From what I recall of using Night Vision, it's actually extremely accurate. There is no digital noise in NVGs, and they can be manually focused so blur is unrealistic.

Maybe a bit darker in areas with extremely low light. Like out in the country side.

In all fairness, I've just watched a lot of videos on youtube haha. I just feel that right now they're not as ive seen, and most of what ive (ive looked more for military ones) that they're a bit busy with noise and there can be a bit of blurriness. They also need to do something about the horrible reaction you get if you put them on if it's not quite dark enough. They whole screen goes white even if it's dusk ive found sometimes. Not sure how correct that is.

To be fair to Dragoan, the older night vision devices did have a fair amount of noise (gen 1 and gen 2 especially). However our current gen 4 devices are very accurate and I think its safe to say that it is going to get better by 2035! As for the whiteness during the day, I feel this is very correct. In general, using night vision during the day is a big no-no, since exposing the lens to bright lights can easily damage the device. All night vision devices that I have seen so far come with a lens cap to protect it from sunlight.

I just find at Dusk time they are still useless. But at night time you cant use your zoomed in scopes so use dot optics which only give you 1x zoom, so the gameplay seems fair still with NVG.

xsolent, this game isn't about fairness, it's about realism. And in real life NVGs are horrible at disk, and you can't us scopes with them. Dragoan, the whole white out thing is pretty accurate. Any bright light like head lights can white out the NVGs.

I realise that haha, I have played the older games so I get how sensitive they are, but they seemed to have turned the sensitivity up, I find that even when it's getting dark and the sun is quite low that they still struggle to work at all.

I haven't tried that yet. I know NVGs are a real pain to use as the sun is rising, but they still function provided you don't look directly at the rising sun. Haven't actually used them at sunrise in the game yet, so I'll take your word for it.

The noise you get from starting NVGs is a cultural leftover from 1/2nd generation NVGs, that I believe was caused by the battery that powered the IR light source that illuminated the enviroment so you could see things.
Today though, 3rd generation NVGs are passive, i.e. they don't need an external light source, and as such there is no noise when starting them.

Other than that, I would agree with a somewhat less clear image. Even if it is 2035, when issuing NVGs on an absolutely massive basis, many of them are bound to be beyond their finest hour so to speak.

@scrim actually gen 1/2 NVGs were passive as well. The noise on those NVGs had to do with inadequate tech, which has improved over the years to become our gen 3/4 of today. IR illumination for NVGs is still being used today, because NVGs work by amplifying ambient light. In some situations however, there is almost no ambient light and this is where you can turn on the built-in IR and use it like a flashlight that only the NVGs can see.

Eh, no. 3rd generation NVGs don't have a light source, which is what caused the noise.

I don't think Generation has anything to do with whether the device needs or has an active or passive light source.

I had an AN-PVS-2A Starlite Scope from the Vietnam-era that was sold to the Israelis and then to civilians. I bought it for $1700 in the late 80's. It was completely passive. Are you telling me it was 3rd Gen, because new 1st Gen NVG's are being manufactured and sold today in U.S. civilian markets?

One thing I don't like is that OFP/ArmA seems to have always overlaid an animated graphical static animation in order to simulate digital noise, and it seems to result in a substantial framerate hit.

@scrim I have used both 3rd and 4th gen optics in the military some with and some without the built-in IR illumination. There are definitely 3rd gen devices with IR and there is no noticeable difference in noise between optics of the same generation with or without built-in IR. However, there is noticeably less noise and less glaring from lights in the more current gen 4 optics as compared to the gen 3. I have also seen 100% passive gen 1 optics which are all very noisy, even if you were to shine an IR light source to brighten up the area.

In the world today you would be hard pressed to find a military that still uses gen 1 or even gen 2 optics. Generally they either don't use them at all or they will purchase at least gen 3s. By the same token, we can expect that by 2035, the minimum anyone would likely have would be gen 4 optics, since it would be ancient tech by then.

My suggestion is if possible to add a tweak to the game to make night vision intensity adjustable as you can on Arma2 ACE. This is a great feature as it allows you to adjust the night vision sensitivity according to the amount of ambient light... for example early morning or at night where there are street lights.

http://feedback.arma3.com/file_download.php?file_id=3464&type=bug

Night vision mode is a just brightened green screen. I think it would be better if we could add the following features ;

1-) Adding 'a little bit' of noise effect.
2-) Being able to see glaring/glowing eyes on both animals and humans.
3-) Reducing the too much of greenish-ness by making it 'slightly' more
black&white-ish.
4-) Instead of having a tight/narrow sight because of the goggles blocking the angle, we can have a wider sight, but as well we can have a dark fade outs to the sides of the view.Screen can get darker from center to the sides of our view. Because basically the way of NVs work is, hitting focused IR light onto an angle and projecting the visual to the optics.
Lights only lighten the center.

These should be easy to add. What do you guys think ?
Additional Information As you can see on the photo, you can see all of the 4 things I mentioned. No matter if it's in 2035. This mode will be highly realistic and entertaining.

I have first generation hunting NV (Passive) and it does not have any noise and it is otherwise sharp from middle but from edges it is blurry. The angle of view is about 30 degree. It is selfpowered with own trigger what you squeeze.

With its self generating power you can not manage its level other than keeping a protection cup on or off (small hole in cup for day/bright environment use) and then adjusting power amount manually. If brightness gets up or too much power, it will turn off and have a safety timer to keep it off for couple seconds.
It is as well black and white.

NV goggles what I used in military were totally different. No noise, no blurry but totally sharp from edge to edge. Digital and functional in 0 LUX, possibility to even attach to head, helmet, rifle, different weapons (from AA to MGs etc) or kept in hand. Illumination was green

Difference in prices were 300 euros and 10 000 euros and size, where cheaper is size of 0.5L bottle, the military version was size of two fingers and you could keep whole device in your fist. Weight were ~600g and ~200g.

The problem with night vision goggles is that you need to get use to turn your head with them. Many has just single lense so you lose stereo vision and because the focal point in goggles is about 10-20cm (depending now models) of your eyes, turning your head gives you totally different feeling than being without.

Do we have realistic NV goggles in game? Not so.... As with typical military NV goggles, if someone even smokes, you can see it from 1km range like a bright dot middile of night, you could right away just wave a flashlights and fire to air yelling "HERE I AM!".

To get NV system work better, I would be willing to accept a blurred surroundings of the view, not the black lines etc but just blurring the surrounding. Then rise the contrast more so you most darkest and most brightest difference is stronger and then finally, move the vision point of character then forward and lower FOV from 80-90 to 60-70. That would cause head turning etc to be different feeling.

In 2035 I bet there would be totally different NV technology, what would include what already exist, meaning automatic adjustments from different light sources in different parts of view (no more getting bright light blinding you), colors and more likely even thermal views.

But would those be in each soldier gear? Maybe a B/W/Green/Orange but not color and definitely not the thermal versions. Those would be for special forces and special personnel.

can someone who knows and has used NVG please post what they think the visual range should be in meters.

Can be from 300m to 2000+ depending gear. The lower range comes in resolution as old gear isnt so sharp always but in this case there is no range as you are not depending from IR lamp to lighten area.