The F-35 is the first fighter in half a century to fly without a head-up display. The HUD did not disappear. It moved onto the pilot’s face. The Gen III Helmet Mounted Display System, built by Collins Elbit Vision Systems, is the pilot’s primary flight instrument. Airspeed, altitude, horizon line, weapon cueing, sensor video, all of it lives on the visor. About $400,000 per unit, and every one is unique to a single skull. How it works: - Two optical channels project a biocular 40 by 30 degree image onto the inner surface of the visor with 100 per cent overlap, at 1280 x 1024 - The imagery is collimated to infinity, so the eye never refocuses between symbology and the world beyond the canopy - The visor is a combiner: optically clear in transmission, coated to reflect only the narrow band the projectors emit - Six staring infrared cameras of the AN/AAQ-37 Distributed Aperture System are stitched into a full 4-pi steradian sphere. Look down and the floor of the aircraft becomes transp...