MicrobeHunter.com Microscopy Forum

Its kinda almost too general of a question to answer super well. A stereoscope can be much better than, or it can be way worse than a compound microscope. If you make everything the same specs to have an accurate comparison, then you arent very likely to have any notable differences, but that kinda ...

I would potentially worry about losing some light from the light source being much further above the condenser, but other than that, I cant see any reason you would encounter issues

In all honesty, I think the risk of breakage isn't as big as some people say. Effectively all of the cover slips that I have broken have been during preparing for reuse, basically cleaning them. So as they are often in a paper towel when they break, oh no, I throw it in the trash, and no harm caused...

Well, they don't make them like they used to, all my 4 microscopes are used, 1 each from the 70s, 80s, and 90s. Much older than me, but they all work fairly well, glad to see another person making good use of old gear, that stuff lasts in a way that modern mass produced products can't. Only issue is...

Does anyone have some advice for cleaning a concave and small front element? Take some soft wood stick wrap medical cotton wool around it and soak it with some optical cleaner. Instead of the cleaner you may use a mixture of ethanol and ether for good results. I used the blunt end of a skewer with ...

So, I have an objective for my neophot 21 that was really dirty, and now it’s clean. Or at least, 99% of its area is clean, except for the actual front element, because it’s concave, and lens paper just harmlessly moves over it, without making any contact, so it’s still got a load of dirt on it. Doe...

I can hardly see any checker pattern, just a bit of roughness to the background. Yes, it’s quite a lot more apparent when looking at the uncompressed files, I’ll have to see if I can upload a png that shows it better when I’m home in a few hours. It is great to see the flagella in slow motion!! :-)...

@Topcode - good point about the Toupview. I haven't anything to lose (except the time I spend trying to make it work!) and if the software which comes with my camera is substandard, I'll give it a try. Much thanks! Toupview and "Amscope" software are one and the same. The Amscope cameras come with ...

In order to record high fps video, I have used the 3x binning option, which allows me to use higher framerate, on a larger area, with higher sensitivity. The issue is that this binning leaves behind a checker pattern, which i assume is due to the partial coverage of bayer patterns when binning 9 pix...

@Topcode - much thanks for your input. I have previously seen reference to the Toupview software, but never discussed it with anyone using it. I went to the Toupview website and they have downloads for their Toupview Light software. Would you know if this is a universal microscope camera software p...

Personally, I use touptek microscope cameras. In their E3ISPM lineup(designed for a trinocular, but they have an eyepiece camera lineup as well, this is just the one i use) which is usb 3.0, they have cameras up to 1.4" (23mm diagonal) but personally ive used 1" and 1/1.2" ones. The software, toupvi...

My SMZ-U has a back port and a side-port. What is the function to have two? And why does the back one have a lens but the side-port doesn’t? Is it so that both have infinite focus despite having different lengths? one port is the left view, other is the right view. In a stereoscope these are two di...

Useful for lower magnification ( up to 400X and maybe 600X) for thicker specimens. Pricey for advanced optical choices. Challenging for illumination techniques other than BF and potentially expensive. Unless you were heavily involved in thick aqueous samples a lot, probably not worth the outlay, un...

Well guys, I got it to work, well work is a strong word, its being illuminated with a milwaukee search light where the halogen bulb is supposed to go, which is not in fact the best way to illuminate a microscope. BUT, I get an image though the eyepieces, and that's just about all I care about right ...

I suggest you ignore the Xenon lamp option, and concentrate on the rest of it. That's fair, to be honest I should probably replace the lighting with LEDs anyways, the thing could use some modernization, given it is 40 years old. And yeah, it definitely does have some potential, but Ive got a hell o...

I would recommend maybe trying some algae instead of what looks to be a section of a leaf. For example, spirogyra have very recognizable spiraling chloroplasts.

Well, the main things missing seem to be the power supplies for the xenon lamp and halogen bulb. I also still have no idea how most of it is supposed to work but, those being missing specifically is an issue because I know nothing about their specifications, like why there are 7 prongs on the xenon ...

Using an infinity optic on a 170mm scope will a) have a different magnification and NA then as labeled b) be improperly corrected c) almost definitely not plan anymore. It is very very not recommended to mix tube lengths.

I see, mine only makes about 1/8th a turn, so I guess thats probably broken... yay!
I'm also now noticing a small clicking noise when turning it, thats probably not a good sign either.

macnmotion wrote: ↑

Sun Dec 24, 2023 1:21 am

My TMD has a lever, not a knob.

Really? This is what mine has, unless I'm looking in the wrong place, but I dont see anything else on the body that could be it.

There should be some method of focusing the Bertrand lens - not sure what it is on a TMD. You do what to center each phase ring individually. There is a small knob on the turret with the Bertrand lens, but it barely moves and appears to have little or no impact on the image, it could just be broken...

So I recently obtained a Diaphot TMD, with 4 objectives, 3 of which are phase (4x PhL, 10x Ph1, 20x Ph2). The Diaphot is great in that it has built in Bertrand lens, it is well focused on the low power 4x PhL objevctive, but totally blurred on any of the other objectives. This is what the 4x objecti...

This is a metallurgical objective meant for epi use and without a cover slip. Even if mounted on its stand or another stand with an infinity tube lens, it won't provide a good image for regular slides. I see, so that ridged ring at its base is just to help with grip when screwing/unscrewing or is j...

I found a used Neophot 21 in a store, thinking of buying it. Its pretty beat up though, specifically the left side of it is a good bit messed up, and there's a lot of dirt on the exterior. However, 15 bucks is effectively nothing for an inverted metallurgical microscope, which looks at least partial...

Currently, I'm a bit puzzled by one aspect: The diameter of the trinocular rear port on my microscope is larger than the side port (the side port is 38mm). I'm curious if there's any functional difference between the two. If anyone has insights on this, I'd love to hear them. One of the main differ...

I agree, it's worth a try. However.... 20x and above M-type objectives won't like the cover glass. On the other hand, if you're using standard objectives for cover glass, you might be limited by depth of field above 20x. Yeah, DOF will probably really suck, because with non immersion objectives not...

I have a nice sample of quartz, with many many very small inclusions. The issue is that the surface of the quartz is rough, causing images I take of the inclusions to be blurry at best. So I have an idea, using immersion oil on top of the quartz, with a slide cover on top of that, should reduce the ...

A frosted plate is not a bad choice, but the SMZ-U mirror under stage glass already has a frosted and mirrored side, which may make a clear plate a far more versatile choice

How much do you want to spend? One easy solution is to get an aps-c mirrorless camera and directly adapt it to the photo port with no intermediate optics. Unfortunately, I only have a Canon EOS Rebel XTi that has a APS-C, but is not mirrorless. If that's not it, would a Swiftcam (e.g. the 20 Megapi...

Personally, I use a E3ISPM08300KPD and a .67x reducer, if you want to go the dedicated camera route, its not bad. It is supported on Mac, though I use windows. However, it doesn't make use of most of the amazingly wide illumination on the SMZ-U, as Scarodactyl said it can go up to APS-C, so an APS-C...