History Main / VisibleInvisibility

* ''Literature/MrMen'': When Mr Impossible turns invisible, he is drawn as an outline.

* The demonic presence in ''Film/ParanormalActivity'' makes itself visually known by moving the bedroom door and the planchette on a Ouija board, shifting the bedcovers, or dragging the female lead out of bed and down the stairs. Later on, they dust the hallway floor with flour, and it leaves white, bestial footprints. [[HellIsThatNoise (It has other tricks as well.)]]

* Jungle in ''[[VideoGame/KatamariDamacy We Love Katamari]]''.

* The InvisibleMan from ''WesternAnimation/HotelTransylvania'' is completely invisible, with the audience only able to see where he is by his eyeglasses.

* ''VideoGame/ShawsNightmare'': Some dogs (and Shaw whenever he picks up the invisibility cloak) are rendered * Miles is rendered a semi-transparent blue outline whenever he turns invisible in ''VideoGame/SpiderManMilesaMorales.'' This makes it easy for players to keep track of him in gameplay while making him less visible than normal.

* ''Video/SuperSmashBros'' series: when a character is under an invisibility affect, the area where they take up space becomes distorted as they move about. Therefore, the only way to be 100% invisible is to remain completely still, giving the status a notable weakness and strategy.

* ''VideoGame/SuperSmashBros Melee'' uses this, when the character uses a movement to guide the player to know where it is; otherwise the character is completely invisible.

* '''The invisible character is rendered as a vague distortion of the background.''' A.K.A. the ''Franchise/{{Predator}}'' method. Whether or not the other characters can see the vague distortion varies from work to work. This is also used quite often as a transitional state, as when something switches its invisibility on or off.

* ''Animation/KingShakir'': The invisible door in "April Fools" has a gray transparent outline that is visible to the viewers, but it's clear in-universe that nobody can actually see it.

* Most renditions, in text and on film, of ''Literature/AChristmasCarol''.

* On ''WesternAnimation/TheFairlyOddParents'', when Timmy wishes to be invisible, he's drawn as a simple white outline.

* Ea from ''Series/ToumeiShoujoEa'' (English title: "Invisible Girl Ea") takes all the methods, for the most part. She shifts between visibility and invisibility to the audience, except when her powers are malfunctioning, wherein she distorts like the predator or shows up as a translucent blue ghost.
* Similarly, Shizuka in ''Manga/{{Translucent}}'' uses several of the tricks. The story focuses on how Shizuka has contracted "Translucent Syndrome", a nonfatal, noncontagious disease that turns her mostly translucent on a monthly cycle. In the manga, this is shown via either sketching in the background lines behind her, showing her without any shading at all (or as a very pale gray), or showing her without any lines at all (merely using shading). People who get more serious versions of the disease can end up with "Fully Transparent Syndrome", which is traditional {{invisib|ility}}le stuff -- which in the manga is shown by the "completely invisible, even to the audience" subtrope, with the exception that extreme positive emotions can cause a faint screentone outline to appear. The one character who has FTS in the series wears a hat, gloves and glasses to show people where her head and arms are.

* On ''Series/{{Misfits}}'', Simon alternates between visible to the audience and totally invisible.

* Claude in ''Series/{{Heroes}}'' is visible to the audience most of the time during his episodes, but when he's introduced at the beginning of an episode, the audience hears his voice and sees him pick up an object, rendering it invisible. Also, the audience has seen him fade in and out of visibility. This causes his fans to believe that after he ran out on Peter, he's in every scene—''we just can't see him.'' Lampshaded by the writers: when asked if they were bringing Claude back, they replied "We already have. Didn't you see him?"
* ''Series/TheOuterLimits1995'': In "Out of Body", Rebecca Warfield is conducting research into out-of-body experiences using electric impulses. When she decides to run the experiment on herself, her soul becomes trapped in another dimension. Although the other characters cannot see or hear her, she is perfectly visible to the audience.

%%** Probably just a stage technique in general— ''Blithe Spirit'', for example.

* ''Theatre/TheLionKing'': The puppet operators are always visible — most notably, Timon's actor is bright green, and Zazu is a small puppet riding on the actor's head. This also applies to many stage mechanics and devices that, in most musicals, are kept hidden; this was highly intentional, to produce an effect where imagination filled the scene in.

* In ''VideoGame/{{Fallout 3}}'' and ''VideoGame/FalloutNewVegas'', the Stealth Boy and Chinese Stealth Armor (only in the former game) behave this way. Enemies with high enough Perception [[UselessUsefulStealth can still detect the player]] when sneaking in this state. However, there's nothing stopping ''you'' from noticing ''their'' cloaking either (aside from your own [=IRL=] perceptiveness), so you're free to open fire on an enemy expecting you to be unaware if you spot them first.

* Enemy cloaked units in ''VideoGame/StarCraft'' have a slight distortion: it's ''very'' difficult to make out a Dark Templar who looks like a smoke trail. And even if you can see where he is, you can't shoot at him anyway. Once you know where the unit is though, you can move a detector there. However, note that the ''attacks'' of a cloaked unit remain perfectly visible, which is a bit of a giveaway to a human player. Said human player will probably drop a Psionic Storm, [=ComSat=] Sweep, or Ensnare on the offending units. This especially gives away the location of the aforementioned Dark Templar, who only has a melee attack. The Ghost's attack is ''very'' hard to spot though, as it only gives off a small muzzle flash.

* Adaptive camo in ''VideoGame/GhostRecon: Future Soldier'' appears like this. Like ''Crysis'', it's not perfect (your character's exposed forearms are still pretty visible in the first level you get it in, for starters), but it's pretty close - enemies from further than a few feet will generally be unable to see you, even if they've been alerted and are firing on your teammates, but the downside is that you can't use it while walking upright, and firing a weapon or being shot at deactivates it.

* The Wraith when using the [[ForDoomTheBellTolls bell]] in ''Videogame/DeadByDaylight''

* A player's own cloaked units in ''VideoGame/StarCraft''. And an enemy's cloaked units once they're within range of a unit with the Detector property, such as the Terran Missile Turret or the Protoss Observer.

** In ''VideoGame/WarcraftIII'', your own and allies' invisible units are partly transparent, but completely invisible to the enemy (unless they have invisibility-detecting), but you can still get them with splash damage. Then there's that unfortunate InvisibilityFlicker...

* ''Videogame/WingCommander''
** In ''Wing Commander III'', in the "fly-by" cutscenes, cloaked Excaliburs show up as wireframe outlines.
** In ''Wing Commander IV'', thanks to special optics for the Dragon fighter you can visually track cloaked ships, which use the wireframe outline mentioned above to display them.

* In ''VideoGame/{{Sundered}}'', the mini-boss Arlie Waylon has a cloaking device that renders him invisible when he’s not actively attacking Eshe. Unfortunately for him, his body—which becomes a mostly transparent silhouette while cloaked—is still visible to the player.

* ''Film/HollowMan'' — even his vomit was invisible. Plenty of tricks were used to still get a view of him though.

* In ''Film/TheInvisibleMan2020'', only through his physical interactions and certain fluids (paint, rain, extinguisher smoke) the title character can be noticed. However, the "distortion" approach also appears [[spoiler:when the main character sees the InvisibilityCloak being created, and when after being hit in a fight, the cloak glitches at certain points.]]

** The [[Series/TheInvisibleMan 2000 series]] — the camera would usually cut to Fawkes' POV to show what he was doing. Somewhat lampshaded in one episode, where Darian has to spook out a superstitious generic South American dictator by pretending to be a ghost. His narration actually says that people aren't afraid of what they don't see, so if he's going to freak this guy out, he'll need to ''see'' something. Cue Darian letting the [[AppliedPhlebotinum quicksilver]] drop from his eyes, to show human eyes looking out of nothing. Effectively creepy.

* In the ''WesternAnimation/PhineasAndFerb'' episode "Don't Even Blink", objects and people hit with the Invisinator are completely invisible to the audience, except when Perry and Doofenshmirtz are hit off center and rendered only half-invisible—''vertically''. Some fans say this is due to the dispersal of the beam. it's highly concentrated when up close and spreads into less visible beams the farther it gets from the source.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{SpongeBob SquarePants}}''

* Similarly, Shizuka in ''Translucent'' uses several of the tricks. The story focuses on how Shizuka has contracted "Translucent Syndrome", a nonfatal, noncontagious disease that turns her mostly translucent on a monthly cycle. In the manga, this is shown via either sketching in the background lines behind her, showing her without any shading at all (or as a very pale gray), or showing her without any lines at all (merely using shading). People who get more serious versions of the disease can end up with "Fully Transparent Syndrome", which is traditional {{Invisib|ility}}le stuff — which in the manga is shown by the "completely invisible, even to the audience" subtrope, with the exception that extreme positive emotions can cause a faint screentone outline to appear. The one character who has FTS in the series wears a hat, gloves and glasses to show people where her head and arms are.

* ''Manga/JoJosBizarreAdventureStoneOcean'' averts this trope and then plays it straight in regards to depicting the Stand Limp Bizkit's powers, which allows the user to summon [[InvisibleMonster invisible]] [[OurZombiesAreDifferent zombies]]. The first half of the Limp Bizkit arc shows the zombies as being completely invisible, even to the audience; Jolyne managed to SeeTheInvisible alligator zombie about to maul her after she splashed blood on its face. The second half of the arc does away with this and depicts the zombies as translucent to the audience, but still completely invisible to the main characters.

* ''ComicBook/{{Wonder Woman|1942}}'': When Saturnians are using their {{Invisibility Cloak}}s and telepathy to makes themselves invisible and inaudable to human senses they are compeletley invisible until Wonder Woman's own telepathy clues her into their presence, following which point the level of detail seen on them is indicative of how much Wonder Woman is concentration on "seeing" them. The most detailed "invisible" Saturnains are rendered in monochrome blue, and at the least as a vauge humanoid dotted outline.

[[AC: Film - Animated]]

* '''The invisible character is visible to the audience.''' No special effect required, just have the other actors pretend they can't see the invisible ones. Used often in live action, especially when the invisible characters are {{intangib|ility}}le as well (lots of ghosts are shown this way). Usually accompanied by some verbal cue ("They can't see us!"). It's common to cut to another character's POV to show he's seeing empty space. This tends to be the norm with things InvisibleToNormals, with the few scenes from the "normals" perspective hiding them entirely.
* '''The invisible character is rendered as a vague distortion of the background.''' A.K.A. the ''Franchise/{{Predator}}'' method. Whether or not the other characters can see the vague distortion varies from work to work. This is also used quite often as transitional state, as when something switches its invisibility on or off.

* ''Film/Ghost1990''
* ''Film/GhostDad''

** Probably just a stage technique in general— ''Blithe Spirit'', for example.
** Hence also used for Oliver in ''Series/SlingsAndArrows''.

* Arakune in ''VideoGame/BlazBlue'' does this with one of his moves.

[[AC:Real Life]]
* This is probably what a real-life InvisibilityCloak will look like in 5 or 10 years.
[[/folder]]

[[AC:{{Webcomics}}]]
* ''Webcomic/BobAndGeorge'' has [[http://www.bobandgeorge.com/archives/010112c Megaman's ghost]]

* ''WesternAnimation/TheSecretSaturdays'' Komodo's "camouflage" ability looks like 1966 style outline-plus-partial transparency.

* ''Anime/MagicalGirlLyricalNanohaStrikers'' uses this method to portray Garyuu's and the Type IV Gadget Drone's invisibility, though attentive viewers may notice that the latter also used the Distortion method a few seconds before it made its presence known to the audience.

* ''Manga/{{Doraemon}}'': In "Noby, the Great Illusionist", Noby uses his illusionist cape to make himself invisible so that he can sneak into Big G's room and retrieve his comic. While he is using the cape, he is still visible, but he is transparent.

See also AstralProjection and SeeTheInvisible. Compare FluorescentFootprints.

** In ''WesternAnimation/DCLeagueOfSuperPets'', this is apparently what it actually looks like, prompting Krypto to say it's "transparent at best". Although a later scene has it completely invisible when landed, so that Ace can walk into it.

** In ''ComicBook/{{Supergirl}}'' story, ''ComicBook/SupergirlsThreeSuperGirlfriends'', when Phantom Girl uses her power, her body becomes a white-and-blue stripped outline. Later ''Legion'' stories ditched the idea that Tinya's intangibility makes her invisible.

** In ''WesternAnimation/LeagueOfSuperpets'', this is apparently what it actually looks like, prompting Krypto to say it's "transparent at best". Although a later scene has it completely invisible when landed, so that Ace can walk into it.

* ComicBook/WonderWoman's Invisible Jet is usually drawn with a white outline and the dash and instrument cluster visible

* In ''VideoGame/TheHidden'', a ''VideoGame/HalfLife2'' total conversion, a team of players must hunt down the mod's namesake (while he is hunting them), who appears like this.

* VideoGame/EccoTheDolphin: In ''Defender of the Future,'' Ecco is see-through to the player with the Power of Stealth, but the enemies can't see him at all, even if he bumps into them.

* ''VideoGame/HarryPotterAndThePhilosophersStone'' uses the Partly Transparent method. And although we can see Harry the whole time, they didn't bother to put a cloak on him -- you know, the thing that's actually supposed to be making him invisible in the first place.

* Franchise/WonderWoman's Invisible Jet is usually drawn with a white outline and the dash and instrument cluster visible

* Used in ''Videogames/TempleRun''. Interestingly, the monsters can still see you while you're invisible, but it does protect you against trees and pitfalls. One can only guess that the invisibility makes you intangible, and that the monsters are quite supernatural. (Well, they ''do'' have skulls for heads.)

* Using the Invisible ability in ''[[VideoGame/SoulSeries Soulcalibur IV]]'' renders your character invisible, even to you the player- all you can see is the effects when swinging a weapon. Of course, this is because it's usable in Special Versus, too, and human players aren't so easy to fool as the AI.

* In ''VideoGame/{{Fallout 3}}'' and ''VideoGame/FalloutNewVegas'', the Stealth Boy and Chinese Stealth Armor (only in the former game) behave this way. Enemies with high enough Perception [[UselessUsefulStealth can detect the player]] when sneaking in this state.

* ''Film/{{Ghost}}''

* ''VideoGame/{{Dystopia}}'''s stealthers are rendered as a watery distortion while they're moving, but invisible while they're still. TAC scans show a snapshot of their IFF boxes, and the Sound Wave Triangulator shows [[EverythingsBetterWithSpinning spinning triangles]] for their footsteps and gunshots.