Military Style HUD

Ok well basically I have a junior project that needs to be done and it can be basically anything to do with electronics,Analog or Digital based etc etc.I came up with the idea of creating one of those audio/video HUDs that the marines are testing for urban combat for around the corner pray and spray.Basically it is a digital camera attached to the the front grip and is wired down along the receiver to an lcd mounted on the kevlar helmet creating a HUD that is used in helis such as the apache.But im having trouble of how to start this and go about doing it.What im trying to figure out is I have a $40 or so digital camera that I dont use and also have a digital camera (was around $400) and is now ruined beyond all repair save for the lcd and driver.Will I be able to strip apart the webcam using only the lense/driver and somehow be able to connect it to the lcd from the camera with its ic driver? If possible just tell me if this is feasible or will I need to buy a new LCD and/or camera/lense/driver.

it really doesn't seem like much of a project, considering all you would have to do is connect a small CCD camera to a small LCD TV... you could do it for like $150 and it would take you 2 minutes to plug it together.

as for connecting the parts of your camera to a CCD... almost certainly not feasible.

well that was actually only part of the project and I wanted to know if it was possible to integrate the two parts.So when you say its not feasible do you mean it doesnt make much sense to because of the lack of there being an actual project or its just impossible with using the preprogrammed drivers etc. or theyre incompatible.And if theyre incompatible which would I have to replace the lcd i have or the small camera? Sorry if I should be able to understand this or something but I dont have alot of education in the video side of electronics,but really just average digital and analog knowledge.

Have you got the schematic for the camera?
It's a shame the camera's original ccd imager is not working
that would of made life much easier to get this project up and running.


As projects posted here it's not bad,
but could use a little more flavour...
This article might be of interest if if your build budget is small
and end up having to use a B/W (monochrome) ccd camera.


A new system, devised for the Dutch military, uses a computer to impose colour on an image, replacing the fuzzy grey or green monochrome images of conventional night-vision goggles.

Night-vision cameras either amplify available light or use infrared sensors to map the heat radiation that emanates from objects.

The new gadget improves on this by "sampling" colour daytime images in the landscapes in which the system is expected to be used.

It then selects random pixels to obtain a sample of the range of colours in a typical environment -- browns for tree trunks, greens for grass, vegetation and tree canopies, blues for the sky.

The system matches these colours to equivalent monochrome shades -- for example, a light grey is matched to a shade of blue for the sky, a dark brown is matched to tree trunks.

Then, when the system is used at night to view a target scene, the mapping is reversed, so that monochrome pixels are replaced with the closest colour match
(full article in next weeks edition of New Scientist magazine)

tansis said:

Night-vision cameras either amplify available light or use infrared sensors to map the heat radiation that emanates from objects.

The new gadget improves on this by "sampling" colour daytime images in the landscapes in which the system is expected to be used.

It then selects random pixels to obtain a sample of the range of colours in a typical environment -- browns for tree trunks, greens for grass, vegetation and tree canopies, blues for the sky.

Click to expand...

I saw that one! It's pretty dumb because if you only want a copy of what everything looked like during the day, why the hell would you be out with nightvision goggles and paint over the picture with the day look? I mean, when operating as designed, it'll only obscure anything going on around you- you could be wearing a bright orange hunting vest and it'll likely paint the daytime texture of a shrub over you so you won't be seen!

What I don't get is, why not use 3 image amplifiers with 3 RGB filters and recombine it to make a true color image again? It wouldn't work under IR illumination (since this signal has no corresponding true color), but for moonlight, starlight, etc there is a broad spectrum of colors mixed together.

The light amplification goggles don't use semiconductors to do the amplification. They use a variation of the photomultiplier tube - a photomultiplier channel - fabricated into a 2D array. This sort of detector is very sensitive. They are capable of detecting single photons; thats why the image from these goggles looks really grainy. The down side to these detectors is that they don't differentiate between different colors and near-infrared - it is all the same.

The IR illumination does use semiconductors but the military doesn't like it because if the enemy has the same system it is just like carrying a flashlight.

For a display you might be better off if you could find an old camcorder viewfinder display. These displays already have the optics to focus the image in space.

I've used a commercial HUD. It was really neat - just like there was a giant image of your computer monitor hanging in space in front of you.