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Synthetic Vision
oniony writes "Ars Technica has a link to a story on new goggles being developed for/by the military. The new device uses satellite imaging and land profiling to build a 3D representation of the world in a soldier's goggles in real-time. This would enable troops to see through sand storms and oil smoke of the kind currently hampering operations in the Gulf. I imagine one could also remove mountains to allow remote viewing of approaching territory."
This seems a bit ambitious. From what I understand the holdup in flying in the sandstorms is the fear of hitting electrical lines. Is this tech gonna provide a level of resolution that can show a powerline? No way.
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tcd004
"Can't you see that everyone is buying station wagons?"
Do these satellites actually detect small changes such as people and tanks?
Otherwise, why not just use a map and a laptop?
Wasn't there an article just yesterday about how cheaters were using technology to be able to see through walls? Now they can say it's OK since the military does it in real life.
I don't want that kind of realism in Counterstrike. Now all of the l4m3r5 will consider it justified since real soldiers now have wireframe mountains and buildings.
Examples:
Driving through a snow storm at night in the middle of nowhere? Overlay location info, along with roadside markings in the goggles so you KNOW where the road is and not drive into a ditch.
Driving from New York to SF for the first time? Can't read a map? Have the goggles map it all out for you connections to GPS for real time roadside updates.
Part of this technology can be used in conjunction with speech-to-text software/hardware to overlay real-time closed captioning so that I know what the damn radio DJ's are saying on my morning commute. At least Satellite radio provides the song info.
These are just some of the possibilities that I can think off the top of my head.
-Cyc
/.'s 10 Millionth
would you rather have a technology with a 12% failure rate than be helpless without it?
I also don't see much of the devlopment phase for this. Aren't real time Satellite images already availible? Isn't an iPaq strong enough to decode/decipher/function for this purpose? And aren't the Olympus EyeTrek Glassessmall enough for such a purpose?
Yell & scream & rant & rave... it's no use... you need a shaaaave ~ Bugs Bunny
already done
r ica/GMA010807Xray_cameras_hunter.html
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/GMA/GoodMorningAme
Also.. this technology seems very far away since the FAA won't allow planes with synthetic vision to get into worse weather than they currently can... FAA are movers and shakers... when they move on the product then you will see some action.
- what is the definition of simultanagnosia?! I've been meaning to look it up!
Dosn't sand shift ?
How realtime would these images be ? Personally Flying low altitude through a world that's 5 hrs old would make me nervous.
I think it gets its data directly from live feeds on satalites, not old pictures, the reason why you see old pictures when you go to the sattelite pictures that can be found online is because that is released technology, at this point we have halos of real time down looking satelites in space. My only problem with this, is that there is bound to be some lag, which in current VR systems, is known to cause sudden, horrible vomiting, because the feelings of Gs your feeling are not changing at the same pace your vision is getting new data.
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Actually, power lines are extremely simple to identify in a satellite image by looking for power poles.
The trouble with goggles, or anything that fills a large angle of view (e.g. IMAX) is that they're compelling and immersive in a way that smaller displays can't really match. Which is great for entertainment, but potentially very dangerous in situations where the augmented stuff is not 100% trustworthy and ought to be treated with some degree of healthy scepticism. Maybe the AR overlays could be drawn in luminous flamingo pink or something, just to make damn sure you didn't forget what was what.
I remember a driver in Germany a couple of years back who drove though a couple of barriers, past several yelling workmen and into a river. All because his in-car GPS navigation was telling him that there was a completed bridge there. And that was a just a teeny little display.
(Side note: "removing" mountains sounds like a truly horrible idea. I have vivid memories of playing the excellent flight sim EF2000 - this was back in the days of software rendering when depth-buffering was still something to be avoided. So the engine just drew the terrain first, and buildings afterward, because, hey, buildings are on top of terrain, right? Unfortunately this didn't cope with occlusion, and I lost count of the number of times I crashed into a bleedin' great hill while on a bee-line for an airfield that was clearly visible right in front of me...)
The Abrams tanks will auto aim your gun you just have to identify the target. The Phalanx is much more autonomous in tracking and killing incoming missiles.
Neutrons are slippery little rascals, they can fool you. They can bounce and show up around corners you don't expect.
It's called Battlezone!
e rs/Atari/battlezone.html
Atari where so ahead of the game with wire frame rendering of objects in the battle arena so that you could see the enemy approaching.
Wow! Smart stuff.
http://www.gamearchive.com/Video_Games/Manufactur
That was my first thought too, but according to the article, they rely on both pre-recorded data and live data:
These shuttle maps could then be checked against public satellite images; double-checked against data in the Global Positioning System or Internal Navigation System; and triple-checked by radar, infrared or millimeter wave sensors.
But then again, it might bring good old barrage balloons back into fashion.
--
"I'm surfin the dead zone
In the twilight, unknown"