BFC, will thermal contrast and blanking be modeled?

[John Kettler]

Obviously, thermal sights and the like are in, but I'd like to know whether, given that they are, the game will also model the phenomenology in which, at certain times of the day and under certain atmospheric conditions, thermal contrast drops so much that the target literally ceases to be visible

to thermal systems? In my Hughes days, I saw an entire truss bridge vanish this way as its temperature for a time was so close to the background that the sight could no longer see it.

Regards,

John Kettler

[John D Salt]

Originally posted by John Kettler:

Obviously, thermal sights and the like are in, but I'd like to know whether, given that they are, the game will also model the phenomenology in which, at certain times of the day and under certain atmospheric conditions, thermal contrast drops so much that the target literally ceases to be visible

to thermal systems? In my Hughes days, I saw an entire truss bridge vanish this way as its temperature for a time was so close to the background that the sight could no longer see it.

Regards,

John Kettler

Oooh, what a good question.

I have no idea what underlying model BFC use for visual target acquisition, but the Night Vision Lab's ACQUIRE model is in the public domain and easy enough to code up (although it doesn't deal with target movement, nor how spotters direct their visual attention and hold things in memory).

The good news is, if BFC use something like ACQUIRE (or for that matter any model based on the apparent contrast of the target with its background), then it can be used in much the same form for modelling acquitsition using thermal sensors -- on merely uses thermal contrast insytead of optical contrast.

The bad news, as often happens, is that getting the data to feed the model is far from easy.

All the best,

John.

[c3k]

Wait!

Does this mean that John D. Salt and John Kettler are DIFFERENT people?

Sorry for the diversion.

I agree that some sort of implementation of night vision/heat vision should be in-game. How about in house-clearing? Some nogs would be a decided advantage. Toss in some IR transparent smoke (visually opaque) and move in. Etc.

Will the U.S. see everying in night-vision green? Little cones-of-view emanating from each soldier? Seriously, how would the player know/see the benefit?

Regards,

Ken

[hellfish]

Would a simplification like during X time of day in Y weather condition, thermal LOS range is decreased? Or if burning wreck Z was in LOS, it would block thermal LOS past it?

That way you could say a sunny day at noon might not provide a thermal LOS beyond 500m, or a cloudy day with a significant sandstorm could not provide a thermal LOS beyond 1000m.

[flamingknives]

Originally posted by fytinghellfish:

Would a simplification like during X time of day in Y weather condition, thermal LOS range is decreased? Or if burning wreck Z was in LOS, it would block thermal LOS past it?

That way you could say a sunny day at noon might not provide a thermal LOS beyond 500m, or a cloudy day with a significant sandstorm could not provide a thermal LOS beyond 1000m.

That's a different issue to the one being raised.

John Kettler's point is that if you park a large tank in front of a wall that, for whatever reason, is the same temperature, you will not be able to distinguish the tank, despite it being in direct line of sight. If that same tank were to move away from the wall into an open field, it would be visible from a vastly greater distance.