MARPAT: Digital Camouflage

MARPAT is the camouflage pattern used by the US Marine Corps. MARPAT is short for MARine Disruptive PATtern.

It is a digital pattern, meaning that unlike most other camouflage patterns which use spots, blobs or splodges of colour, it uses lots of small rectangular areas of colour (pixels). It is sometimes referred to as “digi cam”.

The theory is that this makes it far more effective as a camouflage pattern, because of how the human eye reacts to digital, or pixelated, images.

This use of smaller spots of colour is not a new idea – flecktarn also uses small spots of colour (although not rectangular/digital). It was probably inspired by CADPAT – a digital pattern used by the Canadian Armed Forces.

The MarineCorps has trademarked the name, and is currently patenting the camouflage pattern, which probably means you are unlikely to find cheap copies.

Two patterns are in use – Woodland and Desert. A third – Urban – was developed but never approved.

There are other differences between the MARPAT uniform and the older BDUs.

There are pouches for the insertion of knee and elbow pads, and their construction is better. The pockets have been redesigned to make them easier to use while wearing a flak vest or body armour – the breast pockets are now slanted inwards and there are extra pockets on the shoulders.