optical camouflage

[Marc]

Like something out of a sci-fi/anime film.

CNN story (http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/03/30/invisible.coat.ap/index.html) on Tokyo University project developing optical camouflage. Cameras pick up what is behind an object and the image is projected on the other side, making the object 'transparent'. Downloaded the clips from the website, looks pretty cool!

[arcticpenguin]

We had a thread on that a while back. (http://www.randi.org/vbulletin/showthread.php?threadid=13495&highlight=invisible) It took us a while to figure out what was going on, the description in the current article is a lot clearer.

Tachi acknowledges that the technology still requires too many parts: It can't be seen without peering through the projector lens.
Great, all you have to do is convince the bad guys to look through the special eyepiece so they can't see you.

[garys_2k]

I agree, this article is MUCH better at describing what's going on.

It now seems we have a camera behind the model taking a video of the scene blocked from our anle, a projector playing against the model, and an adapter to the projector's lens allowing us to look through that same lens to see a relatively undistorted view of the projection.

Cumbersome but interesting.

[no one in particular]

This technology seems to be pretty far along, but this National Geographic (http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/03/0311_030312_secretweapons1.html) article/show talks about a technology that sounds far more promising to me. This bio-camo technology appears to be in the conceptual stages, but it could be in its own latter "have blue"-like development stage. If we know about it…

Would you enjoy some quotes? Why not.

The butterfly's blueness does not come from pigment—the natural color of their wings is actually a dull brown—but thousands of semi-transparent scales.
and then...
The challenge for scientists like Vukusic is to create a surface able to reflect different colors of the light spectrum, a surface able to mimic its surroundings, so providing a cloak of invisibility for troops and their weapons.

[alfaniner]

Shortly after this came out the first time I did some tests on my own, and the results were much as they appear in those movies. My setup does not require looking through any special viewfinder, though, and is much simpler.

I'm trying to convince my company to take a look at it.

[Soapy Sam]

During the last Gulf War, a person I knew lost a white pick up truck in the Saudi Desert. Took two days to find. Meanwhile, pink and choc-chip (desert cammo) vehicles, were visible everywhere.
How much of camouflage in the human sense, is simply painting something to look like something else? I realise this sounds stupid- but say you were looking (Ed knows why) for a Macdonalds, but I had painted the sign outside, so it looked just like a "Burger King".....take my point? Misdirection.

[no one in particular]

Originally posted by alfaniner
I'm trying to convince my company to take a look at it.

Convince them to look at it? Don't you first have to convince them that there is somthing there?