"Why was dazzle camouflage so sharply defined ?" Topic

If the purpose is not " to not be seen" but pattern disruption, why were the edges so sharp?
It seems to me that making the edges hazy and ill defined might make optical range finding a bit more difficult.
Was this tried?

I always thought that the straight lines of the camo matched the straight lines of the ship. So in the end you can't tell which lines are real and which aren't. Not to hide.

The intent of dazzle camouflage, as I have been given to understand it, was to cause an attacker to misjudge the inclination of the target ship, i.e. the angle between line of sight and target ship heading. This was essential for any attacking submarine, both for making its approach to an attack position and for setting up the actual torpedo shot.

B

Correct.
Solid edge lines work for this, fuzzy edged lines do not.
No, no one ever tried it on a ship AFAIK, but since it obviously wouldn't work I see no reason for them to.

Wasn't one version an attempt to hide which way the ship was actually travelling? So the paintwork makes the front look like the back?

Dazzle camouflage wasn't intended to hide the ship – just break up the straight lines of the ship to confuse the enemy as to what kind of ship it is, what direction it is traveling, how fast it is traveling, how far away it is, etc.

From what I've read you're all right. Many people make the mistake of thinking camouflage means to literally "hide" something. While concealment of an object is one of its functions, it can also be used to mislead an opponent as to the size, shape, direction or use of an object. It may be helpful to think of camouflage less as "stealth" or "invisibility" and more "hiding in plain sight".

With that all said, the point and purpose as has been pointed out above was not to necessarily hide the target ship, just to mislead enemy vessels into its size, shape, purpose or heading. This applied for both submarine and surface vessels and EVERYONE had a take on it. Some of the color schemes like pale greens and pinks could be horrible at night, add to this midnight blue or black schemes that were variously successful at night but stuck out like a sore thumb in broad daylight. However in dawn and dusk twilight these colors did render a degree of invisibility to a ship depending upon where it was in relation to the sun.

Painting hazy lines probably would have been difficult too.

At a distance, in blue haze, they tend to blend in anyway.