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Optical Camouflage

Posted by timothy on from the see-thru dept.

Mike Siekkinen writes "This optical camouflage project is pretty interesting. It contains three videos demonstrating it in action. Basically they overlay a video projection of what the background behind the object to be camouflaged looks like. So if you were standing in front of a book shelf an image of the portion of the bookshelf you are blocking would be projected on to you. The results are probably better than you would expect."

4 of 55 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Still can't figure out how it works... by Orne · · Score: 3, Interesting

    When you watch football, and you see the yellow line drawn on the screen, do you wonder why it looks like it goes under their feet and not through their bodies? Think of it the same way the local weatherman stands in front of the map... real-time color analysis/replacement.

    1. Take a picture of the background.
    2. Put an object in front of the camera, painted with an obviously different color than the objects in the background.
    3. Profit... no wait, I mean... using a computer, replace all the pixels of that special color with the pixels of the background image, and you have modern television overlays.
    4. But this only works through a video feed; to move into real-space, you need a video projector. Take the image with the special color, and use it as a mask... the image will only shine where the special color exists, and not shine where it doesn't. That's how they get the projector to not shine on the hands.
    5. Note that their special color is silver; like a white screen, a sufficiently light color such that color projected on it will appear. Viola!

  2. That's because ITS FROM GHOST IN THE SHELL by Romothecus · · Score: 2, Interesting
    Look at the page again. Scroll to the bottom:

    Publications

    M. Shiro, Ghost in the Shell, Kodansya, 1991

    M. Inami, N. Kawakami, D. Sekiguchi, Y. Yanagida, T. Maeda and S. Tachi, Visuo-Haptic Display Using Head-Mounted Projector, Proceedings of IEEE Virtual Reality 2000, pp.233-240, 2000(vr2000.pdf(350k))

    M. Inami, N. Kawakami, Y. Yanagida, T. Maeda and S. Tachi, Method and Device for Providing Information, US PAT. 6,341,869 , 2002

    I'm not sure if that means that Ghost In the Shell was the inspiration or an actual source or what... but clearly the connection is not accidental.

    gg, try to look at the whole page next time.

  3. "The results are probably better than you would.." by Superfreaker · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I expect it to work as well as it did in James Bond.

    Instead of using projectors though, Q explained that the car was made up of a material that acted like a screen. I guess like a plasma screen, or even that new electronic paper, it may not be that far off.

    It would be much better than a projector...hmmm...

  4. I love the references they made by mselmeci · · Score: 3, Interesting
    * M. Shiro, Ghost in the Shell, Kodansya, 1991
    I love it how they credited manga for the idea.