Re:US Navy underwater laser development "changes everything"
by windsurfer on Sunday September 13, 2009 @04:02PM
(#820495)
I remember reading about the importance of sub-millisecond shutters in underwater photography. Apparently, if you time the flash and shutter just right, you can get the light bouncing back from the target into the camera, but block all the light from in front of and behind the target, as well as ambient water particles . This apparently increases your visible distance underwater by twofold.
[ Parent
| on HN ]
Re:US Navy underwater laser development "changes everything"
by giardini on Sunday September 13, 2009 @04:22PM
(#820520)
Note that here the laser is used to generate an _acoustic_ pulse, so the light is not used as a carrier, sound is.
Research in using lasers underwater for 40 years with the same result: little use other than for very short distances. Water absorbs the energy too much for lasers to be of use at long distances. And high power emissions only make you look like a searchlight, hardly something you want to do if you're in a submarine.
I cannot see that this "changes everything".