Until now, divers working in dark, murky waters haven’t been able to effectively survey and assess their surroundings.

But with the Advanced Diver’s Mask-Mounted Display System, it’s a new underwater world. The transformational flip-up/flip-down device is like an “underwater night vision” system that allows divers to see what they’re doing, whether looking for mines, scanning for intruders, inspecting ship hulls, recovering a body, searching for evidence, or studying fish behavior.

The 800 x 600 super video graphics arra (SVGA) screen incorporates organic lightemitting diode (OLED) displays that are color-balanced and contrast-matched, giving the diver an astonishingly clear and actionable view. The fixed-focus optical system was designed and manufactured using multi-element lenses that provide an extended eye-relief, allowing the system to be placed outside the dive mask without losing full display-screen field-of-view.

This was the company’s first CRADA experience, and it has gone exceedingly well, with mask-mounted displays currently in manufacture and slated for availability to military and private-sector divers in December 2011.

The binocular lens arrays are assembled at an offset angle that accommodates approximately 95 percent of divers without the need for interpupillary adjustment.

Built to withstand use at depths of 300 feet, the mask-mounted display system is a whole new ballgame when compared to anything previously available, offering higher contrast, brighter color, smaller size, lighter weight, larger eye relief, lower cost, and lower power consumption. In addition, a low-magnetic version will be available for use by Navy Explosive Ordnance Disposal divers.

The Advanced Diver’s Mask-Mounted Display System technology was transferred via a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA) and partially exclusive licensing agreement between the Naval Surface Warfare Center, Panama City Division and Sound Metrics Corporation. Based in Lake Forest Park, Wash., Sound Metrics was formed in 2002 by a group of researchers who had been working at the University of Washington’s Applied Physics Lab. This was the company’s first CRADA experience, and it has gone exceedingly well, with mask-mounted displays currently in manufacture and slated for availability to military and private-sector divers in December 2011.