Multicam: Exploring The Worlds Most Prolific Camouflage Pattern 

All the advancements in the development of the perfect Camouflaged patterns has resulted in colored tape being used to help us identify friend from foe.

The conflict in Ukraine has proven how innovative US commanders were, in forcing soldiers to wear PT belts.

I FUCKING LOVE UNIQUE UNIFORMS THAT FITS A NATION´S UNIQUE TERRAIN AND IDENTITY

Crye Precision just achieved world domination with a camo pattern lmao In all honesty, this just shows how effective and well thought-out Multicam as a pattern is, really was ahead of its time

Great to see such a large range of unique and well developed camouflage patterns!

Thank you for validating my purchase of copious amounts of ATACS FG kit

crye has done irreversible damage to the camo scene...

Actually hurts to see the French woodland camo is going away. That was one of my favorites

Even Canada, who was the first to widely issue modern digital camouflage patterns, is now merging it's Temperate and Arid patterns into a single multi-terrain uniform pattern just as the Brits and others did over a decade back now. I kinda like the looks of CADPAT MT though, and it still uses the original digital geometry instead of being an obvious Multicam rework.

I imagine your old great, great grandpa an old veteran of the Napoleonic Wars watching all the british soldiers marching into trucks to fight in France during WW1 being like "Back in my day we used to wear our regal red proud, now it seems like our army has distanced themselves from his majesty and went and took a dive in a puddle just to mock him."

I'm not going to lie. I got 2/3 way through the video and realised they are all making the same uniform. If you want me I'll be in the corner crying with confusion.

Hey let’s all have the same “groundbreaking”camo and then wear brightly colored duct tape all over our bodies because we all look the same

Also another important factor which you briefly mentioned was gear. The U.S. and Crye not only lead in camouflage but also in individual gear. Companies like Crye, Ferro, Spiritus, etc, produce constantly high quality gear which is affordable for the average soldier. Since they produce primarily for the US, almost all of these products are in Multicam. This private market boom has opened up so much individualism and options for the average soldier that nowadays in many US units, you’ll see a dozen different authorized plate carriers and setups being used by preference of the individual, modifying their kit to fit their personal load out and tactical needs. Meanwhile, compared to alot of our Allies I got to train with while in the Army, I saw the vast majority of them run identical kits down to even the pouches being placed in the same locations, giving little room for individualism and personalization. I won’t go as far to say that that ability gives an definite fighting edge, but I always found that guys in the Army who opted to spend their own money on personalized gear tended to outperform the guys who kept to the standard issued gear, which was more often than not, unnecessarily heavy, bulky, and usually been used for years by multiple soldiers.

Marpat and german flecktarn are the best imo. As a Marine vet it made me appreciate marpat. We have two different uniforms for woodland and desert and I dont think thats a bad thing. Both work extremely well. Surprisingly germany is actually moving towards a multicam variant of their flecktarn but its actually unique and looks great. Its called multitarn and it looks absolutely badass. Leave it up go germany to always pull through!

Every nations: Multicam. Indonesia: Nah, 80s Malvinas DPM is fine.

I’m in the multicam is nice, but now seeing the whole world having it man, I bet it difficult to identify who is who

Now if I were a conspiracy theorist I would say, this is a new world order universal pattern.

Props to Brazil, we still use our own original camouflage pattern, except for the Navy GRUMEC and the feds that dived deep into the multicam sauce.

really the biggest worry is friendly fire/unit ID. Ive been wondering for years how countries are going to get past this issue (and i really dont think the paintball duct tape is it)

The Multicam is so popular, that the Philippine fire service adopted a literally bright mandarin/tangerine orange camo.

I'm from Slovenia, so European forests. Surprisingly enough, multicam is perfect during early spring, when the forest is still mostly light brown. Later, when it becomes vegetated in april/may, the initial multicam pattern becomes too bright. I was currently testing the German flecktarn, and some WW-2, Waffen SS patterns in these highly vegetated woodlands in may. They have both proven to be very effective, along with the Russian digitial green pattern.

I miss the old Australian DPCU, it was so unique and partner forces loved it too.

Reminds me of how a lot countries started to adopt khaki brown for there uniforms in the 1900s. If it works it works.

Spain didn’t adopt the multi am; in fact the Spanish MoD was heavily criticized by some servicemen for this reason. Only some SOF units use multi cam.

Funny enough, When France showed their new camo they did a video where they explain how they made « long research and development » to find a perfect camo but in the end it’s just a baguette Multicam

Important to note that this has happened once before with M81 Woodland, and it caused the same issue we're seeing now. Foes unable to distinguish between uniforms, causing an total IFF breakdown and friendly fire incidents. Eventually, countries will branch back out until the next American design drops, and then it'll happen all over again.

Great video! I’m surprised you don’t have way more subs!

Germany still has its own uniqe Camo althoug they switch to a Multiterrain type of camo,too. It is still based on the Flecktarn pattern.

Multicam is a great all around cam pattern, I understand that but I feel that some of these countries are adopting it because they simply want to be part of the club. They should create a pattern that will reflect their countries geological landscapes.

Coming from a Dane, it's nice to be able to buy all sorts of kit, pants what ever from various manufactures. But I do miss the days of our own unique camo...

I lost it on that clip of Mordor when flying to New Zealand LOL

Keep up the RU-vid vids mate! Great addition to your more known insta content!

Didn't know you guys have a RU-vid, good to see you here

US marines “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it”

Argentina is also using a Multicam "variant" with its own local name... In our country it became a logistic solution since our geography goes from rain forests (north east) to high arid mountains (north west) to grassy plains (centre) and more. The need for a multi terrain pattern makes sense if you put it that way.

Nice video. The proliferation of MC based camo patterns is stunning throughout last 10 years. Especially with old Eastern Block countries. Just a curiosity regarding Poland - it's the Border Guard that is slowly adopting MC type camouflage(shown in your video) for officers working abroad, SF already uses it (or rather uses Suez which is a "legally distinct" version) and the regular Army researches their own pattern called Lampart (surprisingly Finnish M/05 looking, but not with fractal technology). Yeah... I'm going to go now...

The Soldier 2000 unifrom from South Africa is a perfect example of identity, and working perfectly with most terrains of Africa, especially the bushy terrain.

*friendly fire has entered the chat

Many of the soldiers who served in Ukraine have complained about being unable to distinguish between enemy and friendly camouflage and nearly causing friendly units to fire on each other.

I really like the AOR2 and Marpat, very unique yet effective in the environments that they’re useful in

M81 Woodland is still the best and the only type I’d ever be seen (or not seen) in. Love it.

Regenct MultiCam, embrace Lizard Patterns.

Great content. Please, keep going.

Bosnia has also switched to Multicam inspired cammo at the end of the last year. Another European country with Multicam style cammo pattern.

I feel like grandpa Simpson when I talk about camouflage these days “so they made the change to multicam, which was the style at the time”

This was a first rate video, man. Think I’ll subscribe

This is my argument for people who don’t like multicam. It’s not just the US, and Uk and Australia using it. It’s several countries NATO or not therefore proving it must be good plus it’s cheaper than producing woodland and desert camo gear.

Don’t forget North Korea, though they’re notorious for having a bazillion different patterns at the same time ranging from the original Soviet brownish drab to a copy of the Chinese copy of M81 to a low saturation version of Ukraine’s digital pattern and a plethora of unique 1980s-90s home brew designs that are completely ineffective and more recently as of the 2020s a handful of digital patterns. Interestingly they were seen with a reversible uniform with multicam on one side and a snow camo on the other side that looks like they just turned all of the colors white except for the normal light tan splotches and made them gray. Anyways, you get the point, every parade formation seems to feature a new pattern, though multicam is amongst one of the more common ones seen in their media since Covid along with a few varied digital patterns including a lighter tan, tan and brown (like Type 07 Desert), gray, and grayish woodland with similar colors to Chinese Type 07 Universal. I’m not sure what the purpose of having 2 very similar uniforms fit for a desert environment is for a country that will never deploy to a desert, but I don’t run the KPA’s procurement. Of all the patterns, multicam and the tan-brown digital seem to be the most applicable, though the gray woodland seems to do alright (but it’s also similar in appearance to South Korean digital). For the love of God ROK, please don’t adopt multicam.

This pattern is so good that militaries will put bright colored stripes on their equipment to atleast somehow identify friendlies

I never expected the Great Corporate Wars of 2124 to be Amazon, Microsoft and Crye.

Multicam is such a practical all rounder camo. For more than half U.S. forces with the exception of Marines and fighter pilots wear this pattern. Even the iconic camo of a certain Special Forces group isn't used anymore after UBL death and wear multicam instead.

You should go over some of the more special and weird camos aswell!

Time is back when armies uses shiney colour to identify your army and multicam become just like regular uncamouflaged uniform))

Makes me wonder why the army chose the UCP (ACU) pattern back then over the crye’s multicam.

Atleast we can stand united in front of the aliens with all these multica- I mean completely unique camouflage patrerns.

Chile also is a user of both multicam and scorpion camos

It’s not going to be only a few instances of Russia using Multicam in Ukraine, but they are actually switching over to multi-cam as their uniform with their new Vkpo 3.0 system.

When you have the same set of operational requirements, you get the same optimal solutions. Multicam-esque color palettes aren't going away. To the detriment of combat IFF. But due to prisoner's dilemma, there's a first mover advantage to adopt para-Multicam, and a first mover disadvantage from doing away with para-Multicam. Even multi-tarn and MM14, as well as ATACS pattern, they all blend into Multicam way too well past shouting distance. It's about color palette and appropriate multiscaling of swatches.

Just want to comment about the tape. The reasons the tape was used was varied but included - Presence of multiple camo patterns on each side, such as Multicam. Stuff like MM14 and EMR weren't uniformly distributed - Activation of TDF's and partisans who may not have been wearing a camo pattern or whatever they could get their hands on. The use of tape actively defeats the point of camo far more than "corporate imaging" will, and in a normal state vs state conflict, arguably its far better to have a unique camo pattern thats partially effective, than to have a great camo pattern thats defeated by bright yellow reflective tape. A lot of frontline footage we see from the current War in Ukraine shows that tape use has gradually decreased.

Awesome Video!

I love how spain uses a grey/Greenish multicam even trough in their country a normal beige multicam would make more sense since most of their country is like a desert☠️

While Multicam definitely works, I wouldn't discount a certain amount of copycatting going around as well. A lot of smaller nations can't afford to do much research into a camo pattern for their own forces so they look around the world to see what everybody is using and adopt that; Before Multicam became the pattern deJour, lots of nations used variations on either British DPM or US M81 woodland. likely thinking that if it was good enough for the US or the UK, it was good enough for them. Then when the US Army adopted the ACU in UCP there were a few nations that ended up adopting UCP for their uniforms because, once again, if it was good enough for the US Army then it was good enough for them.

One of the main reasons to mimic multicam is to lean on the already existing market of gear done in multicam like setups. There are about a dozen other Transitonal patterns that work as well or better but they dont have that market support that multicam has. Some examples are pencott, kryptek, atacs, hyperstealth etc. Its much easier to lean on whatever the US is using because of the additional market and industry support.

I really like the new norwegian pattern, it's the old one zoomed out a bit and some flecktarn sprinkeled on top for cinematic effect or something, I don't know.

Multicam is the 21st century equivalent of m81 woodland and dpm in terms of copycat patterns. Personally i dont see any other pattern reaching this level unless its actual full fledged invisibility, or a pattern that switches colour based on its surroundings. I could sefinitrly be wrong though 🤷😂

Crye precision must be making bank rn

Coral please make more videos this is QUALITY CONTENT

Based Asian militaries for still retaining unique camo patterns (for the most part)

incredibly underrated

Well done.

I like the US uniform from the Balkan wars conflict, that’s the real deal and perfect for the woods and forest areas and at night in some urban environments

The polish woodland variant of multicam shown in thos video is one worn by the border guard which was adopted last year, only army units that use multicam are SOF and they use the normal unmodified pattern. Normal army still uses a modified woodland pattern although it might be changed out for a modified finnish mo5 pattern (or at least pattern inspired by it afaik) in the future.

I didn't realize the MC wave was that big... although I suspected. You missed Canada in your final list. The Canadian Spec Ops Regt (CSOR) wears MC when needed. There were a bunch of pics of them in Iraq wearing it. I was in Afghanistan when the wave hit in 2010. Initially, the US troops were a mixed bag of UCP and desert cam (USN were in the USMC/Canadian inspired digital desert) with an amount of new arrivals (like 10 Mtn Div HQ) arriving in OEC (MC). Those who were already in Theatre began exchanging their UCP for MC over the next few months. The Brits I worked with were in desert DPM. Around mid-tour, replacements arrived in MTP and those already in country rotated to Camp Bastion to exchange uniforms. The Australians I worked with were all in desert bunny blob cam... except the SASR - they were in MC. I was witnessing the start of a 'movement'. 10 yrs earlier, on a UN mission in Africa, the popular uniform was variations of US woodland BDUs. We, as a nation were just transitioning to CADPAT. Units rotating through Yugo were issued it. Our small group in Africa wasn't deemed worthwhile enough to get it so we were still in our ODs. Of the 40 some troop contributing nations, we and the Finns were the only ones in OD. Ironically, there was a Balkans contingent made up of the various nations of the former Yugo. They all wore woodland BDUs with a common arm patch. They seemed to get along ...for the most part. Made me question why we still had a thousand man contingent in their home region for the purpose of preventing them from killing each other. I mused that perhaps nations with 'peace keeping' forces (by this point it was a NATO mission and not UN, however) in their country maybe weren't quite ready to be providing same to other countries... 🤔 Personally, I like the idea of a sovereign nation being recognizable in its own distinct uniforms. That said, real world effectiveness should be first consideration. The new CADPAT pattern is less overwhelmingly green and appears better. Time will tell. I'm just a random retired guy now, so what do I know anyway...

Actually Vietnamese have the multicam themself for the peacekeeper mission, and before we have the K17 multicam, we had used the K94 in the 90s with the pattern look a like the multicam forest :)))))

Od green, my beloved

At least Norway went for a updated woodland, ya know because Norway has a lot of woods and little arid desert

They should just issue neon blue/yellow or red/white uniforms. I'm sure that would be better than wearing a suit of duck tape. Let's go back to the 1800s, when warfare was cool and not just drones pecking at humans.

I hope you do a video on Concamo, it's a really interesting pattern.

I really like the Austria new Camo

I recon that Defence get the emu imbedded into the pattern to showcase the great emu war thingy to show how original we are or maybe Angus and his killer stare and the black Styer might be better sell-out …. Oops silhouettes to the overall pride pattern ….. 😊🎉

Indonesia too still retain DPM camouflage, even some say they developed new multicam camo. The colors of it, still retain elements from DPM so it fits on geography of indonesia which is tropical jungles

Great video! You made it funny too. Haha

Norway is also going to be replacing its classic camo, but the new pattern is not multicam-like, surprisingly enough.

I remember WWII vets talk of the confusion of the US Army camo and SS camo in Normandy, back in 04 I was at a 60th anniversary Normandy reenactment and notice how confusing it was with the period uniforms. Now you have everyone wearing the samething. Na wont have blue on blue....

Welcome to the MultiCam Continuum

France left out as usual of the five permanent members in the thumbnail LOL

Multicam is to contemporary armies what olive drab was to armies of the mid to late 20th century (back when everyone had dark green uniforms with M1 helmets).

You forgot the new BME (French one), it adapts to outdoor lights and terrains and very nice too

I still love my DPM.

Just ordered a new combat shirt in multicam bcsI couldnt get a hold of M81 colored one and than this vid drops

That why i love usmc camo

All my homies hate multicam variants~

Nothing beats 80' woodland Camo! or TIGER STRIPES!

Coral sea??? I was so surprised, I follow you guys on Insta and has no idea yous were on RU-vid

As an American infantryman Having trained with the Royal Artillery, their camo is just about different enough to catch the corner of my eye, but the uniforms themselves are what is really different.

I am in camp Aachen germany. It's a US base in barvaria that hosts NATO training. I seen a bunch of uniforms. I had not seen UCP (old us army digital gray cammo) for a while but random Ukrainian soldiers have them on. Ukrainians seem to not have one cammo pattern but just wear what they can get. Most these countries wear different cammo, although some do wear patterns close to ours.

This is the kind of video that will clean up my algorithm

I needed this 😂

Polish SG-14 forest Multicam is probably the best MC version

Seem to remember one of the motivators for getting rid of US Woodland and British (woodland) DPM was everyone and their uncles dog had copied one of the two patterns including some of the Iraqi army during DS1 leading to some friendly fire incidents. Glad they sorted that out!!!!