About camera on a microscope

[adruidsong]

I have a digital microscope and now I want to buy a biological microscope that is capable of 400x (digital) but I have the following question for which I didn’t found a straight answer.
A normal microscope has 3 lenses: 4x, 10x, 40xs. Using an eyepiece that is 10x you have a total of 400x. Until now everything is clear.

But if I replace the eyepiece with a digital camera, how can I achieve the same 400x when displaying the image/video on a computer (at a decent resolution, like 1024x768) ?
What technical specifications must the camera have? For example, I saw cameras from 1Mpx to 8Mpx (and the price get’s higher, of course).

The problem is that on the market there are a lot of models and from their technical specifications I don’t know which one to choose. Of course, I I had the money, I can buy the best microscope with the best camera and for sure the image would be great, but i don’t want (and have) that money to spend.

[MicroBob]

Hi,
for a proper scale in your micro photographs it is best to use an object micrometer (ca. 10€ on ebay). Then you determine e.g. how many pixels equal 0,1mm, draw such a scale bar and copy it into your image. The final magnification then depends on the size of your monitor and zoom factor.

Accroding the camera choice you will find a lot of solution here in the forum. When you like the results the people get you can see whether their camera solution would be suitable for your new microscope.

Bob

[DonSchaeffer]

You can also get microscopes with 60x objectives and eyepieces of 25x (for a total magnification of 1500x). The eyepiece camera may limit your field of vision and look like an eyepiece with slightly higher magnification. I have an inexpensive camera that makes a 640X480 image. I have ordered one with more pixels but the one I have works perfectly well. We usually don't talk about the "power" of the microscope since the real goal is make things clear, not bigger.

[Roldorf]

Hi Don, you should watch Olivers channel on microscopy. It's not possible to see any more detail with a so called magnification above 1000x because of the properties of light. Anything above 1000 is empty magnification, in other words there is no more detail to see.

[micro]

If you already have a smart phone just use that as a camera. From what I've seen those microscope specific cameras aren't very good. You either want a dslr setup or just a smart phone with an adapter.

[BramHuntingNematodes]

Hi Don, you should watch Olivers channel on microscopy. It's not possible to see any more detail with a so called magnification above 1000x because of the properties of light. Anything above 1000 is empty magnification, in other words there is no more detail to see.

That's assuming the eye can perceive all the detail at 1000x!

[adruidsong]

Thank you all for the details, I will try to give you a little more detail about my inquire. It may be a dumb thing what am I asking, but I am new to all of this.
The question is, if I look through the microscope myself at a specimen (using the 40x lens and the 10x eyepiece) and if I can focus properly, let’s suppose I will see some interesting details at 400x magnification.
But if instead looking myself I use a camera, the camera will “look” through the 40x lens and that’s it the maximum magnification, because the camera will be instead the eyepiece that’s 10x. So how the camera will achieve the 10x that is replacing so when connecting to the computer it will give me the same details as the ones that I saw myself when using the 400x?

[Scarodactyl]

While the 10x eyepiece enlarges the image the lens of your eye ensmallens it. A camera does not have a wide angle lens in front of the sensor so it behaves differently than the eye.

[micro]

Every camera will give a different size image. So no the magnification will not look the same size as it does through the eye piece. But I believe cameras have their own zoom factor so the magnification will be similar to what you get with eyepieces but no not the same. When I use my 4/3 sensor dslr camera the size of the specimen I am observing is close to the size and quality as it appears through my microscope eyepieces.

[Scarodactyl]

Every camera will give a different size image. So no the magnification will not look the same size as it does through the eye piece. But I believe cameras have their own zoom factor so the magnification will be similar to what you get with eyepieces but no not the same. When I use my 4/3 sensor dslr camera the size of the specimen I am observing is close to the size and quality as it appears through my microscope eyepieces.

You'll get different crop factors based on the size of the sensor and the adapter you use, my point is there is not an inherent 10:1 difference in what the camera sees vs the eye.
This is not a change in optical magnification from one camera sensor to another, the intermediate image is a fixed size and different sensor sizes can capture more or less of it. How big the image is varies from one system to another, though the field number of your eyepieces gives a minimum. Micro 4/3 sensors have a 22mm diagonal so they're well suited for most micrpscopes--some systems can cover 26.5mm ultra widefield eyepieces and these will also usually cover aps-c with no other optics. On the other hand if you put a 1/2.6" sensor with a 7mm diagonal onto one of these with no optics it captires a tiny tiny bit of that image--the end result is like higher mag, but dim (losing most light) and low resolution (pushing low mag NA up to a higher mag).

Adding intermediate optics can help resize that image to better match the sensor size--often it needs to be downsized to match the tiny sensors in microscope cameras and sometimes enlarged to cover larger formats.

[Hobbyst46]

...., because the camera will be instead the eyepiece that’s 10x. So how the camera will achieve the 10x that is replacing so when connecting to the computer it will give me the same details as the ones that I saw myself when using the 400x?

In addition to the comments above, please note that there is more than one method of fitting a camera on top of the microscope: with an eyepiece, without an eyepiece, camera body only, camera plus camera lens, etc. The comprehensive information on this subject, by forum member, the expert Charles Krebs, on his site krebsmicro.com, is highly recommended.

[adruidsong]

Thank you all, after all the info you gave me and reading some more articles on the net i definitely know more about microscopes, optics and how camera on the microscope works.

[DonSchaeffer]

I recently installed a 60x dry objective. I do believe I can see bacteria a lot better with that than I can with the 40X objective. I don't use the eyepiece much. I use my little camera but the magnification with the camera would I estimate to be 1500 X. The camera makes things appear even larger. One should not argue that this an optical illusion. As one commentator put, talking about optical illusions regarding things invisible to the eye is absurd.

[adruidsong]

In the end i bought BRESSER Biorit TP Microscope (https://www.bresser.de/en/Microscopes-M ... scope.html) + BRESSER MikrOkular Full HD eyepiece camera (https://www.bresser.de/en/Astronomy/Acc ... amera.html).

For a beginner like me this microscope it's great and i don't regret this choice, the camera it's not as good as i was expecting but in the end it's a entry level camera and also i am a beginner at this so maybe in the future i will learn how to better use it. Right now here is a video i manage to get with this setup https://youtu.be/h4lWrit5ShU

Also i am investigating how to use my phone's camera with the microscope, a basic setup where i was holding the phone over the ocular with my hand gave me better image, both in image and video quality.

[micro]

You can buy a phone adapter on Amazon for like $20