no this is a scam like that stupid fake pic of two black guys and everyone said it was RJ and Johnny Shines even after Johnny said that was bullshit and people finally noticed the pic was actually two pics.

there is supposed to be a third pic and Mack McCormack had it and he just died this past month with his archives in flux.

didn't johnsons wife die long before lockwood would have been that old?

Lois Gibson is one of the best and well respected forensic scientists in the world. If she says it's him, I'd lay money on it. What reason does she have to lie or verify something if not true?

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alfadriver85
Lois Gibson is one of the best and well respected forensic scientists in the world. If she says it's him, I'd lay money on it. What reason does she have to lie or verify something if not true?

i don't know Lois or anything about the world of authenticating photographs.
i do know a bit about authenticating other things (e.g. works of art).
there are often financial incentives involved.

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alfadriver85
Lois Gibson is one of the best and well respected forensic scientists in the world. If she says it's him, I'd lay money on it. What reason does she have to lie or verify something if not true?

johnsons wife died in the early 30's. no way that pic is from the early 30's

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Naturalust

Here is a shot of Robert Johnson though, I don't really see the resemblence.

The image above is a painting by Sebastian Kruger. Perhaps it might be better to use the actual reference photo of Johnson for purposes of comparison:



The length of his fingers is astonishing - some have theorized that he may have had Marfan's Syndrome, which is characterized by long fingers and limbs, among other things.



^^^ what a difference contrast makes!



I have no strong opinion as to whether or not the man in the color pic is Robert Johnson. He does appear to have rather long fingers, though, whoever he is.

*edited to add more pics



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2015-12-19 12:20 by Plink.

Thanks Plink. I'm still not buying it though, but I am certainly not an expert on such things. There is facial recognition software out there these days that compares hundreds of critical dimensions in order to analyze and recognize key features that make a persons face unique. I would probably trust one of these programs over the work of a forensic expert who may or may not have a financial incentive to make a positive ID.

I just look at something simple like the width of the nose compared to the width of the eye and it comes up different. In any case it's a cool photograph.

All from Wikipedia:

"While living in Martinsville, Johnson fathered a child with Vergie Mae Smith. He also married Caletta Craft in May 1931.
In 1932, the couple moved to Clarksdale, Mississippi, in the Delta. Here Caletta died of childbirth
and Johnson left for a career as a "walking" or itinerant musician.

"From 1932 until his death in 1938, Johnson moved frequently between large cities ...
He did not marry again but formed some long term relationships with women to whom he would return periodically.
One was Estella Coleman, the mother of the blues musician Robert Lockwood, Jr."

"By age 15, Lockwood [born in 1915] was playing professionally at parties in the Helena area.
He often played with his quasi-stepfather figure Robert Johnson ..."


And a follow-up article about the forensics that led Lois Gibson to authenticate
that other supposed Johnson photo in 2008: [www.vanityfair.com]



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2015-12-19 11:37 by with sssoul.

Hey Honestman, good to see you posting! But now you've got me confused, it just might be him! I'm changing my opinion to 50/50.

Look at that line in the hair... I think it's him.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2015-12-20 01:29 by MonkeyMan2000.

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MonkeyMan2000
Look at that line in the hair... I think it's him.

lol he has a hat on in the pic

The only way to recognize someone is by the ears......so no comparison on the pictures .........

__________________________

so who owns the cool shades on da table ....??????



ROCKMAN

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keefriffhard4life

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MonkeyMan2000
Look at that line in the hair... I think it's him.

lol he has a hat on in the pic

LOL!! I think it's the last time you see me here on IORR... this is really embarrassing! I just saw the photoshopped picture on my mobile screen... I think I shouldn't post in the middle of the night.

this is really embarrassing! I just saw the photoshopped picture on my mobile screen


mmmmm yeah and the drink glass to his face so ya can't see him properly



ROCKMAN

When a person sips a drink it can make parts of the face - including the nose - look gaunter. So one might expect Johnson's face to appear a bit thinner in the table photo. Not saying it's him, but that's a factor the expert probably considered.

It's been picked up the by press, also seen it in several Facebook posts. A little surprised that it's gotten this much notice.

And there was the alleged 5secs of footage ....







ROCKMAN

Cool stuff Rockman.

_____________________________________________________________
Rip this joint, gonna save your soul, round and round and round we go......

I reckon it is him. Who else would be most likely sitting next to his wife



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2015-12-20 06:25 by terraplane.

Who else would be most likely sitting next to his wife

Stagger Lee ?????



ROCKMAN

[peering hard] What is the dark splotch behind his head/neck in the "new" sepia shot? devil dust?
And why is he wearing a dark hat with a light suit? In the shot that was supposed to be him and Johnny Shines
he was wearing a light hat with a dark suit. Coincidence? You decide! :E

Ahem, I mean: I don't feel qualified to have an opinion on this. It's either too bad or very convenient
that the position he's in and the hat conceal so much that could seal the deal.

earlobes people...earelobes.

They don't match...can't be him

i buy that mudbone. the earlobes are totally different. good eye!

"There are many problems with the photo that debunk it as being Johnson, and the others. First, the lower half of the alleged Johnson figure’s face is obscured by his hand and the glass he’s holding making his entire face unidentifiable. There’s no way of knowing whether he had a cleft chin, buck teeth or a beard. The woman identified as Craft looks nothing like the only known photo of her. And Craft died in 1932, meaning that the photo had to be taken [sometime before her death]. That would make “Johnson” 20 and “Lockwood” 16 [years old], while the two men in the photo appear older than that. Johnson didn’t even meet Coleman and Lockwood until sometime after 1932.

Further, the quartet is sitting around a table and chairs of bent-chrome design that didn’t become commonly popular until after WWII. The women’s clothing and strapped shoes are not 1931 vintage, nor are their eyeglasses or hairstyles, and even the Coca Cola bottle on the table is of a size that wasn’t used until 1950. Finally, the photo appears to be a faded color print, not a black and white photo, and color film was not available in 1931. Kodak didn’t start producing color film for cameras until 1936. There is simply no way this photo could be from 1931 or even 1932, and it clearly is not of the people Gibson claims it to be.

In our attempts to [be] thorough, however, we even had the photo examined by Professor Mark Nixon of the University of Southampton, U.K., a world-famous expert in computer face recognition and medical image analysis who said that there was “no match” between the individual Gibson claimed was Lockwood and photos of the real Lockwood.

[Excerpt omitted for brevity]

The business of Robert Johnson is always looking for new photos, Johnson’s guitar, or making claims such as his recordings are at the wrong speed. Hopefully the definitive biography of Johnson that Gayle Dean Wardlow and I are completing will put an end to much speculation and conjecture."

Bruce Conforth, Ph.D., is a faculty member at the University of Michigan specializing in 20th century American cultural history. He serves on the executive board of the Robert Johnson Blues Foundation and is the director of the Blues Heritage Foundation.

[www.forensicmag.com]

The eyebrows, the eyes, the nose, the look and the long fingers match nicely.

He got THAT stare as well. I'd say it looks very much like him.

The age of Lockwood looks just about right as well...

I believe the young man on the right is indeed Robert Lockwood Junior and I agree w/ DP that he could plausibly be an older teen in the photo (which would jive w/ the purported date of 1931). Check out these images of an elderly Lockwood Jr w/ the young man in the pic):




I have no idea if the man on the left is Johnson, but I'd bet my unique earlobes that the guy on the right is Robert Lockwood Jr

Thanks christiano. The case seems pretty solid that the photo is not what it is claimed to be