MicrobeHunter.com Microscopy Forum

Lovely video 75RR. Excellent detail, definitely Cthulu

Cue little fella.

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Looking forward to seeing some shots from your new microscope, keep us informed as to how you get on.

Thanks mintakax. Its a toothy grin

Thanks for the info' Charlie, very useful. I like the Relis B.Brown recommendation and will try this ring method out. If I can get it to work well enough it would avoid having to apply MC to the whole sample, my only concern is how much it will elevate the cover slip. I recently bought a batch of ch...

Thanks for the feedback 75RR. I agree, not the best colours for the subject, just something a little different. Pink next ;) The tank has a healthy population of green and brown Hydra, this one was rinsed back to its home. Thanks Charlie. I've a floating ring in the tank to keep an area free of duck...

Big green from the tank. Experimenting with coloured oblique illumination.

Looks good to me timurkhaz, well done, plenty to observe. While high performance objectives and lighting are nice to have, they are not essential IMO.
The filter effects in Shotcut (a free open source video editing program) can also be useful for enhancing footage.

Thanks for the info Bruce!

First one I've encountered that I didn't need to chase around.



Zeiss jena 25x apo. Oblique illumination.

Very nice, congrats.

Nice catch. Moving at a respectable speed compared to the ones I've seen.

In my random testing of household stuff for relaxant properties, salicylic acid also didn't fair well. Conversely if commercial outlets are adding preservatives it does make me wonder about the storage life of diy solutions.

I didn't notice any increase in mortality over the base sample water mintakax. There were only a few exhibiting this behaviour over 4 examined slides, all the others were going about their business happily at reduced speed. Purchased from eBay, it was advertised as 'Refined Methylcellulose' from an ...

The sample was well mixed but possibly. Perhaps some ciliates find it an irritant?

Odd reaction to Methylcellulose of a ciliate (1% solution, 50/50 mix with sample water). Other ciliates on the slide showed normal behaviour, just slowed down as expected. Found others on a second slide also exhibiting this pulsing motion of the oral groove/gullet. Is this normal?

First placid one I've encountered also. Usually only hang around if hidden in a clump of detritus. The illumination is oblique using a diy 3d printed patch. Some purple fringing which might be down to using phase contrast objectives, or perhaps a different patch design is needed? Still experimenting...

And always when your finger is on the shutter release. Great vid, thanks for sharing.

apochronaut wrote: ↑

Tue Oct 29, 2019 2:36 pm

Ciliates transmigrate, and with the wisdom of their age, more often than not come back as slime molds, where they frequently encounter politicians going the other way.

That brightened my day some

Still learning Shotcut video editor, illumination could be better. Apex frankenscope, approx 200x & 600x. Comments/suggestions welcome.

Thanks 75RR! Now all I have to do is remember it, heh.

Hi mintakax. The 10L tank is in a north facing window without any additional lighting. Initially I ran it without a bubbler but it started to pong, so added a bubbler to see if it would help. It worked, but I noticed the algae population fall rapidly after 2 weeks. Changing it to 12/12 seems be the ...

Pic' taken a couple of months ago Bob, started the tank late May. Weed growth has increased since the pic', duck weed covers the entire surface now. Its been as much fun watching the inhabitants through the tank as it has under the microscope Bubbler runs 12hrs on 12 off.

Young shrimp trapped under the coverslip. Returned to my critter tank to go about its shrimpy busness.
4x Plan Acro through 3.3x NFK eyepiece, not got around to making a scale overlay yet, sorry. Diy oblique patch.

An interesting article. Symbiosis isn't the norm for fungi, highly intolerant of other colonies. A side effect of their chemical warfare can be very desirable. https://www.ukfungusday.co.uk/blog/fungus-wars The secondary metabolites used in such warfare are being researched actively. Without them we...

Thanks for the info' Michael. Conformal testing is beyond my resources. If simple comparative shots show anything worthwhile I'll post the results. Right now I'm busy experimenting with photo tube designs for the scope. I'll post a thread on the lighting mod once complete. Thanks for the helpful sug...

Will do Tom. One is an unknown model 1970's monocular Gillett & Sibert, the other a Chinese made Apex trinocular, also model unknown. The Apex came without a photo tube so I'm in the middle of designing/testing/3D printing one to accommodate an Olympus NFK photo eyepiece and mount for DSLR (fun time...

Michael: Thanks and noted. I was hoping there would be an obvious choice but think I'll have to compare both LEDs. I'll do some tests time permitting. I assume a DSLR might be able to do some comparative shots for CRI? Custom WB? Hobbyst46: Thanks also for the suggestions. The finned heatsink I've s...

Thanks Bob, it didn't occur to me that I could use filters (lots to catch up on). As the guts of the present illumination system are coming out, I think I can shoehorn a substantial heatsink into the base for the LED and the semiconductors of the current shunt circuit. I have a spare XHP50 also, so ...