Make: Technology on Your Time Volume 12

Looking at the Low End

Infrared photography reveals a world invisible to the naked eye.

By Richard Kadrey

Photography by Richard Kadrey

For the human eye, the lowest visible wavelengths are red light measuring about 700 nanometers (nm). Below that, infrared radiation runs from about 750nm down to 1mm. When photographed in this part of the spectrum, leaves and grass glow with energy, as if the entire natural world is lined with fiber optics. Skin is luminous and perfect, like alabaster. Infrared photography gives you an inhuman view of the world, ...