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| 1 | 2 | 3 |  » Stats |
Members: 48,655
Threads: 78,892
Posts: 821,435
Top Poster: glsammy (14,779)
| | Welcome to our newest member, redfrag | |  | | 
06-10-2009, 01:18 AM
| | Commander of the Wild Empire | | Join Date: Nov 2008 Location: Near Scarborough
Posts: 2,048
| | | Re: Microscope Camera Techniques
Quote:
Originally Posted by Chris Yeates  would you want to go birdwatching with a laptop looking at what your bins are seeing?
best
Chris | Yes, definitely .... if the improved view was as good an improvement as I get from my microscope set up  . What I see is like the detail when using a spotting scope on a tripod compared with a pair of bins  . I am being honest. I see SO much more with my set up than without. It was a shock to be reminded what it was like before I used it. And I don't think there is a lot wrong with my eyes either, they are only just beginning to get a bit old   Good thing I do a lot of keeps them well exercised
Melanie |
06-10-2009, 12:28 PM
|  | Wild Member | | Join Date: Mar 2008 Location: Yorkshire
Posts: 116
| | | Re: Microscope Camera Techniques
Just had a quick look at that site and as I have a wife to keep in red wine it looks out of my price range.. . . . . but I may try the clever software with multiple images again. How do you get the camera to focus at discrete intervals? Was it by guesswork or is there a (cheap) clever gadget?
[General Query, off topic - is there a Cortinarius forum? I'm trying to educate myself on these  ]
cheers, Alan |
06-10-2009, 04:29 PM
| | Commander of the Wild Empire | | Join Date: Nov 2008 Location: Near Scarborough
Posts: 2,048
| | | Re: Microscope Camera Techniques
Quote:
Originally Posted by Chris Yeates looking down the scope will (probably?) always be the best way for me to study fungi microscopically | Wise man to qualify with the word 'probably?' Quote:
Originally Posted by Chris Yeates ... resolution on a screen / photo is, after all a limited, 'dotty' view, always inferior even though my new set-up which can produce RAW images at 28Mb is getting there
would you want to go birdwatching with a laptop looking at what your bins are seeing?
best
Chris | How often do you find that a photo taken with your camera reveals more than you noticed/can see with the naked eye? That is a dotty picture that it takes, but a dotty picture of what the camera sees through its lens, not what I see through my eyes, (though the object and the space between is the same). It can get closer up and more personal than I can do ....
And remember what Dave J said the other day about using his camera to help id birds? ... when he can't see the detail he needs with his bins? Yet he is looking at a dotty picture but gets more detail, and that is on his lcd camera screen ....
Similarly with the microscope camera, it doesn't turn what I see with my eyes into a dotty picture (though when they develop the technology to plug my brain straight into the computer then that might happen  ). Then I'd agree, if that were the case then it might not be so good, perhaps, unless its intelligence in interpreting light is better programmed than mine. Instead it is what the camera sees down the microscope that gets turned into a dotty picture. It appears to see more than my eyes plus an eyepiece lens can see. Its lens must be better than mine even when enhanced by the eyepiece 
cheers
Melanie   |
06-10-2009, 04:53 PM
| | Commander of the Wild Empire | | Join Date: Nov 2008 Location: Near Scarborough
Posts: 2,048
| | | Re: Microscope Camera Techniques
Quote:
Originally Posted by JennyS Hi Melanie - what equipment are you using for the microscope images you post?
I desperately need a microscope set-up but I don't think I'd be able to see too much with an ordinary microscope - one eye sees much better than the other, with or without glasses!
Your 'down the scope and onto the screen' set-up sounds like it could be what I need........
Jenny | Hi Jenny
I've got a pretty basic Zenith microscope (Advanced Student series), and a down the microscope camera DCM130 (USB2.0), max resolution 1.3M pixels from Brunel. The camera is plugged into the USB port and the picture shows real-time on my computer screen. I do have a dirty great big screen, mind you, but it works almost as well on my small 15 inch lcd, but I do have to scroll the picture on that to get the extreme edges at max resolution. The picture via the camera does have murkier colours than my eye interprets direct, (compare Rob Sutton's micro photos with mine for an idea) but I see things in far greater detail on the screen than I do down the scope, and it is very relaxed viewing.
However resolution of the camera is very important. If the max is 800x600 you don't get the level of detail that would make a difference. Hence I'd suggest not less than 1.3M pixel (which gives 1280x1024) if you intend to use the screen real time for viewing. Higher than 1.3Mp has other problems, in that the processing time is longer so there is a time lag between the pic being taken and it appearing on the screen, which can make focussing difficult as you are always overshooting.
Maybe there is someone out your way with a similar set up who could do a demonstration? There is nothing like seeing for yourself what you get to know if it will suit your needs, particularly as microscopes and cameras don't quite come in the cheap category.
Cheers
Melanie |
06-10-2009, 06:44 PM
|  | Commander of the Wild Empire | | Join Date: Oct 2008 Location: Huddersfield, West Yorkshire
Posts: 3,459
| | | Re: Microscope Camera Techniques
Quote:
Originally Posted by Alantb Just had a quick look at that site and as I have a wife to keep in red wine it looks out of my price range.. . . . . | FYI there's one for a third the price at: 9MP NEW DIGITAL CAMERA FOR MICROSCOPES WITH ACCESSORIES on eBay (end time 07-Oct-09 17:50:51 BST) - and they do have lower MP versions down to around £120 from time to time I think . . . Quote:
Originally Posted by SheffieldLass Wise man to qualify with the word 'probably?' | I only said 'probably' because future technological advances may just run a bit faster than my life expectancy Quote:
Originally Posted by SheffieldLass How often do you find that a photo taken with your camera reveals more than you noticed/can see with the naked eye?
cheers
Melanie | I can honestly say never; it is as I said earlier the struggle to echo what I see (bit of a mixed metaphor there  ) that has led me to this camera jump; but it's clearly a case of "diff'rent stokes for diff'rent folks" and your bank balance will benefit if you're happy with your system and I've been pushed to one with 7 times the resolution
perhaps it's because you are mainly agaricking and I'm looking at fungi where the spores can have bristles which are very difficult to make out and where the subtleties of conidial formation need to me ascertained; maybe it's a case that I am not looking at the whole picture but concentrating on small, key areas of the field of view
It's all fascinating stuff - perhaps I need to organise a mini-workshop looking at these issues - I could just about accomodate a dozen or so people . . . .
best
Chris
__________________
"You must know it's right - The spore is on the wind tonight"
--Steely Dan, "Rose Darling" |
06-10-2009, 06:50 PM
| | Commander of the Wild Empire | | Join Date: Oct 2008 Location: Huddersfield, West Yorkshire
Posts: 3,459
| | | Re: Microscope Camera Techniques
Quote:
Originally Posted by SheffieldLass Higher than 1.3Mp has other problems, in that the processing time is longer so there is a time lag between the pic being taken and it appearing on the screen, which can make focussing difficult as you are always overshooting.
Cheers
Melanie | agreed - I soon found that the simplest thing to do is to focus at a low resolution and then switch up; although it never 'disappears' - snapshot capture seems virtually instantaneous and you only save to file when you're happy with the image (that takes a couple of seconds on my laptop); I also am using a dedicated external LED screen as the one on the laptop is relatively small
Chris
__________________
"You must know it's right - The spore is on the wind tonight"
--Steely Dan, "Rose Darling"
Last edited by Chris Yeates; 06-10-2009 at 06:56 PM.
|
07-10-2009, 03:01 PM
| | Commander of the Wild Empire | | Join Date: Nov 2008 Location: Near Scarborough
Posts: 2,048
| | | Re: Microscope Camera Techniques
Quote:
Originally Posted by Chris Yeates
I only said 'probably' because future technological advances may just run a bit faster than my life expectancy
I can honestly say never; it is as I said earlier the struggle to echo what I see (bit of a mixed metaphor there ) that has led me to this camera jump; but it's clearly a case of "diff'rent stokes for diff'rent folks" and your bank balance will benefit if you're happy with your system and I've been pushed to one with 7 times the resolution
perhaps it's because you are mainly agaricking and I'm looking at fungi where the spores can have bristles which are very difficult to make out and where the subtleties of conidial formation need to me ascertained; maybe it's a case that I am not looking at the whole picture but concentrating on small, key areas of the field of view
It's all fascinating stuff - perhaps I need to organise a mini-workshop looking at these issues - I could just about accomodate a dozen or so people . . . .
best
Chris |
Melanie |
08-10-2009, 09:08 PM
|  | Commander of the Wild Empire | | Join Date: Jun 2007 Location: SW Ireland
Posts: 1,616
| | | Re: Microscope Camera Techniques
Quote:
Hi Jenny
I've got a pretty basic Zenith microscope (Advanced Student series), and a down the microscope camera DCM130 (USB2.0), max resolution 1.3M pixels from Brunel.
| Thanks Melanie, and for the info as regards camera resolution etc.
I've just been told that a friend has an old dissecting microscope that I can have in a couple of weeks time, though I don't know what make etc. It will get me started!
Jenny |
18-11-2009, 05:09 PM
| | Wild Member | | Join Date: Mar 2008 Location: Yorkshire
Posts: 116
| | | Re: Microscope Camera Techniques
Hello Everybody.
I've just bought one of these ScopeTek DCM130E devices and it's exactly what I was looking for and why it didn't get mentioned for such a long time I'll never know - but I'm only an occasional viewer of WAB so I didn't see the later posts. Anyhow, quest over , expect a lot of micro-pics in the future.....
Thanks to All, Alan |
19-11-2009, 12:45 AM
| | Commander of the Wild Empire | | Join Date: Nov 2008 Location: Near Scarborough
Posts: 2,048
| | | Re: Microscope Camera Techniques
Quote:
Originally Posted by Alantb Hello Everybody.
I've just bought one of these ScopeTek DCM130E devices and it's exactly what I was looking for and why it didn't get mentioned for such a long time I'll never know - but I'm only an occasional viewer of WAB so I didn't see the later posts. Anyhow, quest over , expect a lot of micro-pics in the future.....
Thanks to All, Alan | Excellent. Glad you've finally found something that does what you want. I'd be bereft if mine packed up!
Melanie | | | |
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