#when Wally did it against Hawkman Wally was caught because Hawkman could see him

[givemewallywestorgivemedeath]

Lmao, vibrate to be completely invisible must be one and the most useful, and least used power from the speedsters. I can't remember it been used in recent times, like since the 90's.

You would think, right? But no, it's pretty useless actually.

How it works is the speedster vibrates at a rate faster than the human eye can see. Think hummingbird wings but faster. And while invisibility would be super useful, this ability isn't technically invisibility and thus it has a lot of drawbacks.

1. They're only invisible to the human eye. Aliens, metahumans, technology and some animals can still see them. Any camera would still pick up a blur because modern cameras are way faster than the human eye. Most aliens and metahumans have enhanced speed (at least relative to humans) and would at least see a blur. Canonically, this trick doesn't even work on Hawkman because his eyes are just fast enough to see a slight blur.

So that right there is the majority of heroes and villains. The only people left would be non-powered humans.

2. Most non-powered humans would still be able to see them. At least most non-powered humans that aren't civilians. Because most of their masks come equipped with infrared cameras or cameras just in general. Speedsters generate a lot of heat just in general but they generate a fuck ton of heat when vibrating. So they'd light up on infrared like a house on fire. And again, any cameras would detect them immediately.

3. Doesn't work against other speedsters.

4. Can't make any sounds while doing it.

4. Doesn't work against anyone with psychic abilities (detect mind), infrared based abilities (see them), light based abilities (see them), ability to sense water (detect body), ability to sense electricity (detect powers), anyone with superhearing (hear heartbeat and breathing), anyone with cybernetic eye enhancements (see them), ect.

5. It costs a lot of energy!

6. It's REALLY hard to do correctly! This takes a lot of skill and effort. We've seen Bart, Jesse and Wally pull this off for short periods of time while standing still but the second they start to move while doing it they become a very visible blur. Wally used to do this all the time as a kid because he assumed villains wouldn't be worried about a blur following them. But Wally was also living in the silver age where villains didn't care about blurs following them and would chalk them up to mirages and stuff. So it's not a move that can be done for a long period of time and you can't move at all while doing it.

So yeah, there are very few situations in which this technique would actually work.