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Ask Slashdot: Anti-Camera Device For Use In a Small Bus?
Paul server guy writes "I am building a limousine bus, and the owners want to prevent occupants from using cameras on board. (But they would like the cameras mounted on the bus to continue to operate; I think they would consider this optional.) They would also like to do it without having to wear any 'anti-paparazzi' clothing (because they also want to protect the other guests on board), and without destroying the cameras. (So no EMP generators, please). We've done some testing with high-power IR, but that proved ineffective. Does anyone have any ideas that they are willing to share?"
Just confiscate cameras before they get on the Girls Gone Wild bus. Rich People/First World Problems.
Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
Can anyone come up with a sensible reason to implement such a thing?
You want to have your own cameras capturing everything on board, but you want to prevent your guests from doing the same.
Best advice is to stop being a dick.
People use limousine buses for special events and parties. These are the times people most want to remember and are likely to want to take their own pictures. Preventing them from doing so (even if it were possible, which in your stated scenario seems dubious) would be a pretty dick move.
Trunk Monkey!
This article is yet another confirmation that Slashdot just gets worse and worse. I hate to troll, but come on guys, up the quality some.
-- the computer doesn't want any beer, no matter how much you think it does. NEVER, EVER feed your computer beer.
Really, what you want is a behavior control device, not a anti-camera device. Seriously, what the fuck? Why shouldn't people be allowed to take photos on the bus? What do they have to hide? If people want to take photos of each other on the bus, why shouldn't they?
I reject your fascist attempts at controlling others, as should others as well. In short fuck you and fuck beta.
The best solution that comes to mind is to create a small black hole in the center of the bus. If it is of sufficient mass it will draw in all the light gravitationally, thus preventing the cameras from capturing said light.
Better known as 318230.
To do so whilst reserving the ability of the limo owners cameras to work is unreasonable, and doesn't deserve any suggestions.
It's some rock stars who want to be able to tape the orgies for their own viewing, but don't want pictures of themselves showing up on the Internet.
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
So basically you want to treat your customers like dirt. I'm sure your business will find all the success it deserves.
I am becoming gerund, destroyer of verbs.
Limo owner wants a defense in case something illegal happens or damage occurs.
Partiers want protection from each other - that no one will publish pictures so they can party freely.
Diffuse but relatively bright UV, implemented with either UV fluorescent tubes or UV LEDs should do the trick. Fit your own cameras with UV filters. Regular cameras will work, but will be affected by a strong 'white haze'.
The bright but diffuse UV should not be harmful to eyes for shorter intervals. Be careful about that, however.
UV??? wouldn't be my first choice. If it's bright enough to haze the image in a camera, it's bright enough to be dangerous if you look into the source-- and if you're doing this without clear warming, you can expect at random some people will be looking at the source.
The problem with UV is that, in any wavelength that's not absorbed by air, you're still only getting one electron per photon on the CCD detectors. So, since the photons are so energetic, it is terribly energy inefficient as a way to overexpose a CCD. You have to pump out a lot of UV to overload a CCD, and that's dangerous.
IR is much better choice-- the photons are low energy, so you're in the opposite regime. Use a wavelength of about 1 micrometer, and you can't see it, but the CCDs can.
Other than that solution, I think you're out of luck.
Beware of nicer cameras which might be fitted with a UV filter. They are common.
Yes, that's another flaw. Most professional-level photographers keep UV filters on their cameras just as a matter of course.
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
First off, as the subject says: beware of a customer/client who comes to you with "I've come up with this great solution that I'd like you to apply to this problem." Because, for one thing, they've already taken you out of the brainstorming, refining ideas and feasibility phases -- and since they've come to you, it's out of their area of expertise, so those steps probably weren't exactly done in an expert manner. There's a good chance that you won't get such a thing to work, then you're gonna have a problem getting paid for basically proving that it was a bad idea. Because workable or not, you're still gonna have spent your time and resources on it.
Secondly, this sounds like something way outside the core business of a party-bus sort of service. Because really, a selective photography-denial device would have a considerably bigger market than just protecting the interests of the owners of a rolling disco/bar/whorehouse/whatever. Who wouldn't want what is essentially a cloaking device? That business would dwarf whatever racket they're in now.
I'd tell them no, or direct them to a security device vendor instead. But if you really want to try anyway, maybe get them to pay for a "feasibility study" or something like that. It won't cost them nearly as much as a failed project, but you won't have to turn away business that you might need.
I am not a crackpot.
Imagine if this sort of technology was within reason to implement. Police of all kinds would jump on the chance to forbid others from taking pictures and allowing their own pictures. Riot squads would love it. There would be one of these devices on the front of every cop car.
I'd be willing to bet they didn't do it right. It needs to be strobed at a high rate. But it will affect the vehicle cameras as much as others, unless they have good IR filters.
Strobed high intensity NIR is the right track. Sync the vehicle camera shutters with the strobe dead time. Use a shuttered camera so the IR doesn't leave lingering effects on the focal plane. Heck, you can even use the NIR for camera illumination and use very fast shutter speeds.
I'd be willing to bet they explored this and found that either a) the necessary intensity of the NIR was beyond safe limits, or 2) the cameras necessary to work in this scheme would be prohibitively expensive. Or both.
My solution: confiscate the passengers' cameras and enforce the no photos policy strictly.
Alternately, make them ride in the dark. Naked.
I can see the fnords!
it sounds like they want to make a bangbus style porno and invite people for the ride, so they can film it but the guests cannot.