digital " pixels " aircraft camo

a pretty neat idea , being employed on USMC aircaft



and a close up :



both pictures are from a series posted to the alt.binaries.pictures.aviation , usenet NG and are copyright jim john [ thats not me , btw ] .

its an interesting [ imho ] hi tech development of the dazzle cammo of WWII era , and wonder if it might be particularly usefull against opto - electrical targeting systems and sensors ??

just a thought -- that it could be intended to screw with auto focus and shape recogintion software by spoofing it into believing that the aircaft is actually a digital artefact .

Could you pissible add somekind of RAM (radar absorbing material) on this?

I don't see why something like this would affect how you could apply RAM, Fighter Master. I'm not sure if these sorts of aircraft have RAM on them anyway. I've always presumed no, but they might.

It is an intresting scheme; although I find this one to capture my intrest just a bit more!

Not trying to put a dampner on the pictures, but is there any chance they're photoshopped? Not having a go at you ignorant, they are interesting pictures. My thoughts:

1. They do bugger all for visual ID in the air. You'll be beak to beak going to the merge, and the outline shape is more important that the skin picture.

2. It won't do anything for IR ID.

3. It won't do anything for ELINT and NCTR ID.

4. For a ground guy, seeing as most weapon releases will occur well above 20k, it won't do anything for them either.

5. For EO sensors, you'll see a nice plane with pretty block shapes on them.

I simply don't see the combat utility for this type of camouflage. With other visual camouflage technics which would be infinitely better than this, I just don't see any point to this at all. Once again, I'm not having a go at the ape man, I'm simply offering my perspective on the combat utility of such a scheme. Zilch. Hence my question on photoshop.



[edit on 24-9-2006 by Willard856]

Originally posted by watch_the_rocks
It is an intresting scheme; although I find this one to capture my intrest just a bit more!

I still don't get that chopper.

Just look closely, Mr. Fin. Look very closely.


And as for the points Willard856, I agree. I was going to say all that, but I'm usually wrong when it comes to modern aircraft . . . even if they are 40 years old.

Originally posted by watch_the_rocks

Just look closely, Mr. Fin. Look very closely.


And as for the points Willard856, I agree. I was going to say all that, but I'm usually wrong when it comes to modern aircraft . . . even if they are 40 years old.

All I see is a chopper and a tail? what should I be looking at?

[edit on 24-9-2006 by Figher Master FIN]

Originally posted by Figher Master FIN
All I see is a chopper and a tail? what should I be looking at?

look at the dark shape in the middle, under and just behind the rotors and just in front of the marines sign.

justin

[edit on 24-9-2006 by justin_barton3]

Bloody hell justin barton3!!! That's half the point, finding it!!!

It took me a few minutes at first, but for that time I was pulling my hair out. What were these other members snide comments aimed at

Actually, I just remembered that the Army and possibly the Marines brought in a pixilated pattern on their camos. Picture, and Image.

Particualrly above 20K, Brightness and Brightness In Motion (as specular differentiaion against a given backdrop) count more than any other single element of visual and electro optic combat acquisition.

And most jets in fact lose the race by trying to vary their intraoutline shapes to the point where they look DARK. Like an aeroplane shaped hole in the sky.

Paint a jet to match ONE saturate level condition and make it glossy or mirror-finished enough to 'glow' with the ambient light it picks up in certain shadow zones and complex curveatures and it will be nearly invisible at that particular combination of altitude, TOD and viewing angle (no maneuvering allowed).

Even if the actual color used is say Flamingo Pink against a blue-blue background.

Again, anything which seeks to split contrast values away from that unified 'total shine' of presentation value simply makes the jet look dingy and _dark_.

The best optical LO options we have at present are the teflon schemes you see on some of the V-22 and F-22 airframes and the 'paintable/tileable' (the rumors vary) electroluminescent systems that have been tested on everything from the A-10 to UAVs and supposedly at least one B-2.

Particularly as regards the latter two, the fewer vertical:horizontal elevation meeting points and slope changes or open silouhette breaks which functionally silouhette the jet against the blue-black above or the cloud-white below, the better.

i.e. As usual, monobody shapes without a mutant under glass, big nose, gaping inlets or indeed 'maneuvering' mission requirement at all are your best options for gaining valid optical Harveyness because they present tiny frontal elevations (all of which can be back-illuminated if need be). And are a veritable billboard of uniform contrast value when seen from below or above.

Oh yeah, SIZE DOES COUNT when it comes to visual observables. More than anything.


KPl.

Here is another picture I found of the F18 in flight:

www.airliners.net...Text Navy

Here is another picture I found of the F18 in flight:

www.airliners.net...Text Navy

Originally posted by justin_barton3

Originally posted by Figher Master FIN
All I see is a chopper and a tail? what should I be looking at?

look at the dark shape in the middle, under and just behind the rotors and just in front of the marines sign.

justin

[edit on 24-9-2006 by justin_barton3]

Now I got it.

Here is a link of the F/A-18C in flight, looks real to me....

Originally posted by watch_the_rocks
Bloody hell justin barton3!!! That's half the point, finding it!!!

aye half the fun is finding it but if after a few weeks and you still havent found it it does get more annoying than funny. now look at fighter master fin, happy as larry.

justin

www.uniteddynamics.com...


Goodness me what goes around comes around!

The above is from a 1971 test of digital camouflage...1971.. thats a lot of years back, and yet its presented as the 'new' in thing...rofl.

Nice F-18 pictures by the way, thanks.

www.hyperstealth.com...

Now heres some really sweet photoshop jobs of digital camouflage...I love the F-35 one!!

awesome stuff.

[edit on 24-9-2006 by D4rk Kn1ght]

Dark Knight,

>>
Goodness me what goes around comes around!

The above is from a 1971 test of digital camouflage...1971.. thats a lot of years back, and yet its presented as the 'new' in thing...rofl.
>>

And (as intended) it looks like it would 'work really well', if it were about 100ft closer to those trees. Except then it would need to be painted zinc chromate yellow to match the grass. So maybe it should be about 50ft higher. Except that then, any grunt (which is the only threat ever likely to see this aircraft that close) would be viewing the Kiowa backlit against a deep-azure sky or a bright-white horizon.

>>
Now heres some really sweet photoshop jobs of digital camouflage...I love the F-35 one!!
>>

Not representative because there is no equivalent light sourcing or specular reflectance variables between the original photos and those which show the supposedly 'enhanced' camouflage. ALL of the schemes shown in fact being _dead flat_ (2 dimensional) which means that not only are you playing the 'any background color you choose to match too' game. But also the 'zero glint here' real space consequence of light reflecting off complex curves.

>>
Awesome stuff.
>>

Blather. The only shot on the entire page which comes close to giving a true indication of the problems involved in optical camouflage for aircraft is ironically another helicopter. Shot against a brilliant blue and stark white cloudy sky backdrop, the whole 'thunder and lightning' nonsense comes off as being a black airframe shaped hole-

www.hyperstealth.com...

Compared to the original monotone grey baseline-

www.hyperstealth.com...

Which is obviously too uniformly reflectant for the up-close perspective but which, a mile or two distant, would fade into the averaged brightness of the total sky (air 'glows' with saturated refractance index, masking direct return by mixing it into the overall spectra and temperature of the background. Past a certain intensity level and distance, you can successfully hide an elephant behind a teacup).

That said, camouflage has two principle uses:

1. To delay initial acquisition.
2. To disrupt outlines and intratarget features leading to false presumptions of ID, motion and angle after acquisition.

BOTH the (USMC F-18 and Hyperstealth) digital patterns are questionably effective at either mode because they show the viewer a perspective and viewing distance he can relate to as a civillian on the premise of 'look how clever we are' in proving a fixed environmental casepoint.

Rather than adopting a tactically appropriate condition wherein the target is a dot on the horizon such that individual 'pixelations' are almost certainly merged-invisible anyway and the commonest optical tracking mode is zoom-TV or IR for which every intra-target change in total isoluminency in fact averages darker in increasing the overall symmetrical contrasts of the airplane-shaped-hole-in-sky effect instead of 'breaking up the shape'.

If we could envision air to air combat from the same detached viewpoint of say targeting pod imagery during a standoff munition attack against an _airfield_ we could barely see out the canopy; we might be able to understand the distances and silouhette sizes involved.

Thus rejecting this kind of 'cleverness' for the fashion statement it is.

Digital camouflage might have worked in the days of the 250ft turning circle of biplanes. They might have worked in the 1,000ft turning circle of WWII. Against a jet whose turn circle is measured in MILES covered at _hundreds of feet per second_, there is nothing that a human can do to maintain sight on a target that doesn't want to be seen. And nothing an (airplane sized) target can do to avoid being tracked by electro optical gear that is determined to track him during WVR combat.

The only thing you can do is keep yourself at long range and match the general intensity of the background (radiometric MMW can do this as a function of 'temperature' in real time) so as to provide minimum signature variance with the given isoluminent colors.

Anyone who says otherwise is throwing away a 35-80 million dollar airframe and should have his keys if not his budget taken away from him.


KPl.