tentative grasp of these events and for the last four seasons I have predicted what formations we were going to get. The fact that I have had a consistent success at that leads me to believe that one doesn't really know what is going on." Matthew Williams is a self-confessed circle-maker and the first man to be prosecuted for doing so. He plans to expose crop circles for what he says he knows they are - a hoax. The circle-maker, from Bishops Cannings was fined £100 with £40 pounds costs by Kennet Magistrates in November 2000 after admitting causing damage to crops at West Overton in August 1999. He was also barred from attending Professor Glickman's talk in Devizes town hall in August 2001. On his website, Total Human Solution, he describes his aim and denies he is trying to ridicule researchers. He claims the concept of his site is simple: "To provide proof positive that certain crop circles have been made by the hand of man, whilst allowing the creators to remain anonymous. The objective is to demonstrate that no circle or effect is beyond human capabilities." He and his circle-making colleagues post designs on their website in encrypted form, so that when the crop circle season is over they are be able to show which formations, claimed as genuine by the investigators, were their own work. Peter Sorenson a crop circle videographer, has been studying formations in England since 1992.  He is
also a familiar figure at The Barge
Inn in Pewsey Vale. Although he does not purport to the belief that
the circles are made by aliens, he remains open-minded about their cause.
On his website
he argues his position: "The sheer size, complexity and other-worldly beauty
of many formations argues against my position, but I have been present when
some amazing ones were constructed. I have never seen a design that couldn't
be constructed with simple tools."He believes the circles have an overall positive effect. He said: "I think that when art history books are written about the end of the 20th Century and the beginning of the 21st, crop circles will be recognized as the most remarkable new art form of the time. He also believes that the crop circle 'designers', as he calls them, are on a par with the greatest modern artists and goes as far as to say: "They are highly skilled craftsmen who work with unbelievable speed and they are virtually never caught!" The 'Rogues Gallery of Croppies' on his homepage claims to be the biggest collection of portrait shots of circle researchers on the web. The Circlemakers  are
possibly the most notorious and secret of the circle-makers.
A shroud of mystery surrounds them, something they try hard to maintain. They have created circles for car adverts and television programmes, showing how the circles can be made by man, under cover of darkness. They include John Lundberg, Rod Dickinson, Wil Russell and Rob Irving. On their website you can hear a crop circle being made and get a beginners guide to making one yourself. The Wiltshire Crop Circle Study Group is one of the key organisations researching formations.  Francine
Blake is one of the central figures in the group. She said: "Every year they blow
our minds and just seem to get bigger and more exciting. We are continuing
to build up a picture about them but I have no idea yet who is actually
pressing the button. We can say how many there are and record the fact
that they alter the soil and plants show radical changes at cellular level,
but we do not know how they are created.Francine has photographed many formations and experienced strange happenings when taking snaps of a complicated formation that appeared in Windmill Hill near Avebury. She said: "I was in a helicopter above the formation which was 280 feet in diameter. I took three shots which came out all right but when I asked the pilot to fly lower I started having problems with my camera and later found that all the electrics were literally gummed up." Francine believes that the damage was caused by an electrical force within the formation. She says it is important for people to maintain an open mind about crop circles. "I want people to look at all the evidence before they decide whether to accept the sceptics' claims," she said. |
[an error occurred while processing this directive] [an error occurred while processing this directive] [an error occurred while processing this directive]
|
| [an error occurred while processing this directive] | |
|
|
| Postcards
I Wallpaper
I Site
Map I This
is Wiltshire I Newsquest
Digital Media Services I Other
This is sites Home I Crop Circles I Silbury Hill I Stones I UFOs I White Horses I Ghosts I Miscellaneous I |
|