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Stealth bomber in flight on Google Maps

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Re: Stealth bomber in flight on Google Maps

#31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sure you wrote this in jest, but in case people aren't aware: The "Stealth" in "Stealth bomber" refer to hiding the plane from anti-aircraft defenses like radar, infrared, acoustics and some optical visibility, but the anti-reflective paint that is used for hiding it optically is only on the underside, not on the top.

I wonder if imaging from above could actually be a threat for these planes. I mean -- stick cameras on all the SpaceX satellites and you've got an awful lot of eyeballs in LEO, right? Might at least be able to tell a ground based radar where to focus their search...

Pretty sure you need powerful lenses to do useful things though, but who knows, maybe this is workable with some image processing of multiple satellite feeds?

Re: Stealth bomber in flight on Google Maps

#33

Interesting how the three separate R/G/B images are taken independently a few ~seconds~ milliseconds apart, with a different color filter placed over the image sensor. I assume this is to maximize resolution, since no Bayer interpolation [0] is needed to demosaic the output of a traditional image sensor that integrates the color filters onto the sensor pixels themselves. As these satellites are not intended to photog…

I wonder if there are ways to get superior (compared to Bayer) color images from conventional raw-capable monochrome digital cameras (like Leica Q2 Monochrom) in static scenes using similar workflows of taking three separate shots.

Re: Stealth bomber in flight on Google Maps

#34

I would love to know if this was found other than randomly poking around and if so how it worked specifically. "out of place shapes in the middle of fields" might find out some other neat stuff too.

The college town near the airbase made it pretty well known that the airforce base nearby has these B-2s when I took a campus tour years ago.

Granted I like aerospace engineering as a software engineer so I grew up knowing about it ahead of time, and it's only an hour and a half drive away.

Re: Stealth bomber in flight on Google Maps

#35

Interesting how the three separate R/G/B images are taken independently a few ~seconds~ milliseconds apart, with a different color filter placed over the image sensor. I assume this is to maximize resolution, since no Bayer interpolation [0] is needed to demosaic the output of a traditional image sensor that integrates the color filters onto the sensor pixels themselves. As these satellites are not intended to photog…

You can use this difference in time to calculate the speed (although you also have to account for parallax for an aircraft)

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6651096/

Re: Stealth bomber in flight on Google Maps

#36

Interesting how the three separate R/G/B images are taken independently a few ~seconds~ milliseconds apart, with a different color filter placed over the image sensor. I assume this is to maximize resolution, since no Bayer interpolation [0] is needed to demosaic the output of a traditional image sensor that integrates the color filters onto the sensor pixels themselves. As these satellites are not intended to photog…

Doing it this way allows not only higher resolution, but you can also use different types of filter for specialist applications. Infrared for example, or some kind of narrow band pass filters etc.

Re: Stealth bomber in flight on Google Maps

#37

Interesting how the three separate R/G/B images are taken independently a few ~seconds~ milliseconds apart, with a different color filter placed over the image sensor. I assume this is to maximize resolution, since no Bayer interpolation [0] is needed to demosaic the output of a traditional image sensor that integrates the color filters onto the sensor pixels themselves. As these satellites are not intended to photog…

Interesting. A search for those gradients could help find all fast moving objects in the satellite images.

Re: Stealth bomber in flight on Google Maps

#39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sure you wrote this in jest, but in case people aren't aware: The "Stealth" in "Stealth bomber" refer to hiding the plane from anti-aircraft defenses like radar, infrared, acoustics and some optical visibility, but the anti-reflective paint that is used for hiding it optically is only on the underside, not on the top.

I wonder if imaging from above could actually be a threat for these planes. I mean -- stick cameras on all the SpaceX satellites and you've got an awful lot of eyeballs in LEO, right? Might at least be able to tell a ground based radar where to focus their search...

They often fly their missions at night time, so this would mitigate that.

Re: Stealth bomber in flight on Google Maps

#40

The aircraft seems to be a Northrop Grumman B-2 Spirit. > The Northrop (later Northrop Grumman) B-2 Spirit, also known as the Stealth Bomber, is an American heavy strategic bomber, featuring low observable stealth technology designed for penetrating dense anti-aircraft defenses. Designed during the Cold War, it is a flying wing design with a crew of two.[1][3] The bomber is subsonic and can deploy both conventional a…

And The B-2s are apparently stationed at Whiteman Air Force Base[1]. Just due south of the image. Perhaps lining up for a landing approach?

1 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whiteman_Air_Force_Base

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