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How does thermal imaging work?
Home » Gadgets » Night Vision » How does thermal imaging work?Thermal imaging is the first of two technologies used in night vision. This technology operates by capturing the upper portion of the infrared light spectrum, which is emitted as heat by objects instead of simply reflected as light. Hotter objects, such as warm bodies, emit more of this light than cooler objects like trees or buildings.
In thermal imaging, a special lens focuses the infrared light emitted by all of the objects in view. This focused light is scanned by a phased array of infrared-detector elements. The detector elements create a very detailed temperature pattern called a thermogram. It only takes about one-thirtieth of a second for the detector array to obtain the temperature information to make the thermogram. This information is obtained from several thousand points in the field of view of the detector array.
The thermogram created by the detector elements is translated into electric impulses and the impulses are then sent to a signal-processing unit, a circuit board with a dedicated chip that translates the information from the elements into data for the display.
The signal-processing unit sends the information to the display, where it appears as various colors depending on the intensity of the infrared emission. The combination of all the impulses from all of the elements creates the image you see in the night vision goggles.
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