History Main / NightVisionGoggles

* WesternAnimation/MyGymPartnersAMonkey: In the episode "Don't Noc It 'Til You Try It" Adam Lyon gets a pair to help him navigate Charles Darwin Middle School at night to rescue Slips.
* In ''WesternAnimation/TheBoondocks'' in the episode "Thank You For Not Snitching" Mrs. Van Heusen can been seen wearing some while firing an AK-47.

* Even scientists aren't exempt from this. A biology professor had David Suzuki following him while he studied grizzly bears. At one point, the professor assisted with the filming of the bears at night with an IR camera. Suzuki, not liking how that looked on TV, replaced it with daytime footage, filtered so that it looked like night time. Needless to say, that was one very peeved biologist.
* Actually this trope isn't entirely a form of not doing the research, as modern armies often use infra red vision to spot enemies emitting large amounts of heat (for example, the exhaust of an engine). However, such a heat seeking sensor is typically linked up to a heavy weapons system designed to take out targets capable of giving off that much heat, so unless your goggles happened to be linked up to a missile launcher or a cannon, this trope still does not reflect reality. Such a heat sensor often also requires being constantly cooled to prevent it interfering with itself, which would make it a tad heavy to put on goggles with today's technology.

The confusion comes from the fact that "infrared" is also the spectral range used by thermal imaging. All objects at temperatures found in the earth's biosphere do produce radiation in the infrared, but not necessarily in the frequency range that CCD sensors are sensitive to. The infrared range regular CCD cameras operate in is "near-visible" — an object glowing at 400°C is glowing brightly to someone who uses a CCD camera, but is still pitch black to the human observer, who would only begin to see a red glow at around 450-500°C.

* The [[ElitesAreMoreGlamorous Special Forces]] expansion pack of ''VideoGame/{{Battlefield2'' adds these to the player's inventory. Using them around bright lights or when a flash-bang is chucked at you is highly inadvisable though.

*** Unfortunately, [[WalkingTank Gekko]] are equipped with these in their main eye atop their heads that can easily see your even with the [[BraggingRightsReward stealth camouflage]] item equipped, the only thing that fools them a great deal is Old Snake's newest addition which is his [[StealthyCephalopod OctoCamo suit]] which perfectly mimics not only his nearest surroundings, but the temperature as well, fooling their otherwise nearly-flawless sight.

*** Unfortunately, [[WalkingTank Gekko]] are equipped with these in their main eye atop their heads that can easily see your even with the [[BraggingRightsReward stealth camouflage]] item equipped, the only thing that fools them a great deal is Old Snake's newest addition which is his [[StealthyCephalopod OctoCamo suit]] which perfectly mimics not only his nearest surroundings, but the temperature as well, fooling their otherwise-nearly-flawless sight.

* In WesternAnimation/TheBoondocks in the episode "Thank You For Not Snitching" Mrs. Van Heusen can been seen wearing some while firing an AK-47.

* The action film ''Film/SheShootsStraight'' has the main villain leading his band of gunrunners against the police in a nightclub shootout, and inevitably the club's power source ends up being cut, resulting in the whole building plunging into darkness. But it turns out the villains are GenrySavvy enough to pack night-vision goggles -- they quickly make short work of the police team after that.

* The season 3 premier of ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'' shows [[CloudCuckoolander Pinkie]] wearing a pair of "night vision goggles"[[note]]glass and metal steampunk spectacles with no electronics[[/note]]... [[SunglassesAtNight during the day]]. [[RealityEnsues She quickly crashes into a light post due to being unable to see]].

* In ''VideoGame/FarCry'', the nightvision goggles show living things in hypnotic false-color, while the background plants and earth are in blue-green starlight-scope vision -- a melding of two completely different technologies, which is nonetheless quite feasible given that ''Far Cry'' is clearly TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture and [[http://www.defensetech.org/archives/003732.html such systems]] [[ScienceMarchesOn are becoming available right now for military use]]. Though technically, they're [=CryTek=] goggles which show you [[WeWillUseWikiWordsInTheFuture CryVision]] - the devs were quite conscious of the fact that they were not portraying night-vision accurately, [[ArtisticLicense and did not actually make any pretense of doing so]].
* The [[ElitesAreMoreGlamorous Special Forces]] expansion pack of ''[[VideoGame/{{Battlefield}} Battlefield 2]]'' adds these to the player's inventory. Using them around bright lights or when a flash-bang is chucked at you is highly inadvisable though.

* In ''Film/{{Cloverfield}}'', the night vision setting of the InUniverseCamera is used to find out what the hell is making those weird noises in the dark subway tunnels they're travelling along. Turns out to be Clovie fleas, and HilarityEnsues.

* {{Subverted}} in ''Webcomic/TerminalLance'', in a comic called "Creator/TomClancy is Full of Shit" (#12): A Marine who spent his childhood playing video games such as ''VideoGame/SplinterCell'' is disappointed to realize what it is like to look through actual night vision goggles.

* ''ComicBook/RobinSeries'': Jaeger's goggles have night vision in addition to a HeadsUpDisplay.

* In ''Webcomic/YokokasQuest'', Grace, Clyde, Blinky, and Inky wear earrings which allow them to see in the darkness of the underground village, and Pinky also wears these when not wearing his monocle (implying that his monocle also serves this function). Yokoka, Mao, and Yin [[BoringButPractical know a spell]] which lets them see in the dark.

* In ''Film/WrongfullyAccused'', Ryan Harrison is about to be ambushed by Sean Laughrea (who is wearing these to sneak up on him) when Ryan flips on the light switch, blinding Sean.

* Eating [[http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Cateye Cateye pills]] in ''VideoGame/FalloutNewVegas'' ups the gamma and turns everything a pleasing shade of aqua[[note]]This is an effect reused from ''VideoGame/TheElderScrollsIVOblivion'' in this case [[http://uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Night-Eye the night eye effect]][[/note]]. Oddly, even though you are walking around in what should be a blinding desert, you actually see ''better'' in the daytime if you take Cateye, since the game reduces all of the [[RealIsBrown bloom]], though at the cost of being unable to determine different colors. The Friend of the Night perk gives night vision without the blue tint or risk of addiction, and the Riot Gear helmets from ''Lonesome Road'' have "Sneak Sight" vision when crouched, which is grayscale outdoors and sepia tone indoors. One of the Varmint Rifle's [[GunAccessories add-on parts]] is a starlight sniper scope.

The confusion comes from the fact that "infrared" is also the spectral range used by thermal imaging. All objects at temperatures found in the earth's biosphere do produce radiation in the infrared, but not necessarily in the frequency range that CCD sensors are sensitive to. The infrared range regular CCD cameras operate in is "near-visible" - An object glowing at 400°C is glowing brightly to someone who uses a CCD camera, but is still pitch black to the human observer, who would only begin to see a red glow at around 450-500°C.

CCD are useless for obtaining a thermal image below a few hundred degrees celsius, so for ordinary thermal imaging applications, other types of sensors are used, which then in addition are frequently (but not always) cooled below environmental temperature, depending on technology.

The version most often seen on TV is actually an [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image_intensifier image intensifier.]]

[[folder:Films -- Live-Action]]

* The 1992 Family Channel version of Zorro used a primitive night-vision device in Season 1 Episode 4, a tube that removed all color from what he was viewing to make it easier to pick out contrast.
* ''Series/StargateSG1'' made a habit of doing right by these.
* Happens in an episode of ''Series/{{Monk}}.'' After the city is plagued by reoccurring blackouts Monk who is very much afraid of the dark gets himself some nightvision goggles. During a break in Monk tries to fend of the intruder while wearing the goggles. The lights come on during the process and Monk is oblivious to the fact when he should have been blinded by the sudden illumination. This entire scene is also a ShoutOut to the finale to ''Film/TheSilenceOfTheLambs''.
* In the Season 2 Episode of ''Series/{{Highlander}}'' a "hunter" uses night vision goggles to kill immortals in a completely dark room.

* In the ''[[Series/TheColbertReport Colbert Report]]'' christmas special A Colbert Christmas, while looking for a bear that's keeping him trapped in his cabin, Stephen dons a pair, before realizing he can't see anything because it's daytime. His response? Put on a pair of shades over the night vision goggles.

* In one ''Series/{{Farscape}}'' episode, John uses a sort of night-vision monocle over one eye, which you would have thought would be impractical due to lack of depth perception. In another episode the crew all uses similar devices in a firefight; Aeryn's breaks down and the fight is over by the time she gets it working.

[[folder:Web Comics]]

* ''VideoGame/SevenDaysToDie'' features NVG's as loot, notably from fallen soldiers. They provide a little bit of protection and [[InfiniteFlashlight work indefinitely]], but they're not [[RagnarokProofing as durable as some other items]], so seeing through them makes the screen exceptionally blurry. They're decent for skulking around at night in {{PvP}} servers when you don't want a beam to give you away, but otherwise the mining helmet is a far better pick for hands-free lighting.

* The ''VideoGame/SplinterCell'' series gets the starlight-scope 'night vision' mode bang on, but rolls out the false colour images for the 'infra-red' mode. The latter is also strangely inconsistent: it can see through thin walls but windows, objects and sufficient quantities of ''air'' are (realistically) opaque. Also, it combines both systems in a single visor, but this can be excused as [[AcceptableBreaksFromReality an acceptable break]] for the sake of RuleOfFun: developer commentary indicates that they knew the starlight and infrared scope being put in the same device was not possible by current technological standards, but decided to do it (even having to convince Creator/TomClancy to let them do it) to avoid having Fisher switching goggles all the time. [[LifeImitatesArt They were invented about 2 years after the game's release]].

** ''Double Agent'' gave players who complete all side objectives an enhanced night vision that can see in color. The technology didn't exist at the time ([[LifeImitatesArt they were invented about 5 and a half months after the game was released]]).

* The night-vision goggles from the movie are on display in the queue line for the ''Ride/JurassicParkRiverAdventure'', but are not used.
* According to the storyline, the 3D glasses are "supposed" to be this in ''Ride/TheAmazingAdventuresOfSpiderMan''.