The entire story is a bit long to repost in entirety here, so this is the link:
-->Invisible Inc<--
Modern camouflage began in 1915, when, after a crushing defeat by the Germans, the French army abandoned their stylish white gloves and red pantaloons and enlisted a cadre of artists to develop stealthier attire. The U.S. followed suit in 1917. In addition to hand-painted uniforms, these camoufleurs created false bridges, decoy tanks, and, as seen above, paper-mache horse carcasses that snipers used as blinds.
Norman Wilkinson, the famed British marine artist, is credited with the creation of dazzle painting, in which ships were covered with bold stripes and splotches. Instead of blending ships into the horizon, such painters rendered the vessels highly visible to adversaries, but made their size, direction, and armaments maddeningly inscrutable. The tactic was used by all major allied forces in World War I.
During World War I, the German Air Force concealed its planes with blotches of color on the wings and irregular polygons along the fuselages. Often these attempts at camouflage clashed with the bold, individualistic hues and insignias favored by ace pilots.
Named for the Gaelic lads who accompanied deer hunts in the Scottish Highlands, the Ghillie suit is a camouflage garment covered in heavy foliage. Temperatures in these portable hunting blinds can reach 120 degrees Fahrenheit in moderate climates. Above are Ghillie-suited snipers of the 2nd Foreign Infantry Regiment (France) in Afghanistan in 2005.
Used by the French in Indochina and the British in Burma, the lizard and tiger stripe patterns use strong, overlapping horizontals of green and brown to break up the vertical human form. In the image above, Cubans and Russians wearing a lizard pattern march in Angola.
Developed in 1981, the US Woodland pattern enlarged the splotches of its predecessor, the ESRD, and thus avoids blurring into one color when seen from a distance (the colored splotches of camouflage are meant to blend into the background, not into each other). The enlargement of the design represented a shift in military tactics from close-range combat in Vietnam to more distant fighting. Among the US Military, the Navy SEALs are the primary users today.
Also called chocolate chip, this tan-and-brown pattern featuring rock-like clusters of black and white was developed by the US in 1962 for the Arab-Israeli conflicts, but used only sparingly until the Gulf War. Here its seen on George H.W. Bush and Brigadier General Thomas Mikolajcik.
In the late 90s, the Canadian military adopted a digital pattern that replaced swirls with a pixilated design. The idea was not to make the uniforms undetectable, but rather to create ambient visual noise that the roving glance of an enemy would disregard. In 2001 the US Marines adopted a similar design. Today all branches of the American military have some version of digital camouflage.
According to Guy Cramer, President/CEO of HyperStealth Biotechnology Corporation and one the world's foremost designers of camouflage, the future of camo will be chameleonic, with uniforms that can change color, shape, and brightness, depending on the surrounding environment. The fabric he's engineering to do this, which he calls SmartCamo, changes hues through electromagnetic fibers running through the garment. Because of the high costright now a single uniform runs for about $1,000the technology is more likely to be used for tanks and aircraft first. An even more dazzling innovation is his quantum stealth project, in which he plans to create a uniform that bends the entire spectrum of light around its wearer.
-->Invisible Inc<--
Modern camouflage began in 1915, when, after a crushing defeat by the Germans, the French army abandoned their stylish white gloves and red pantaloons and enlisted a cadre of artists to develop stealthier attire. The U.S. followed suit in 1917. In addition to hand-painted uniforms, these camoufleurs created false bridges, decoy tanks, and, as seen above, paper-mache horse carcasses that snipers used as blinds.
Norman Wilkinson, the famed British marine artist, is credited with the creation of dazzle painting, in which ships were covered with bold stripes and splotches. Instead of blending ships into the horizon, such painters rendered the vessels highly visible to adversaries, but made their size, direction, and armaments maddeningly inscrutable. The tactic was used by all major allied forces in World War I.
During World War I, the German Air Force concealed its planes with blotches of color on the wings and irregular polygons along the fuselages. Often these attempts at camouflage clashed with the bold, individualistic hues and insignias favored by ace pilots.
Named for the Gaelic lads who accompanied deer hunts in the Scottish Highlands, the Ghillie suit is a camouflage garment covered in heavy foliage. Temperatures in these portable hunting blinds can reach 120 degrees Fahrenheit in moderate climates. Above are Ghillie-suited snipers of the 2nd Foreign Infantry Regiment (France) in Afghanistan in 2005.
Used by the French in Indochina and the British in Burma, the lizard and tiger stripe patterns use strong, overlapping horizontals of green and brown to break up the vertical human form. In the image above, Cubans and Russians wearing a lizard pattern march in Angola.
Developed in 1981, the US Woodland pattern enlarged the splotches of its predecessor, the ESRD, and thus avoids blurring into one color when seen from a distance (the colored splotches of camouflage are meant to blend into the background, not into each other). The enlargement of the design represented a shift in military tactics from close-range combat in Vietnam to more distant fighting. Among the US Military, the Navy SEALs are the primary users today.
Also called chocolate chip, this tan-and-brown pattern featuring rock-like clusters of black and white was developed by the US in 1962 for the Arab-Israeli conflicts, but used only sparingly until the Gulf War. Here its seen on George H.W. Bush and Brigadier General Thomas Mikolajcik.
In the late 90s, the Canadian military adopted a digital pattern that replaced swirls with a pixilated design. The idea was not to make the uniforms undetectable, but rather to create ambient visual noise that the roving glance of an enemy would disregard. In 2001 the US Marines adopted a similar design. Today all branches of the American military have some version of digital camouflage.
According to Guy Cramer, President/CEO of HyperStealth Biotechnology Corporation and one the world's foremost designers of camouflage, the future of camo will be chameleonic, with uniforms that can change color, shape, and brightness, depending on the surrounding environment. The fabric he's engineering to do this, which he calls SmartCamo, changes hues through electromagnetic fibers running through the garment. Because of the high costright now a single uniform runs for about $1,000the technology is more likely to be used for tanks and aircraft first. An even more dazzling innovation is his quantum stealth project, in which he plans to create a uniform that bends the entire spectrum of light around its wearer.
