Photographers who are a real double take

Instead of seeing their balding friend, his red-headed wife and two daughters, they saw someone who looked almost identical, but with the same life - including a red-headed wife, two daughters and career in photography, right down to the same family dog, a Lhasa Apso.

The man's name: Graham Cormie.

The Aberdeen photographer only discovered his doppelganger when concerned friends e-mailed him to say that a man was impersonating him on the social network site and was even using some of his photos.

However, when Mr Comrie looked at the site he discovered that the second Graham was not imitating him but was freakily similar in looks and lifestyle and had an almost identical name.

Amazed by what he saw, Graham contacted his lookalike, Graham Cormie, and things began to get stranger still.

The Grahams soon realised they were both professional photographers, and as they chatted they discovered more striking similarities - both had two daughters, were almost the same age and both owned Lhasa Apso dogs. They found out they both had red-headed wives and are set to celebrate their silver wedding anniversaries next year, in July and September.

• Graham Cormie's: how the compare

The two men met face to face for the first time this week to share a pint and figure out if they could have been separated at birth.

Graham Comrie, 45, from Aberdeen, said: "A friend had got in touch a few months ago to say that I had someone impersonating me on Facebook. My name is quite unusual and Cormie is a similar name to mine.

"But when I looked into it, it got even more interesting. It turned out we were both photographers. It was quite amusing at first. We realised we were virtually the same age, with almost the same name and were both photographers."

But when Graham saw what his namesake looked like, he was stunned.

He said: "That was the freaky part - when we saw each other's profile pictures. I did a double take. We've checked and we are definitely not related. But I wouldn't go as far as getting a blood test done.

"We keep on getting messages from each other's friends on Facebook with people mistaking us all the time. So we've had to change our pictures so people don't get us confused. We've joked that one of us would have to change our name - but neither of us is backing down."

Yesterday, Graham Cormie, 47, of Ellon, said: "It's all very confusing. I thought someone was impersonating me! We were both getting e-mails from the wrong people. I've had people e-mailing me saying 'when are you coming in to take my photo?', 'when are we doing this shoot?', and I've never heard of them before."It's so strange, we even have the same kind of dog - a Lhasa Apso. We both have red-headed wives, two daughters each, we're both photographers, live about ten miles away and our names are an anagram of each other.

"But then when I saw Graham's picture I was completely gobsmacked. We could've been separated at birth. I call him my nemesis."

Heather, wife of Graham Comrie, said: "It's quite spooky." She admitted she was shocked to find how much they looked like one another and said their life stories were pretty similar, too. She added: "It's just weird. There are too many coincidences."

After realising how much the pair have in common, the men now say they hope to become good friends.

The term doppleganger is German for "double walker" and refers to the folklore in which a double of a person is commonly used to represent evil or as a harbinger of bad luck.

The idea is explored in a new Hollywood movie, Black Swan, starring Natalie Portman as a ballet dancer who begins to lose her mind after seeing her doppleganger as well as becoming confused by a fellow ballet dancer who looks very similar.