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Based on a patent filed by Apple, the company may be working on a new super matte black finish for its line of devices.
The patent, discovered by Patently Apple and titled “Matte Black Appearance Anodized Part,” suggests that the color scheme would not just be your typical matte black finish. These can still show stains and scratches; these are really more of a dark gray. Instead, the patent seems to point to a finish a little closer to an ultra-black material like Vantablack, capable of absorbing “generally all visible light.”
If you are not familiar with Vantablack and other ultra dark materials, they are basically similar to looking at a black hole. As well as looking good, it could have the effect of significantly hiding scratches and other metal damage. For example, in the image below you can see how the wrinkles in the aluminum foil basically disappear completely once Vantablack is applied to the material:
I wouldn’t expect the material to be that dark, but the idea seems to be to make a product as black as possible without making it glossy, a surprisingly difficult task. The technology would work by using a special etching process that creates pores in the metal, effectively increasing the surface area for light absorption in an anodized layer. According to the patent’s own description:
“The anodized part includes a metallic substrate and an anodized layer superimposed on and formed from the metallic substrate. The anodized layer includes (i) an outer surface that includes randomly distributed light absorbing characteristics that are capable of absorbing incident visible light on the outer surface, and (ii) pores defined by the pore walls, where the particles of color is infused within the pores. “
Pores would look like this when viewed under a microscope.
Dark materials convert light to heat, so that amount of light absorption could pose a thermal management problem in sunlight. Still, if we ever see the product come out in the open (dark?), It’s fair to assume that Apple will have fixed that particular reservation; their new chips are very efficient after all.
The patent dates back to 2019, so it remains to be seen if Apple dropped the idea or just needs a little more time.
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Posted December 5, 2020 – 00:49 UTC
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