Incident light DIC question

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Yann E.
Posts: 36
Joined: Thu Sep 22, 2016 12:08 pm
Location: Near Toulouse, SW France

Incident light DIC question

#1 Post by Yann E. » Thu Mar 23, 2017 5:42 pm

A DIC question to fully show my level of ignorance...

I just missed a reasonably priced incident light BF/DF DIC nosepiece for my Orthoplan and I was considering experimenting with DIC on the Reichert Metavar or the Metapan (my "try everything & see what works" scopes) before investing in Orthoplan DIC accessories at their "normal" price...I noticed that

- many DIC nosepieces use only one Wollaston Prism for all the objectives (like the one I missed, or the Reichert Zetopan and Metavar setups)
- others (the DIC setups for the Orthoplan & Ortholux-2 incident light BF/oblique nosepieces) have one matched Wollaston prism for each objective. This intrigues me as it seems inconsistent with the "1 prism nosepiece" setup...
- there seem to be "generic", unmarked Leitz Wollaston prisms for DIC floating around, do these fit all Leitz objectives (all Leitz infinity corrected epi objectives, that is)

For my first steps in the realm of DIC, would the following options work :
- inserting one of those "generic" Leitz prisms in the optical path of the Reichert Metavar or Metapan, just above the nosepiece, to more or less replicate the "one prism for the whole nosepiece" setup ?
- Getting a set of 3-4 such generic prisms to fit each of the BF objectives of one of the Reichert Brothers ?
- Getting ANY wollaston prism and use it with ANY objective, as in incident light the prism works both ways and is always matched to itself anyway ?

Last option : considering how little I know about DIC, should I just forget about the whole thing & stick to brightfield ? :(

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