Play by Numbers "Numerator" youtube video

[TOYOTAセ&#1]

what I want to know is, if this is indeed a fake, where did he get the high quality art from, and how do I get it?

I'm fairly certain it's just an upscaled version of the original with remade text slapped on there and ran through a median filter to smooth it all out. If you look around the eyes (particularly the left one) you can see what appears to be a bit of pixelation still present from the upscaling:

Yeah, because that's totally how it works. A little detail people also seem to forget is the detail of the "3" in the toddlers eyes.

Image that has been circulating the web for years:


One from video:



I have applied everything you described the best I could and these are the comparisons of the two images when in contrast to each other. I have up-scaled it to the video image size, applied a 2 pixel median filter, and heightened the exposure slightly. You tell me.

[wash]

Something about this doesn't seem right to me...sure, the picture is higher resolution, but the 3s on the eyes as well as the Boards of Canada text just look off. It seems to me like somebody added them into the picture afterward digitally. Something about them seems too crisp, new, and digital to have been part of the original run. It looks like they were added on afterward to make it look slightly different.

However, that just brings up a whole new slew of question..the first one being, of course, why? If it's fake, then why would someone go through so much trouble? Purely to make the Twoism community scratch their heads? I mean if that's the case they've certainly done it. But the fact that the picture is undoubtedly in higher resolution makes this whole thing seem much creepier. I've been staring at that baby's face for the past few minutes thinking about this and it's starting to make me feel genuinely unnerved. I'm trying my hardest to keep myself from thinking there's more to this, but of all the fakes I can remember this is certainly one of the most suspicious.

[Mexicola]

Photoshop's great isn't it? (sorry, not taken my anti-sarcasm pills yet this morning)

[Kilroy the Killjoy]

Yeah, because that's totally how it works. A little detail people also seem to forget is the detail of the "3" in the toddlers eyes.

It's not exactly that hard to recreate the number "3" in the same style with photo editing software. Assume the title text and threes are recreations for a moment and just focus on the photograph itself in your comparison: both the high resolution version of the cover and the upscaled version you made seem to have exactly the same level of detail. There's the same level of blurriness in the mouth, the nose, and the eyelids. If it were truly higher resolution, the transition from the eyelids to the pupils would be at least a tiny bit sharper than on the upscale.

also, no need to get so snarky, man

[TOYOTAセ&#1]

Yeah, because that's totally how it works. A little detail people also seem to forget is the detail of the "3" in the toddlers eyes.

It's not exactly that hard to recreate the number "3" in the same style with photo editing software. Assume the title text and threes are recreations for a moment and just focus on the photograph itself in your comparison: both the high resolution version of the cover and the upscaled version you made seem to have exactly the same level of detail. There's the same level of blurriness in the mouth, the nose, and the eyelids. If it were truly higher resolution, the transition from the eyelids to the pupils would be at least a tiny bit sharper than on the upscale.

also, no need to get so snarky, man

I apologize, but there is just no way. I don't understand why people must keep deluding themselves. If someone could replicate exactly what they had done in the video image, and even added the glossy paper reflection with the staple indents, then I would be convinced that this is indeed a fake.

All the more while with people regarding mdg to come and confirm if this is the real thing, he sure seems to be late to the show in terms to this while "real" copies of AFoT and OTV2 are debunked within days, weeks, or months. I don't know. It's just a little observation of mine.

And the only thing we can really think of is "Why?"

[zeoevil]

To be fair, we've been over and over this and, to my best recollection, mdg has not chimed in. So let me be the one who plays the "mdg Card" on this one.

[North by North]

I've been thinking ^^ since the first thread on this.

[Mexicola]

You're assuming MDG has (a) seen this discussion and (b) chosen not to reply. On the first point, he may not have and on the second, if I was him I wouldn't bother shooting down all fakes for precisely this reason. Ie. Failure to do so becoming a confirmation by default. I'm still calling fake, but then again, who knows? Opinions. Facts. We don't have both, sadly.

[Jonse]

I just love this community. Maybe it's a stretch, but I think we often think too intensely about something that's ultimately simple.

You know, it's like I mention early on all about the text on the artwork and possible scaling, I mention all my feelings about whether or not it's real, but at the end of the day I admit the obvious (we don't know). That seems better to me regardless of how I feel because people like the ability to speculate about something, especially if an official has yet to say nothing about it. The band that told you about spending 3 weeks on a one shot, that teased people with a black box, that hasn't even allowed themselves to be in videos or audio interviews can't possibly have let anything seep out under their discretion - perhaps augmented to seem less simple than it is - to watch their fans pick at each other's brains...surely?

But it's probably simpler than that. What I don't understand though is this: the longer this sort of thing goes on, the urge someone has to just flat out declare a glorified "fake and gay" becomes apparently too much to contain. They jump in between those who lean towards something being real, those who lean towards something being a hoax, and they stomp around with declarative statements. Like there's some wisdom to impart at every stage of the conversation when the conclusion is still the same.

I've come to a new opinion: it's both real and fake. The track is and isn't Numerator, the artwork is and isn't a real scan. Someone took a chunk out of their day to do all this trickery and simultaneously spent that day fishing instead of fooling around in photoshop.

[Mexicola]

I like this. Almost a quantum state. Schrödinger and all that

[Berselius]

My opinion: someone found the original baby picture, put the number and the text above it, then put the synth above the random35 track and then uploaded it.

The reason I think it's fake is the name of the uploader: it's February 2014... even I was a believer back then, but as the days passed, it turned out to be just a joke someone did for fun.

[Cupz]

Schrödinger and all that

Ok now I'm scared The Boards Of Canada Paradox.

[zeoevil]

On the first point, he may not have and on the second, if I was him I wouldn't bother shooting down all fakes for precisely this reason.

All valid points and I agree. But to be fair, mdg has chimed in at random times about seemingly innocuous things. Like when he responded to my post about who owns the rights to the old material. I pointed out there were parts of the old material the band might not own the rights too and he quickly posted that they owned all the rights to the music. He posted right away when someone was trying to get money for remastering old material. Are those less important than this? Maybe. Probably. I don't know. Nobody's trying to make any money of this so who knows. I'm fine either way. I was just pointing out the obvious.

[Mexicola]

Agree entirely, I'd just be wary of assuming silence equates to a confirmation. One things for sure, someone went to some trouble with this. If its fake, and I suspect it is, I do wonder why people go to all the bother lol.

[Techboy]

jesus, there was like a 30 page thread about this already which im ashamed to say i read most of

the guy who posted this video months later went on to post this

Subject: When do they finally say "enough is enough"?

lmao even my lazy-ass fake had some semblance of craftsmanship

apply yourself

so it's fake

end of story

[qualia]

Not that any further confirmation is necessary at this point, but I also ran an error level analysis (ELA) on the fake cover. It is indeed scaled up and then Photoshopped to clean up the eyes, recreate the text, and add dust/speckles to make it look like a scan.



I used http://fotoforensics.com/ for the analysis.

[qualia]

Oops, I guess it's too late to edit my post. One thing that's interesting to note is that the crease in the bottom left and the white in the top left corner do not show up in the ELA. Additionally, the other two images ran through the analysis look like this:




Perhaps I was hasty to draw such quick conclusions. The mystery only seems to deepen.

[Techboy]

The square-y footprint of the second set of results just indicates the error is as a result of JPEG compression rather than an algorithm applied over the image

[TOYOTAセ&#1]

jesus, there was like a 30 page thread about this already which im ashamed to say i read most of

the guy who posted this video months later went on to post this

Subject: When do they finally say "enough is enough"?

lmao even my lazy-ass fake had some semblance of craftsmanship

apply yourself

so it's fake

end of story

>Cassette Master

That was about R35TT.

[Negamuse]

The thread and the spectrogram were about r35 but saying 'my lazy ass fake' was referring to audio he'd posted before... and THAT was Numerator