How Does Night Vision Work?
Techquickie
·Techquickie
·2017-05-06
·
875 words · ~4 min read
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there aren't actually too many more things more difficult than trying to see
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your surroundings in a pitch black room and while you can always feel your way
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around and hope that you don't trip head first into the toilet there are times
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that actually being able to see in the dark is a must fortunately night vision
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isn't just a thing in your favorite first-person shooter it's present in
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everything from surveillance cameras to military periscopes to ordinary
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smartphones in fact part of the reason night vision has so many applications is
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because it's not just one specific piece of technology rather it comes in several
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different forms that can be deployed depending on use case but what many
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people think of when they hear the words night vision is something called image
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intensification or image enhancement
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this is that stereotypical green form of
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night vision that you might associate with the military or what you see in
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action movies speaking of which that green color is used on purpose because
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your eyes are more sensitive to Green than other colors image enhancement
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works by being able to detect low levels of light and then amplify it when
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photons the tiny particles that make up light enter an image enhancer they first
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hit a special layer called a photocathode which releases electrons
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these electrons then hit a second layer called a microchannel plate which mult
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mullies the electrons before they hit the phosphor screen why are these things
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all so epic that then converts them back into light because there are now so many
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more electrons you get a Brighter Image so you'll have an easier time getting
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into someone's base and killing all their dudes but hold on a second what if
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there isn't enough light for thermal enhancers to see at all this is where
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thermal imaging comes in instead of detecting light thermal cameras detect
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heat coming off of different objects since they can see infrared light you
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see heat causes things to emit photons in the infrared or IR spectrum and
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although humans can't see infrared light these special cameras take advantage of
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it in a number of different ways IR cameras produce images called
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thermograms which sometimes look rainbow colored where the different colors
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represent different temperatures thermograms are useful for everything
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seemingly from medicine to construction but they're very specific specifically
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handy for night vision since it's really easy to pick out different objects such
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as people or animals due to their different colors standing out on the
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screen thermal cameras often can't achieve the same level of detail as
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their image enhancing counterparts but they have a big advantage of being able
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to pick out things that might be hard to see with a normal image enhancer for
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example a firefighter trying to locate people that need to be rescued in a
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burning building a hunter picking out prey deep in the woods hiding behind
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foliage or cops trying to locate that hiding fugitive and speaking of thermal
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imaging some cameras can even create their own infrared light in a process
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called active illumination where they actually light up their surroundings
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with ir radiation because this additional infrared energy reflects off
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of whatever the camera is pointed at this strategy can result in much higher
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resolution images great for things like surveillance camera where you really
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want to get a positive ID on that per that tried to steal your slushy
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machine what a downer audible.com is the
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leading provider of audiobooks with more than 180,000 downloadable titles across all
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types of literature including fiction non-fiction and periodicals audiobooks
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are great to listen to when you're doing whatever programming playing games going
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to school working out doesn't matter basically anywhere you have your
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smartphone for our audience members audible is offering a free 30-day trial
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just go to audible.com techquickie and browse the over as I've already said 18
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180,000 audio programs there might be some audio book about stealing a
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portable slushie machine but I've been listening to Game of Thrones it's
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absolutely fantastic no spoilers the current movies are or the current show
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is kind of running right now so there's a lot of spoilers online too so just a heads up to avoid those but yeah if
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you're like old enough I I i' listen to I'd listen to Game of Thrones Audi book
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speaking of things I'd do like the video
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or you know dislike the video if you want to like be the other side in a Game
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of Thrones War you know uh that analogy
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sucked going to roll with it don't forget to go to Channel Super Fun they're pretty cool don't forget to
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leave a suggestion down below if you're like wow you should probably have better
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analogies and Segways that would also be fine or you could be like here's an idea
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for another video that would be even more fine and yeah if you want to see
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more just come back that's cool