Find out why test car camouflage looks the way it does

You have probably seen a series of spy photographs of cars being tested somewhere in the world, in plain sight but with their shapes hidden under a very special paint that covers the entire bodywork and prevents the design details from being seen clearly. At first glance, they do not seem to hide much, but in reality it is a very useful camouflage to conceal without being overly busy, and it comes from the military world.

It is normally a white paint with black lines that partly cover that white paint. To understand why it is used today to camouflage cars, we have to go back to the First World War. Its technical name is “dazzle paint” or “Dazzle camouflage“. Its principle is very simple: the contrast between white and black prevents the human eye and, above all, the camera lens from fixing on the details.

It was first used on warships, so that once painted this way and at sea, the strong contrast between the two colours made it impossible to determine their position accurately when aiming the guns. Little by little it became popular and more and more ships used it. To create the camouflage patterns, painters were brought in, who carried out part of the work of disguising the ships.

This camouflage has since passed into other areas of civilian life, such as the automotive world. In fact, thanks to the appearance of digital cameras with autofocus, manufacturers have been cautious and have for years incorporated this system to confuse the outside eye that seeks to capture the details of their models.

Autofocus works by seeking the optimal lighting conditions, so when it registers the black and white patterns it is not able to calibrate correctly and cannot focus correctly. Many of the car’s details end up out of focus and it is unable to record them properly.

It is not the only system used. Sometimes a false bodywork with plastic bubbles is used, or false elements are introduced that will not appear on the production model. They also use black vinyls, which absorb the infrared light of the cameras, so the image cannot be perceived well.

But perhaps the most effective and simplest system is to use this type of black and white colour patterns, which bother both the camera and the human eye and help manufacturers have their newest models, those not yet ready to be seen, out on the streets to test their technical specifications.