Night Vision Binoculars

Duh!

Why is it that every time whenever I meet someone while birding or discussing on the subject of binoculars, they would ask me if mine is a "Night Vision" version?

When I asked them why would one need to go birding at night unless one is seeking to observe Owls and Nightjars. I would then get cold sweats at their answers.

Many are so misinformed at the word 'Night Vision'.

They do not know the meaning altogether.

A pair of binocular is just that. A binocular.

They are meant to be used for observation and studying nature such as landscape, animals and for exploration. With latest technologies, glasses are developed with special coatings to improve the quality of images. HD (High Definition) lenses are now being employed to make our viewing more realistic.

Studying colourful birds (with e.g. varied hues) depends largely on the available daylight and it is an ultimate joy to see them as Nature's intended us to see. The Silver-eared Messia in Fraser's Hill is an example. My 20 seconds encounter nearly floored me!

So, back to the subject of Night Vision.

Does that mean that if I see a group of girls in bikinis on the beach at night,

I get to see as if in full daylight like this?

Fat hopes!

You see, Night Vision is not what you think it is. It was developed by the armed forces to track targets for their purposes. One do not see 'daylight' images. One would only see 'thermal imagery' like in heat signals in Infra-red signals. Or blurry greenish 'alien' like 'hantu' visions like this.

They are NOT optical devices but electronic in every sense. A 'camera' is placed in front and a mini LCD viewfinder at the back. Your eyepiece is focused at the viewfinder and the image is processed, amplified & intensified to reach its desired effect. These very optically limited views are very poor in descriptive qualities as far as nature observation is concerned.

Or is it just because some toy manufacturers decided to add red/yellow/orange colors to their lens coatings and claims to be 'Night Vision' so that you would be so impressed and buy it straight away?

The red color coating makes an impression issit?
Now where was I? Oh yeah, I am still wondering what type of BINOCULARS did the Ministry bought for RM50,000.00++? You see, there are no Binoculars made for Night Vision use. None what so ever. Surprised?
You bet your bottom Ringgit!

There are only MONOCULARS not binoculars as the other 'eyepiece' is an Infra-red transmitter which emits IR rays that is being read by the IR receiver!
So just what did the Ministry buy?

For RM50,000.00, I would have checked the contracts and wordings by professionals!!