Macro-photography

The iffy 'six' isn't objectionable at all in context of the original shot. It's a good photo. We're having a violent agreement!

I'd say the photo taken with an old Nokia Phone is a good example of an engineering solution that's both Fit for Purpose and Value for Money. Phones are excellent for capturing photo opportunities like that loco. Not necessary to spend £10,000 on a high end camera, several lenses, flash equipment, filters, and a heavy tripod in order to get 'quality'. In fact a quality camera outfit would take so long to set up the engine would have gone.

But the Nokia isn't 'Fit for Purpose' in all circumstances; many situations demand more elaborate kit to get acceptable results. That's all I'm saying - horses for courses. Even inexpensive cameras work remarkably well and you don't have to be an expert to use them. Enjoy!

Dave

Raphael, could you please tell us how much you moved the camera between these 30 images?

It would also be interesting if the stacking software says something what is sensible/necessary and what not.
Can images be stacked say with 1/100 mm distance, or is that nonsense? I hope you see what I would like to know.

Thanks, and regards
Hans

Edited By Versaboss on 24/05/2020 12:31:34

Thanks Neil.

Sam, tried to look hard and make my eyes crossed but no luck. Ended up feeling dizzy and sick.

Thanks Nick, just utilising what I have. Wanted a dedicated macro rail but my problem is it could not hold its position on vertical plane. Maybe a more permanent solution is to adapt a low cost cross slide which I can tighten the gib strip to hold its position on a vertical plane.

Chris, great shots here. Very nice on this small carnivorous plant (or am I just imagining things). Take another picture during feeding time.

Hans, the movement on each shot is 0.25mm. I could do less than that but the focused area is quite good. You can lessen the distance to over lap it and the stacking software will do they rest. I use HeliconFocus. I think the software can handle quite a lot of stacks, never tried it more than 30 but I might just to see.

BW,

Raphael

Edited By RAPHAEL VAL GOLEZ 1 on 24/05/2020 14:36:59

Edited By RAPHAEL VAL GOLEZ 1 on 24/05/2020 14:38:10

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I don’t know what Raphael is using for stacking, but we commonly use one or two micron increments in microscopy.

Software like Zerene and Helicon will stack small or large numbers of frames, at equal or unequal step sizes.

MichaelG.

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http://zerenesystems.com/

Edited By Michael Gilligan on 24/05/2020 15:30:55

Hi Michael, I found this poor little bee on my door step that can barely move prior to cycling this morning. An ant is tugging on his legs so I placed him near a leaf and an early morning sunshine. When I got back from my run the poor thing is dead.

I took a picture of him prior to placing him back in my garden. I took a 180 stack shots. Each picture is taken at an increments of 0.125mm. Taken at 1:1 magnification. HeliconFocus is brilliant and was able to merge all the photos in without any issue despite high numbers of shot taken. I don't think its necessary to take that much but I was testing the software if it can handle it.

First uncropped picture.

Second with cropped borders.

Third cropped which focused closely to the head.

Wish I can magnify closer to see more fine details. Each hair looks sharp and the fuzzy look of the bee was captured very well.

BW,

Raphael

Edited By RAPHAEL VAL GOLEZ 1 on 24/05/2020 18:04:26

Edited By RAPHAEL VAL GOLEZ 1 on 24/05/2020 18:05:14

Excellent result, Raphael

I don’t think there is much to choose between Helicon Focus and Zerene Stacker

... I just happen to use Zerene, and knew there was some good introductory text on the link I provided for Hans.

MichaelG.

These are in-between my ultrasonic tank and mag-stand.

Thanks Michael. Here is another algorithm stocking option from Helicon focus. It is 180 stack so they advise if its over 100 shots option C needs to be chosen for rendering. I tried it and observe that the fuzzy area near the wings are all gone.

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Then you may like this, Raphael

It’s a detail from the wing of Volucella pellucens, near to the root

[ stacked image, from a prepared microscope slide ]

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I was intrigued to see what looks remarkably like a spring, or an hydraulic ram, or a damper

I think it's a spring, which allows the Alula [winglet] to toggle into one of two positions, to change the aerodynamics ... but I have yet to find a clear explanation.

... The more I learn, the more I realise how little I know.

MichaelG.

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volucella_pellucens

Edited By Michael Gilligan on 24/05/2020 19:15:26

Fantastic magnification Michael. Micro world of arthropods are complicated. The wings of this small flyers are very complicated. Likely they take the flight information generated by their wings and its sensory component (hairs and a lot more structures such as the one you posted) to make minute adjustment during flight and use it to control their wings. Think of it as a very sophisticated structure that allows lift, drag, variable pitch etc. Its the ultimate flying structure made. A wing and a propeller with variable geometry during flight. If we can reverse engineer it and make one I think that would be the ultimate evolution of flight (birds and bat not included here in the discussion).

Great to see this Michael. Post some more. This thread is getting more and more interesting.

BW

Raphael

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O.K. ... one more for now

Mallow pollen, in situ, from a wonderful vintage microscope slide mounted ‘without pressure’

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Any physical resemblance to coronavirus is entirely coincidental

MichaelG.

Edited By Michael Gilligan on 24/05/2020 20:36:09

I was having a quick play earlier on whilst I was photographing some milling cutter chucks for an album I'll eventually upload on the forum. All the following are pretty much uncropped, save for trimming the edges where I straightened them up, or changed the aspect ratio.

When you look up close, you can see why cheap taps are a bit of a pain to use.

And one from the Clarkson collet chuck; the characters are a little under 2mm tall.

I was quite impressed with the neatness of the engraving, to say it looks hand done.

The last one was taken with the Olympus 60mm macro & 10mm + 16mm extension tubes, on an E-M1 Mk2.

The pair of the tap, I was trying for a bit more magnification, so used the older 4/3 50mm macro with a 25mm extension, which gives a 1:1 magnification, still on the same m4/3s body.
[On the 4/3 DSLRs only one accessory is recognised, hence using it on the micro 4/3s body, where I could cheat, by using an extension tube on either side of the adaptor.]
This meant I could use the m4/3s to 4/3 adaptor and add both 10mm + 16mm extension tubes.
The front of the 50mm also sported a Sigma macro anastigmatic doublet; it doesn't give as much magnification as a Raynox, but it's all I have.

I think this is about as magnified as I can get without trying something more exotic; I was struggling for depth of field on the tap as it was.

Bill

Raphael,

Until I scanned the Internet, I had only known of the cross-eyed method of unaided stereo viewing. This **LINK** explains various techniques including free-viewing which might work for you. For me, it doesn’t.

My brain seems to have been exercised on too many occasions to only take a cross-eyed view of things.

I've arranged this for free-viewing, and hope it works for you.

Sam

Just to be clear, Sam "free-viewing" encompasses both wall-eyed (parallel) and cross-eyed viewing.

Yes, I 'see' what you mean

What a wonderful thread, and so much to learn.

Keep it going Bandersnatch.

Sam

Hi Sam, I still can't see this type by unaided stereo viewing even using the unaided techniques in the link, I remember trying on this Stereoscopic 1 which Michael Gilligan posted back in May 2015, it woks with my stereoscopic viewer though as do this Stereoscopic 2 or this Stereoscopic 3 which I've downloaded on my phone and your one works very well on my phone too.

Regards Nick.

Hi Raphael, really excellent photo of the bee.

Jack Hobson, beautiful photos of your birds.

Regards Nick.

Hi MichaelG, very good microscopic photos, this is probably the best I'm ever going to achieve Digital Microscope taken with one of those cheap USB microscopes.

Regards Nick.

My macro lens goes closer than those birds, but this is as close as it gets...

Today I used my lock-down purchase Oxygen Concentrator to silver solder this (watch hands) hole gaugeback together. I was incredibly annoyed when I snapped it this morning but I think I'm more than happy that I managed to to fix this - and it is very strong! Still needs a tidy up.

Just been having another quick play as a diversionary tactic to doing something useful.

I thought I'd try a slightly different setup to attempt a bit more magnification, which I achieved, but at the expense of it being almost impossible to grab focus without a movable stage.
Camera is on a decent tripod, and tap is on a folding coffee table, but both on a laminate floor, so taking a good 10 seconds for vibrations to die down after trying to set the focus.

Same M1 tap as before;

and a slightly larger 10BA one;

Both images uncropped, barring change of format to 16:9

Olympus E-M1 Mk2 150mm Sigma 4/3s + 25mm 4/3s extension tube, adaptor to m4/3s, & 10mm + 16mm tubes.
F11, so maybe a bit of diffraction coming into play to blur the image as well.
Clearly I need more practice (and some better metric taps).

Not sure the photography's much better, but the tap seems to be higher quality.

Bill