Jarvis on 12/9/2009 at 01:20

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Okay, there seems to be some interest in this so I'll do a quick write up.

Deadspace: The human eye, even ones with poor vision, function "flawlessly". The mind interprets that flawless information. When the mind interprets that information incorrectly, dead space occurs.

This is a very basic definition to a very complex concept. The main thing I'm trying to get across is that stealth is the domain of the mind, *not* the eyes. Eyes are instruments for receiving light. when you view a landscape, your eye receives *all* of the light. Your eye sees everything.

But your mind can not process it all at once. We have a very complex ability to "fill in the blanks" for details and areas that we do not intentionally focus on. For example: when you view a beach you can not count all the grains of sand that are visible. Your eye sees them all, or more to the point, their light has been turned into an electrical signal and *is* being received by the brain.

But do we see a large number of grains of sand? No. We see a "beach", and we fill in what the individual grains look like with our imagination. After all, we can trust that the sand is there. We saw it.

I hope that makes sense. I'll move on to another example so I can show how this relates to stealth and the deadspace.

Think about the last time you were walking through the forest. Can you tell me how many trees you passed? Can you tell me what kinds of trees you passed and specifically what order you passed them in? Of course not. There are too many.

Most people see what is referred to as the "wall of green". The know trees are over there, and might even stop to consider a particularly large or unusual tree. But the rest are all just trees. They all look more or less the same, so the mind organizes them into "treeline" or "grove" or "forest" or whatever. That is what the mind places in your peripheral vision. The only way to turn the "treeline" back into individuals trees is to actually look at them and study them with intent.

But if you don't do that, and I stand in such a way that makes me look more or less like a tree, your eyes are going to glance right over me. The mind has already painted the whole area, including me, as "treeline". So that's what it chooses to see.

This is where deadspace goes hand in hand with camo, because if I stand out as obviously not being a tree, then I ruin the illusion. Let's say I was wearing an orange hunting vest. The eye sees the orange, and the illusion is ruined. The "treeline" turns into "treeline with a guy in front of it". This is what I call "drawing the eye". The orange vest draws the eye to it.

But I want to keep away from camo in this talk, because as I said before it's not actually required for deadspace. It just helps a whole lot.

So the secret to mastering deadspace is to learn exactly what draws the eye in any given situation. This is *highly* circumstantial. For example:

Imagine you opening your bedroom door to find a strange jacket on your floor in the middle of the room. It puzzles you, so you walk over to it and pick it up. More specifically, you look at it while you walk. You don't notice me hiding behind your door, or maybe even against the wall just beside your door (there is a body position for this that I use, I call it the "deadspace" position because it is so critical for this sort of thing.)

Now pretend you've been getting a lot of death threats, and your home has been broken into recently. When you walk through that door and see the strange jacket, immediately your awareness expands. You very well might see me behind the door, because your previous experience gave you a different reaction to the strange jacket.

This is how circumstantial deadspace is. It moves all the time, and being aware of where it moves to requires a very keen intuition and understanding of the person you are attempting to hide from. So most sneaks study the circumstances that are generally universal for all people. Most people look down or straight ahead when they walk. This is why being above the "sight line" is so effective. People generally don't look up unless their eyes are drawn up by something different or unusual.

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So now that I've walked you through the very basics of deadspace, I'll go into more detail about the occurrences I described earlier in the thread.

My friend when to the bathroom in my apartment. It was down a short hall. So when exiting the bathroom he'd have to walk down the short hall which then opened up into the living room. The majority of the living room was more towards the right side, including the couch and TV and everyone else who was visiting. To the left was another hall to the front door, and a closed bedroom door.

So when planning my ambush, I took all of this into account. When my friend came back from the bathroom his mind would be on the couch and all of his friends there. They would draw his eye over everything else in the room. So I pressed up against the wall to the left. Note: I was right beside the corner and I did not even use the "deadspace" position. I was standing up fully, just pressed flat against the wall.

I knew his focus would be on the right, and I was correct. He walked right by me, so I followed in behind him as he walked across the living room. I knew he would then turn to his left to look at the TV and sit down, so I anticipated this movement by moving around his right side as we neared the couch. Unfortunately my foot was a little too far out still, and he saw it as he bent down to sit. At which time he jumped back up and turned around.

That is a very simple example. Often, finding deadspace is a very complicated thought process, where you're left guessing between several good options. You'll find yourself asking questions like "will their focus be on the bright windows to the right? Or maybe the cat sleeping on the floor straight ahead."

In a way, the more you practice the more you'll begin thinking of yourself as a sort of "negative Feng Shui" artist. You'll be watching people intently as they move around, paying attention to where they look and trying to figure out why.

It's a very fascinating study, and the better you get at it the better you'll become at learning how to disappear at will. There is a lot I can say on this subject, but I've already written a lot. I'll cap it at that for now.

ZylonBane on 12/9/2009 at 01:36

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Stopped reading here. WTF?

Outlooker on 12/9/2009 at 01:54

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Interesting.
So basically you say humans "see" everything, but can only pay attention to one or very few things; all other things "fade back". This makes sense; my view works that way if I think about.
This should be further intesified through the fact that our eye optics can only focus one spot, the central view, sharply. Anything around that focus centre IS actually very unsharp
(for example, you may watch text/cursor on your monitor, but the text next to your focus, even more so the borders of the monitor or things next to the monitor ARE blurry - by trying to verify this, you try to "look there" - with your sharp focus centre view by moving your eyeballs centered on the object; its hard to describe - try to focus your attention about 15cm from your centred view, just don't "look" there - you will notice everything is unsharp).

However, this means that MOST of our view is not sharply focused - we see only rough structures, "blobs", and colours. Actually, this helps and hinders
stealth: If one can remain in the huge unsharp zone, one is unnoticed if no strong contrast in colour/brightness occurs with the surroundings.
But:
Deer, for example, have very bad sight: They see almost nothing sharp.
Why this ? Because movement (predators) is very easily detected in unsharp images -
the same goes for humans. Thatswhy you shouldn't move if you want to remain unseen, camo or no camo.

edit:
Darn, I text amateurish thoughts, and there even is this:
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peripheral_vision)

jtr7 on 12/9/2009 at 02:39

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People standing still or off to the side will always get more attention than someone going about usual business, especially from a distance, where another person (all it takes is one) can see them from meters away and has to walk toward them or past. I've always known this and can take it for granted. If a person isn't blending into something or with a group, they stand out, even if they are harmless. Seeing people looking like a Keeper, watching, observing, waiting, will look suspicious enough (it only needs to be enough) to be noted. A repeat experience will raise curiosity and garner at least one stare. One cannot be around people and not be noticed if one is only wearing a cloak and standing to the side. Only daydreaming, distracted, focused people, or people with certain vision deficits, or people who are ever-facing away, will not notice, but not all people fall into that category, and there are many people who are very good at observing their surroundings, even when they aren't conscious of it.

Jarvis on 12/9/2009 at 03:01

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Then you have missed the point entirely, and I can't be held responsible for your lack of abstract thinking.

We all know the eye is not perfect. Many of us wear glasses because we all see at different ranges. But at whatever level your eye functions, it functions at that level with out mistakes. The mistakes we make in not seeing something that is there are due to our misinterpretation of what the eye is showing us. That is my point. To properly study deadspace, one has to stop considering what the eye sees, and focus on how to interpret what the mind sees.

It's funny that you bring up the eye's blind spot, because that actually plays into my explanation perfectly. You're right, there is a blind spot in the eye that is compensated by the other. But when we shut one eye, do we see a black spot? No. The mind fills in the blanks.

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Slightly off the topic, you have what a zen master might refer to as a "full cup", zylonbane. A full cup cannot receive more tea. To fully understand, perceive, and learn one must empty their mind of preconceived notions.

I appreciate your attempt at feedback on the eye and how it functions. It's valuable information, but it really has very little to do with the concept presented.