There are many who believe in ghosts and there are a lot who have had their own personal experiences which reinforce their beliefs. There are theories that there are different levels of spirit, from good, not so good to non-human entities (dark shadow figures). Little is really known about the non-human ones, so if you are considering getting into paranormal investigations, or are working in the field, it is best you take precautions just in case.

What are the best ways to protect yourself? Most will do some form of prayer, before and after the event.  The first part is to have spirit guides or protectors look after you while you are trying to connect with spirit. The end prayer is to thank those guides and ask them to remove any energy that is attached to you.

So, what if you are not religious, or have not got a particular faith? If you believe that there Is a possibility that there are spirits, you must believe in some level of spirituality. A prayer is just setting an intention, asking for the powers to protect you on your journey. You do not have to call on a specific deity, just something that you strongly believe in.

For example: instead of saying “I ask for the father, the son and the holy spirit” or “I ask the ark angels”, you could say something like “I ask the powers that be”. You are basically asking for the same thing, but most importantly, you must believe in your heart what you are saying for it to work.

Here below, are some examples of what you could say. You can say whatever you like, as long as it has meaning and conviction. Do not be rude or demanding, speak with good intention and a good positive vibe. While you are saying your intention/prayer, close your eyes, imagine a small ball of light, then let that light grow and surround your whole body. This is another form of protection.

1 (religious)

Dear Heavenly Father, we come before you, asking for your divine protection. We ask that you guard and protect us from any negativity or evil spirits that may come our way tonight. May your presence surround and shield us, keeping us safe from harm. In the lord’s name, we pray. Amen

2 (non-religious)

We call upon the powers that be, to guide us and protect us from any negativity or evil spirit that may seek to harm us. We ask that you surround us with love and light, protecting us from any dangers that may come our way.  We thank you for your presence and protection as we walk tonight.

Amen (if you wish to say)

After your investigation

(religious)

In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, we thank you for protecting us. We thank the archangels for their presence, shielding us from any dark spirits that may have approached us and sheltered us from their harm. We ask in the Lord’s name that you remove any negativity or spirit that has attached to us. We thank you heavenly father

Amen

(non-religious)

We thank the guardians and the powers that be for protecting us from any harm tonight. We thank you for warding off any negative or evil spirits that may have come our way.  We ask the powers that be to remove any energy, negativity or spirit that may have attached itself to us. Thank you

Amen (if you wish to say)

So, we have asked for spirit to be removed from us if they have attached, but what about the location? It is also good practise to ask any entities to go back to their realm. Thank the spirit for their communication, but they must go back and leave the location (you do not want anything lingering).

We thank spirit for communicating with us on this day and appreciate all that you have done. We wish you love and light and command in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ that he guide you to where you came from, and any inhuman entity or spirit go to where the Lord decides for you.

We ask in the name of the Father that you must not attach to this location or any person that may dwell here. Dear Heavenly Father, please protect this place with your Holy Light and keep any unwanted or evil spirit away. Amen

Note: if you are not religious, replace the Lord etc. with something that has more meaning to you

So this is a basic idea of what you can say. It is good to write down your intentions/prayers in a book so you can read them out on your location.

When you take pictures and video there will be no doubt that there will be dust in the room (not necessarily visible to the eye or camera in normal light conditions). Cameras struggle to focus on such small things and it tries its best to make out what it detects, but it blurs it and makes it look larger than it is. When you have a light source illuminating the area the dust reflects the light accentuating it making it look like it is glowing. These are what people sometimes mistake as orbs.

The other thing that can reflect light and can be mistaken for an orb is a small insect. These are quite easy to pick out as they have quite distinguishable paths of flight.

A true orb is visible to the eye and sometimes interacts with people, illuminating and moving with specific questions.

Blurring can also be an issue when taking photos in low lighting conditions without a flash. The reason is because when a digital camera is in auto mode it tries to make several decisions to get the best results. These are ISO, shutter speed and aperture. The ISO determines how much light accesses the camera’s sensor, the shutter speed is how long the shutter is open when taking the image and the aperture is how wide the lens is open.

The ISO is not really going to affect the focusing, but if it is too high it could make the image grainy.

The shutter speed or exposure time is the main reason for an image blurring. It is basically how long the shutter is open to allow light in to take the image, the longer it is open the more light gets in. For example if you are taking a picture of someone or an object that is moving around, a shutter speed of around 1/500 and above (one five hundredth of a second) should be enough to prevent blur in the image. If the person is standing still and there is no background movement a shutter speed of 1/60 of a second should be fine. When the camera is in auto mode and lighting conditions are poor, there is a good chance it will select a low shutter speed making any movement blurry.

Here is an extreme example of a slow exposure time: If you go into the manual mode of a camera and set the shutter to be open for ten seconds, it will allow 10 seconds of light/image to be processed by the sensor (you will need a tripod to take this kind of picture as any movement will blur). The first part of the shot have someone in the frame for 5 seconds, then get them to move out of the scene. The camera will take 5 seconds of the subject and another 5 seconds of the background so the main subject would appear transparent. Here is an example of one I did

Camcorders and other video recording devices obviously work differently mechanically to cameras that take still images but the same rules apply to dust and insects reflecting light. So if you see something bright, slightly transparent and spherical in shape moving across the screen, it just might be dust or a bug.

Some of the more expensive video cameras out there offer adjustable frame rates. The bog standard hi8 camcorders usually have a frame rate of 29.97 fps (frames per second). The higher the fps the better quality the video will be when the footage is slowed down. If you have a video camera that takes 60fps per second, that is going capture 30 more frames in a second than if you were to have your video set at 30fps. The higher the frame rate, the more information will be captured per second. Slowing down the footage can be handy if you catch something you want to look at further in detail and review frame by frame. Most DSLR cameras can take video and usually offer higher frame rates, as do most modern video camcorders.

Please be aware frame rate and shutter speed are not the same.