eli5 why is military aircraft and weapon targeting footage always so grainy and colourless when we have such high res cameras?

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eli5 why is military aircraft and weapon targeting footage always so grainy and colourless when we have such high res cameras?

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Anonymous 0 Comments

First of all, it’s high magnification, the cameras are zoomed in all the way. That target that looks so big in the grainy video, it can actually be some 5-30 miles away, and you’re looking at it through maximum zoom. So if you grab your phone camera and try to zoom in to say an insect on a distant wall, see what happens to the quality of your video.

And then, transmitting video isn’t a primary concern for the helicopter, tank, or soldier taking that video, so there’s probably lots of compression so the video doesn’t create lag on the military wifi or whatever they’re using. You’re seeing live footage, they don’t want lag when they’re in the middle of combat operations, so transmitting the video is minimized in a major way.

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