Think you can hide in that building? Think again, micro drones will find you!

originally posted by: funkadeliaaaa
a reply to: Bedlam

Praytell

They® have been working on a system to see inside of buildings from a vehicle at the street level. For quite some time. The initial bidfest was called Visibuilding. It's sort of like the through-wall scanner SF use to spot how many people are in a room before they knock the door in, writ large.

The last I had to do with it, they were using UWB radar and a metric crapload of processing power to pick out all the relevant data from the mish-mash you get back.

It's fallen off the unclassified radar, since it passed phase 2. Or at least it doesn't seem to have a lot published anymore.

Cant say much as don't want to land a friend in trouble but I can say the UK has been in on this project or at least a very similar one. It been on the military wish list for a while.

originally posted by: cheesy
they use this drone to locate otobots..cool

You mean Autobots?



Not a robot belonging to Otto

originally posted by: grey580
for about 150 on amazon you can get a Hubsan X4.

the quadcopter is tiny. it comes with a camera which sends video to the controller.

Check out the video.

$150? Seriously?

The Pentagon contractors would rather say they developed something, pour lots of taxpayer money into it, then charge $10K or more per unit.

I assume the drones use RF to communicate with their controllers.
If you were inclined - how expensive would it be to build a DIY multi-band RF Jammer with a broadcast area extending to the perimeter of your "safehouse"?
Probably under a thousand in parts for something with lots of noise.

I like the looking through walls approach more but again I wonder exactly how many layers of tin foil and chicken wire it would take to defeat it ....5 or 6 ??

a reply to: Bedlam

You know I was talking to a SF guy a few years a go and he mentioned being able to see right through/into buildings using microwaves. Even said that they used vans. Then the conversation moved onto to cell phone jammers and he says he knew a few guys that would drive around town testing them for fun and if your cell suddenly gets zero bars and drops a call take a look around and see if there isn't a guy in a van smiling at you.

I believe they have this tech down pat by now or are real close. Probably even have them on sats and recon aircraft. why take photographs when you can take 3d footage of everything that's going on in that building, base, or bunker. I can imagine a few things they could throw into the mix with this sort of tech that would really make it powerful. It's only a matter of time when instead of intel guys pouring over pictures of a location in question they will instead get to pour over 3d holographic video footage of everything thats going on on the ground/surface while at the same time perusing 3d holographic microwave video footage that shows everything thats going on inside of said location too. people in 3d walking down hallways, machinery in 3d. interior layouts of bunkers in 3d, where everything is stowed at - floor by floor. like a giant x-ray video, but with enough computer power to calculate the various depths of things from the return or scattering effects on the microwaves and render out a 3d image. Like a real life video game or starwars holomap. Think you can hide in that bunker ehhh?

a reply to: Britguy

www.amazon.com...

yep.

However I can only assume that the one being built for the military is better engineered, quieter and has a better battery life. that hubsan is loud and would give you away.

a reply to: BASSPLYR

I have no doubt that that is close to or already reality at some level. Where tech like these mini drones will be beneficial is at the squad or individual soldier level, where they won't have immediate access to real time surveillance on that scale.
The boys sitting in their offices at Langley can see what's going on but that info doesn't always get to the boots on the ground.
Plus an advantage this system has over a microwave scanner is in size and portability. This system in its current form only weighs probably a pound or two at the most and can fit in your pocket. Microwave scanners sound like they need a vehicle sized platform and a ton of computing power to operate, not super useful to the dude on foot in the back alley wanting to know if there are enemy combatants behind that door, in that shack or around that bush.

a reply to: grey580

Yeah, the Hubsan last about 6 minutes in the air and has a 100 meter range. The Black Hornet has 1000+ meter range, can stay in the air about 30 minutes and can reach speeds of 12 mph.
From the videos I've seen the optics look much sharper too.

a reply to: Sammamishman

surpisingly enough most of the drones i see for sale have a 720p camera on them.

if you can get the drone stable enough it will send back a decent video feed. what kills the quality is the lack of stabilization of the video.

I'm sure that the one in the article has all the cool trick in em to make the video high quality.

Once we found the baddies with the micro helo's, we can send in the fighter support:

a reply to: Sammamishman

I think one day we'll be here.



A tiny assassin to take out the bad guys