Microscope photography?

[DocFrankenstein]

I'm gonna be a student in 2 days and I'll have access to light microscopes for sure. It's oil emission microscopes, capable of 1000x magnification I think.

What adapter do I need to take pics with an EOS camera? How long are the exposures? Some living organisms are really fast when they're alive, and anything over 1/30th of a second will blur them.

Is the usual lamp from under the microscope be enough? What's the most common way to mount the camera?

[LittleG.]

x1000? Jeez!!! :shock: I have been using x10 - x40!! So you will be using slides on a compound scope? Whereas I use a stereomicroscope for a 3D image with more of the subject in view.

If my assumptions about a compound scope are correct, then slide preparations are illuminated from beneath and have to be thin enough to be transparent. There are accessories such as ring lights, high intensity bench lamps, spotlights, and fibreoptics available, but these are more suited for use with stereomicroscopes.

The dof is so narrow it will practically be non existent. Aperture is generally f0 no matter what photomicrography you are doing, because usually the microscope 'lens' has no iris - unless you are going really upmarket and your scope has an internal iris diaphragm to allow adjustment of the aperture.

Probably you will need a T2-1 Canon adapter ring, as listed here:
http://www.meijitechno.com/photovid_acc.htm
I say 'probably' because with some microscopes (e.g. Leitz and Olympus trinoculars) you will need the specific manufacturers adapter because the tubes are wide. So maybe best to find out more about the type of scope you are going to be using first.

Here are some pics to show how the cam looks mounted:
http://www.brunelmicroscopes.com/photomicrography.html

Good luck, and please get in touch when you have some results! :D

[Loekito]

Hi LittleG, so interesting reading your post. You're such an expert on microscope photography. Can you show me the sample of the picture taken with it? Is it in your website? (since I cannot find one there).

thanks & regards,

Loekito

[LittleG.]

Hi LittleG, so interesting reading your post. You're such an expert on microscope photography. Can you show me the sample of the picture taken with it? Is it in your website? (since I cannot find one there).
Thanks Loekito, but I'm a long way short of 'expert' :oops: :roll:
My website has only four samples on display at the moment. You can see them here:
http://www.photo-art-gallery.com/gallery/thumbnails.php?album=22

[EXA1a]

I'm gonna be a student in 2 days and I'll have access to light microscopes for sure. It's oil emission microscopes, capable of 1000x magnification I think.

What adapter do I need to take pics with an EOS camera? How long are the exposures? Some living organisms are really fast when they're alive, and anything over 1/30th of a second will blur them.

Is the usual lamp from under the microscope be enough? What's the most common way to mount the camera?
I think Little G. answered the adapter question.
Exposure times are usually in a range between 1/10 and 1 sec, depending on the magnification. With this shutter speed you exactly hit the mirror slap sensitive range. As a consequence, you can't work without MLU (Wasia's modified firmware), except you either don't attach the camera firmly with an adapter (not practical) or you use the cardboard shutter (set on bulb and use a black cardboard to open/close the light source, also not very practible).
As a light source you can't use anything else but the microscope's lighting.
To slow down these little organisms, you can add some glycerine to the water droplet to make it more viscous. The organisma will survive for a while but look like moving in slow motion.
I have done some microscope work 20 years ago, obviously before the digital days...

Have fun!
--Jens--

[DocFrankenstein]

Cool pics Little G :D

It's obviously a compound microscope, with slides and separations (which I am still learning to make properly) :lol: Illiminated from underneath with a lamp of some sort. Magnification is awesome. You can see the chromosomes separating in big cells if you color it properly. :D

The thing is that I don't know the diameter of the tube where the eye piece goes. Kinda silly asking a question like this.

To stop the motion... I'm gonna get a flash in a few days. Vivitar 285 with 42 m rating. If I attach it with a cord to the camera, put the flash in the place of the lamp and blast it... I'm pretty sure it would give a nice pic at 1/200th of a sec...

I just don't wanna go blind doing this :D


I'm gonna be doing this for fun mostly. It's not required yet and the labs are standard. Thanks for the replies. I should find out what microscope I have and then try this stuff.