Garden (in ballpoint pen) DSC_2821FM
This is the ball of a ballpoint pen, with the reflection of my back window in it. The total size of the image subject is 1mm by 1mm.
I found this "ultra-macro" difficult for two reasons, technical (getting everything set up so that vibrations don't make everything blurry) and composition (how do you set up your subject when you cannot see it?). Once I realised that I could capture the reflected image in a ballpoint, that was straightforward, with a chocolate wrapper in the background for contrasting colour.
Taken with a Meopta 10x phase contrast microscope lens and 10x eyepiece on the Kopil Bellowsmat at full stretch, with some extension tubes for good measure. I did try a 20x lens, but vibration made set up too difficult.
Quite a lot of PP, because this is a focus merge of 18 shots, taken at approximately 20 micron depth intervals (total depth of field is therefore about 0.35mm). I have then cropped square, adjusted the blackpoint and saturation before rotating the image to get the reflection the "right way up".
Garden (in ballpoint pen) DSC_2821FM
This is the ball of a ballpoint pen, with the reflection of my back window in it. The total size of the image subject is 1mm by 1mm.
I found this "ultra-macro" difficult for two reasons, technical (getting everything set up so that vibrations don't make everything blurry) and composition (how do you set up your subject when you cannot see it?). Once I realised that I could capture the reflected image in a ballpoint, that was straightforward, with a chocolate wrapper in the background for contrasting colour.
Taken with a Meopta 10x phase contrast microscope lens and 10x eyepiece on the Kopil Bellowsmat at full stretch, with some extension tubes for good measure. I did try a 20x lens, but vibration made set up too difficult.
Quite a lot of PP, because this is a focus merge of 18 shots, taken at approximately 20 micron depth intervals (total depth of field is therefore about 0.35mm). I have then cropped square, adjusted the blackpoint and saturation before rotating the image to get the reflection the "right way up".