The process of Kirlian photography is named after Seymon Davidovitch Kirlian, an amateur inventor and electrician, born on February 25 of 1898 in the city of Krasnodar, in the South of Russia, who accidentally discovered a camera that could capture the aura or bio-fields of persons or objects on film.

The initial Kirlian experiments were simple. In his first experiment Kirlian just photographed his hand, noting a strange orange glow radiating from the fingertips. His wife and comrade, Valentina Chrisanfovka, was educated in humanist studies, and together they photographed both animate and inanimate objects. Over the years, they refined their equipment and graduated from black and white to colored photography. 

In the late 1940's, the Russians began serious research into the auric field and how it pertains to the physical body. But it wasn't until the 1960's, that Kirlian photography began in the United States.

Kirlian photography uses a high voltage camera which provides a method for converting the non-electrical properties of an object into electrical properties. These converted electrical fields are then captured on film by means of high-voltage spark discharges.

There is evidence that Kirlian photographs do give indications of the health and emotional changes in living things by changes in the brightness, colour, and patterns of light. At the University of California Centre for Health Sciences, a plant's leaf showed changes when being approached by a human hand and pricked. Even when part of the leaf was cut off, the glowing portion of the amputated portion still appeared on film.

Other researchers have found that changes in the emotional conditions of humans can be detected by changes in the brightness, colour and formation patterns in the photographs. When psychic healers and the psychokinetic metal-bender Uri Geller were photographed flares of light were seen streaming from their fingertips as they performed their respective activities. 

What is Kirlian photography?

A photographic process that captures the auras or bio-fields of persons or objects within the photograph. The technique involves the photographing of subjects in the presence of a high-frequency, high-voltage, low-amperage-electrical field, which display glowing, multi-colored emanations known as auras or bio-fields.

According to the Wikipedia free online encyclopaedia, Kirlian photography is completely different from "Aura photography," in which a colourful image is produced of a person's face and upper torso using various methods of biofeedback. The images made with an Aura camera do not result from coronal discharge, the colours are projected with fibre optics. People commonly use the term "Kirlian photography" to erroneously refer to "Aura photography," and vice-versa. The terms have almost become interchangeable, even though the techniques are completely different. This leads to confusion among those who are not familiar with the two different techniques. The Kirlian technique is contact photography, in which the subject is in direct contact with the film which is placed upon a metal plate that is charged with high voltage, high frequency electricity.

In Aura Photography, no high voltage is involved as with the Kirlian technique, and no direct contact with the film is made, it uses sensors that are placed on the subjects skin. These sensors take readings that are then fed into an electronic processor which translates the information into the form of signals.

The signals are then sent to a special camera, which interprets them as colours and produces a coloured image surrounding the person.

Sometimes though the operator of the camera will intuitively tune into your aura and adjust the colours and shapes produced by the camera accordingly. So therefore the resulting image will be the operators impression of what your aura might look like and not a photograph of your aura as it is.

The science of Kirlian Photography is just one way of seeing the Aura