This article comes from the WeChat public account: Love Faner (ID: ifanr) , author: Fang Jiawen, drawing from the title: the movie “The invisible man”

“Invisible Man (The Invisble Man) ” became the first explosive thriller in 2020.

Despite the impact of the epidemic, Invisible Man was only released in theaters for three weeks, but this small production, which cost only US $ 7 million, quickly gained US $ 120 million at the box office worldwide, and the freshness of rotten tomatoes reached 91%.

Based on the classic science fiction novel “Invisible Man” published by H.G Wells in 1897, this year’s adaptation of the film puts the concept of “invisible” in a more modern context.

A particularly intuitive point is that in the 2020 movie version, the way in which the male lead achieved invisibility changed from the original novel and the “drinking magic potion” in the past several adaptations into a wearing set The camera’s invisibility clothing .

Invisible clothes covered with cameras

In fact, screenwriter and director Leigh Whannell also went to Sydney University of Technology to consult with researchers for this concept:

They said, “Well, this might work.” Then they started drawing pictures for us, trying to make it look more credible. I hope that the audience will not feel that this concept is too weird or far away from daily life when watching movies.

It is true that “incognito” sometimes sounds as far away as “old” science fiction fantasies such as “human flight” and “time and space travel”, but generations of researchers have never given up trying to realize this fantasy. In real life, we can indeed find many “invisibility techniques” based on modern technology.

Modern “stealth”, many of which you can do at home

Picture from the University of Rochester

In the film, the cameras on the “invisibility cloak” are all over the body, but in reality, the most “low-profile” invisibility technique requires only two cameras, so you can now turn out the combined tools at home.

Mark ROber, a former NASA engineer is now a popular YouTuber. He thought of netizens in Halloween in 2011: put an iPad on his chest and back, and then turn on Facetime, the screen on the chest iPad will show behind him Through the images recorded on the back of the iPad, and vice versa, the effect of “piercing” the body is made at once, and part of the body is “invisible”.

Image from YouTube

The limitations of Rober ’s solution are the same as many previous attempts- You have to look at it from a certain angle before “invisibility” is established . So when we see a lot of “invisible” technology videos, we will find that the angle of the lens is usually fixed, because only at a specific angle can the effect be achieved.

Physical Professor John Howell and PhD student Joseph S. Choi of (University of Rochester) in the past few years Research is all around solving this “pain point”.

In 2014, the University of Rochester team used two sets of lenses with different focal lengths to form “ Rochester Cloak (The Rochester Cloak) “device, by twisting the light to hide the object in the middle of the lens group.

Picture from the University of Rochester

Many technologies try to be invisible, the principle is to keep light away from objects, but those technologies often use special materials that are difficult to obtain, and our devices only require ordinary optical lenses.

Responsible for the research, Howell said. In addition, they also disclosed the “recipe” for making this set of tools, which can be made at home by spending $ 100 on materials.

More importantly, with this device, if the viewer moves within a narrow range, it can still achieve a reasonable stealth effect.

“Rochester Cloak”, picture from the University of Rochester official website

Two years later, Howell and Choi upgraded the “Rochester Cloak” to a new combination based on cameras and screens, allowing a wider viewing angle.

In the demonstration, the two first used the camera to capture the original background visual material, and then made a composite image through a set of algorithms and transmitted it to the iPad.

Before they start to use, they will also superimpose a lenticular lens on the iPad screen. In this way, the iPad screen will become somewhat similarLike the 3D three-dimensional painting when I was a kid, the same picture will have different effects from different angles. It is for this reason that this “Rochester cloak” allows a visual angle change of nearly 30 °.

Upgraded version of “Rochester Cloak”, pictured from the University of Rochester official website

As a conceptual explanation, the device they made was still rough. The iPad screen resolution is not high enough, so we look vague; while it takes several minutes to shoot the background and make composite pictures.

But the research team said that in theory, these problems can be optimized with the future development of screens and cameras, as well as the improvement of computer computing power, and finally achieve the real-time generation and display of high-definition composite images, and the size of the “cloak” , Can also become larger as the screen increases. If you combine with the flexible screens that have been getting more and more attention in the past two years, and want to be an invisible cloak or even an invisible cloak, maybe it is really not that far away.

Without “stealth”, someone has already done stealth persecution

In my opinion, not only is the stealth technology in the film an update that fits our times, it also talks about the problem of uneven power caused by technology, and it makes people shudder.

In the story, the male lead continuously monitors the female lead through stealth, disrupts her life, and causes her to lose her support system (Loss of trust and help from family and friends) , and ultimately control.

Although invisibility has not yet been achieved, another technology in our lives is fueling the perpetrators and helping them achieve similar effects.

This tool is exactly those smart home products that promise to make life more convenient and enjoyable.

In the film, the heroine is very familiar with the densely packed cameras and combination locks in the male host ’s home, and was able to successfully escape from the house at the beginning.

But in reality, many home smart home products are installed by men. Naturally, the usage methods and passwords are usually controlled by men, and women do not understand or control these products.

According to Graciela Rodriguez, a domestic violence assistance organization operating in California, more and more people told her that various “crazy” things happened at home, such as the temperature of the thermostat suddenly rose to a high temperature, and the smart speakers played loudly for no reason. music.

They feel that they are losing control of their home. Only a few days after they came here to calm down, they realized they were being abused.

pictures from The Lily

Many women who have been persecuted say they cannot predict when and where the attack will come from. Even if the perpetrator is not at home, they can still use their mobile phones to control the smart devices at home to monitor and create panic.

Because their partner has control over technology, they also have control over them.

pictures from Axios

Currently, the role of US law in preventing violence from using smart homes is very limited.

Some advocates started to educate aid workers. When helping victims apply for restraining orders, they should ask the judge to ask the victim to hand over all smart device accounts in the family. Otherwise, even if the perpetrator left, they could still control the victim’s life remotely. At the same time, the relevant agencies suggested that it is essential that all members of the family understand smart devices.

In addition to direct violence against the victims, many abusers further abuse the victims by “distrusting” them, thereby cutting off their support system (this can be family, Friends or the rescue department) .

In the movie, the heroine who fled because she insisted that her dead partner persecuted her in stealth, was eventually sent to a mental hospital. Even the police pals who had originally put her on hold no longer trusted her.

In real life, some women who have been persecuted for smart home products have been sent to psychotherapy institutions to assess their mental status after reporting for help.

If you open your heart to the wrong person, say that your husband knows your every move, and that he knows everything you say in the room, you may look crazy. It may be easier to believe that the person who said this is crazy than to believe that all this really happened.

Ruth Patrick, who operates the WomenSV in Silicon Valley, told The New York Times.

Another invisibility

Sometimes, you do n’t have to “disappear” if you want to be invisible. As long as no one is looking, it ’s invisible if it does n’t disappear .

Whether you are a man or a woman, an adult or a child, every aspect of our lives is being recorded in the form of data as never before.

In the book “Uncanny Valley”, the author Anna Wiener recalls his experience working in a data analysis company in Silicon Valley. Through cooperation, this company obtains a large amount of user behavior data from other companies and makes profits from it.

No one knows these dataPainted a detailed portrait of their life. Most importantly, no one knows who they give their data to.

Researchers at Imperial College London found that with four time-location data points alone, they could identify 95% of the people in the data set.

Recently, Eric Silverberg, the founder of the same-sex dating app Scruff, told “Protocol” that in the past two years, a data analysis company has continued to make offers in hopes of obtaining the original geographic information of application users with a reward of $ 100,000 or more. data. Later, there were other companies that proposed cooperation costs of 300,000 USD / month.

Due to the particularity of the users, Silverberg continued to cautiously refuse the cooperation offer from the other party. At the same time, he also pointed out the temptation of “quick money”-it is already difficult to make money with applications. With the increase of users, the operating costs will increase, but it is very difficult to realize; , The money is in your pocket.

In the stories we have n’t heard, the protagonist may have embedded a code to get data in the application. A word from Silverberg points out a message that we often forget:

(data generated on the application) That ’s our data. Not yours.

Pictures are from Factordaily

Real life is intuitive and concrete, while digital life is dim and obscure. Joshua Rivera of “The Verge” wrote:

The demons here are those algorithms and codes built to manipulate people. They use rows and rows of data to form our digital life and have been hiding from our sight because no one has ever retreated enough. See from a distance what they are building. No one sees that these software applications are giving the men who designed them the power of unexamined access to all information and anonymously monitor everyone.

Invisibility can also be easy, as long as the other party closes their eyes.

This article is from WeChat public account: Love Faner (ID: ifanr) , author: Fang Jiawen