Have I photographed a ghostly apparition?

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Gongster

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No of course not, but these were taken a couple of summers ago. Please don't judge the photos I know they're rubbish, all I have done is converted them from RAW to jpeg to put in here. As you can see I was trying to get some sort of arty sunset shots. In all three towards the centre of the frame is a red and yellow shape. I don't know what has caused it, I can only assume that it is some form of reflection from the setting sun, possibly from my lens? I'm sure somebody out there will be able to tell me exactly what has caused the photos of the 'wood spirits'
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Gongster said:
I don't know what has caused it, I can only assume that it is some form of reflection from the setting sun, possibly from my lens?
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Yeah, that's pretty typical of internal reflections which could be in the lens itself or between any filter (e.g. UV filter) and the various lens elements. When a lens is stopped down it's typical to see these kinds of internal reflections in the shape of the aperture blades. This particular set of reflections seems to be replicating the light through the tree branches giving it the unusual shape.

It could even be the bright reflection of the sun through the tree branches off your front element and projecting on the ground but then you'd likely have seen it with your own eyes when shooting the photo. A similar thing happens during certain events like just prior to or just after a total solar eclipse when the highly columnated light rays shine down through tree leaves and like a hundred pin hole cameras projects the eclipsing sun onto the ground as multiple images.
 
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I have seen some strange thing in my shots when I was stacking neutral density filters. I think the light must bounce between the filters creating strange things. I have seen Trees and rock from this affect showing up in landscape sky's .
One other thing are you using your lens hood?

Just a thought.
 
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With the sun, or any bright direct light source in the frame, you are likely to get lens flare like this. Ditch the UV filter for starters, that is going to make it much worse. The lens hood won't help much when the sun is in the frame, but always use it anyway.
 
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As some have mentioned above a lens hood won't reduce flare when the sun is actually included in the shot. No harm in using one but don't expect miracles. Lens hoods are great when the sun is outside the shot but still in front of the camera where bright light coming in from the sides can cause troubles but the hood can't do a thing to keep bright light sources out when they're actually included in the framed image.
 
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