Radio-Controlled Nessie Video
Posted by: Loren Coleman on June 1st, 2007
The Gordon Holmes footage newly taken at Loch Ness, which you can view the stablized version here, should have us looking with caution at the footage of an already existing radio-controlled Nessie.
Recognize the above image? Is this one of the two photographs of the original “Surgeon’s Photograph” from 1934? Or is it something else?
Since 2005, the year when the Japanese toy company Takara introduced their radio-controlled Nessie, we all have to be careful and questioning when looking at new loch and lake videos of cryptids.
Here are some photos of the model, in two different color versions, with video footage for comparison to the Holmes images.
When the Takara Nessie came out in 2005, the media quoted me as saying this Nessie toy will make it “more and more difficult to separate the wheat from the shaft.” (I purposedly used the word “shaft,” instead of “chaff.”)
How did the American branch of Takara respond? Takara spokeswoman Lauri Abel told the Wireless Flash news servise she wasn’t worried about hoaxed photos because, she pointed out, “In order to compare it to a real Nessie, you have to prove there IS a Loch Ness monster.”
There is no way I am saying that the Holmes footage is a fake. I don’t know what it is. But I figured if we are going to have to address that angle of the forthcoming investigation of the new Nessie images, you might as well see these of the Takara model.
About Loren Coleman
Loren Coleman is one of the world’s leading cryptozoologists, some say “the” leading living cryptozoologist. Certainly, he is acknowledged as the current living American researcher and writer who has most popularized cryptozoology in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.
Starting his fieldwork and investigations in 1960, after traveling and trekking extensively in pursuit of cryptozoological mysteries, Coleman began writing to share his experiences in 1969. An honorary member of Ivan T. Sanderson’s Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained in the 1970s, Coleman has been bestowed with similar honorary memberships of the North Idaho College Cryptozoology Club in 1983, and in subsequent years, that of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club, CryptoSafari International, and other international organizations. He was also a Life Member and Benefactor of the International Society of Cryptozoology (now-defunct).
Loren Coleman’s daily blog, as a member of the Cryptomundo Team, served as an ongoing avenue of communication for the ever-growing body of cryptozoo news from 2005 through 2013. He returned as an infrequent contributor beginning Halloween week of 2015.
Coleman is the founder in 2003, and current director of the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine.
Sorry Loren, but the two really don’t look all that similar. The head on the RC never gets under the water like the Holmes video. Nice comparison though. Although it makes me want to own one of these RC toys just to have.
The toy’s movements are stereotypical and predictable. By contrast, the amateur scientist’s footage shows a creature making fast unpredictable and compicated movements. No comparison!
I don’t see a comparison to the Holmes footage but I do see where this may be a problem in the future. Even though it does look fake from up close, someone with enough time could make a great hoax with one of these.
Yeah, I think we can rule out this toy as an explanation for the recent footage…
Nice toy, though…