Browser BBC Autos talks about how in the “digital camouflage”, invented by an American officer in 1970-ies, the pixels placed at the service of the army.
September 3, 2015 China staged a Grand parade in honor of the 70th anniversary of victory over Japan and the end of the Second world war.
On Tiananmen square in Beijing were hundreds of combat vehicles and 12 thousand soldiers of the people’s liberation army of China, usually classified in all his Affairs, there has demonstrated its power.
Many models were presented to the world for the first time, but other than that was what surprised the Chinese used the so-called digital camouflage.
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Marching columns of the machine were covered with multicolored squares-pixels: one – shades of green and khaki, the other is an incredible blue-white-black colors.
This scheme of camouflage, resembling a schedule known computer game Minecraft, very similar to the traditional design used by the armed forces of the world since the nineteenth century, – color spots rounded “natural” forms, which are designed to help blend in with foliage and other landscape elements.
It is hard to believe that the bold variant with pixels – which is now increasingly used by the military, despite the initial skepticism – actually works: after all, in nature no such hard forms.
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Oddly enough, but the higher efficiency of the new scheme surprised even the inventor, a U.S. serviceman, who developed it 40 years ago.
“When I saw the result, all I thought was, “Holy shit,” recalls the first test of the new camouflage Lieutenant-Colonel, retired, Ph. D. Timothy O’neill.
In the late 1970s, O’neill suggested that the US army use for camouflage spots instead of large squares, imposing the assumption that this form is better suited for the camouflage of military equipment.
The logic was that with squares you can make a pattern which would have a masking effect at any distance.
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Image captionТкань, from which sewed the camouflage of US Marines
Masking over a large distance it is advisable to use large shapes, and small – small. However, because of small squares, or pixels, can form a pattern, which will contain figures of both scales.
Near will be noticeable only alternating smaller squares, similar to the color variation of leaves on the tree, and from a distance will be visible larger forms, which correspond to the branches of the trees and the patches of light and shadow.
“At that time there were computer graphics – digital image processing, recalls O’neill. I saw how to conduct the discretization is to divide the image into squares. Then I had the idea that such squares would be organized, the background of the area”.
The hardest part was to convince military officials that the squares are masking technique better than the good old blobs
At some point, O’neill, and three or four of his friends took and tested a new “digital” – or, as he calls it, “simulating visual texture” – camouflage. The whole event cost them about 100 dollars.
Testers painted armored vehicle without an engine. Armed with a five-centimeter cushion, they found that the squares are more convenient not only to model on the computer, but also to draw.
The APC staged at the Aberdeen proving ground in Maryland. Then was made a series of photographs “before” and “after”. (PHOTO LINK)
The results exceeded all expectations, but the recognition of a new kind of camouflage did not come soon.
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Image captionМногие the armies of the world have switched to digital kamulai
This was partly due to the fact that to choose the best pattern and put it on the car it was extremely time consuming task (today, in helping computers and machines with digital control).
However, it was difficult to convince military officials that the squares are masking technique better than good old blots.
“Actually it it was supposed to be implemented back in the late 70’s” – says the guy Kramer, one of the leading developers of modern camouflage, as well as the President and CEO of HyperStealth Biotechnology Corp.
“Further tests only confirmed that the pixel camo is a huge advantage. But, of course, was among the experts and other Amateurs who kept saying that the new method does not work because will not work”.
Today, however, such camouflage has been adopted by many countries. And in the future we should expect even more sophisticated means of concealment.
With this system the tank can disguise itself as a car – or even a cow
Kramer develops a variant of digital camouflage, color of which will change on the fly, like a chameleon – this technology has named SmartCamo (“smart camouflage”).
The downside of such coverage is likely to be its high cost and the fact that it will require an energy source.
But when equipped with combat cars to deal with this issue easier than with the equipment of individual soldiers.
“For cars that already have their own source of energy, whether air, water or land technique, the ability to change the coloration and pattern of camouflage may well pay off”, says Kramer.
But that’s not all: British defense contractor BAE Systems has developed for combat vehicles system thermal mask, which by means of heating pixels may completely change how technology looks in night vision devices working in the infrared range.
With this system the tank can disguise itself as a car – or even a cow.
Have something to show and Mercedes-Benz: as part of a recent advertising campaign new car of B-class fuel cell “disappeared” from the eyes of passers-by through a screen of flexible plates with thousands of LEDs, which fed the image from the camera installed on the other side.
But the coloring of the squares does not require high technology and for forty years remained the most simple and effective form of camouflage.
O’neill and Kramer continue to Refine the method, and again and again we see – or rather, not see – fighting machines, masking which is based on the same principles.
Epilogue: so why Chinese tanks blue?
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The question that was asked by many observers of the Chinese parade: why are some cars painted in bright blue color?
Known experiments in which the shades of blue were used to obstruct the perception of the silhouette technique against the sky – which makes sense on flat terrain. Another option is masking in conditions of snow and ice.
“Machines-amphibians that would give some advantages on the water, but they would be highly visible on land,” says Kramer guy from Hyperstealth Biotechnology.
If so, blue could be chosen for purely aesthetic reasons. Entertainment events, of course, only win, but to Orient in the world of deceptive camouflage is more difficult.
