TS don't be a retard..., there's such a thing being R&D...,
active optical camouflage. From The Observer.
Japanese boffins spawn almost invisible man.
They are the ultimate form of camouflage. Put one on, and you
disappear from view. One saved Harry Potter from many tight
scrapes, and in the film Die Another Day the technology provided
James Bond with the ultimate escape vehicle, an invisible
car.
But now Japanese scientists have turned fantasy into reality by
creating an invisibility cloak that makes it possible to see
straight through its wearer. He, or she, simply vanishes from
view.
The garment - demonstrated last week at Nextfest, an exhibition of
emerging technologies in San Francisco - is the work of Japanese
inventor Susumu Tachi, a professor of computer science and physics
at the University of Tokyo. 'It's a kind of augmented reality,' he
said of his device.
In reality, the 'optical camouflage' cloak is anything but
invisible. It is made up of 'retro-reflective material' coated with
tiny light-reflective beads that cover its entire length. The cloak
is also fitted with cameras that project what is at the back of the
wearer on to the front, and vice versa. The effect, as the Japanese
team demonstrated last week, is to make the wearer blend with his
background.
The material was used to coat a ball, a brick and a cloak. In each
case, it appeared as if the viewer could see through each item as
it was moved about by a human operator to the back of the
room.
The effect was not total, but it was sufficient to demonstrate that
optical camouflage is technically possible, though one expert -
writing in Wired magazine recently - pointed out that, for an
invisibility cloak to work, it would have to have six stereoscopic
cameras built into it, be covered with 11.6 million 'hyperpixels',
each consisting of a very bright electronic display, and be
controlled by a super-fast computer that would run on a power
source that could be built into the cloak.
In short, a little more work will be needed before invisibility
technology becomes reality, and certainly has some way to go before
it reaches the effectiveness of Harry Potter's invisibility cloak.
This originally belonged to his wizard father, James, and is used
in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban to let Harry move
around the wizard village of Hogsmeade unnoticed.
The device is attracting serious attention from military experts
keen to exploit a technology that could help troops move into
action without being spotted.
Nor does the potential end there, says Tachi's colleague, Naoki
Kawakami. 'It could be used to help pilots see through the floor of
the cockpit at a runway below, or for drivers trying to see through
a fender to park a car.'
And, of course, there is also the prospect for mischievous, or even
dangerous, misuse, from sneaking Celtic fans into the Glasgow
Rangers end at Ibrox to wandering into changing rooms unseen. As
one expert said: 'This technology has an awful lot of
potential.'
