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Microscope Setup & Technical Questions

SiBurning

SiBurning

Starting this thread for technical questions about microscopes.

Here's some helpful links

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SiBurning

SiBurning

Continued from: http://badgerandblade.com/vb/showth...ith-my-new-microscope-My-Boker-straight-razor

re: green around edges on Oympus BH/BH2 microscope setup

I'm wondering if you have all matching parts. Is there an infinity symbol or 160 or 180 on the objectives and the illuminator? (It'll be 180 for refelected light because the illuminator extends the path.) I'm trying to remember & look things up, but I think it use a 180mm tube length. I thought it was infinity corrected at the tube lens, but now I'm no longer sure. On the BH stand, there might be an adapter, but I thought the UMA had that all built in. Just not sure.

If the parts all match, it might be the distance to the camera, or the lens on the camera or lack thereof.
 
I

Inkidu

Like the new thread. Thanks for the effort. Seems appropriate to keep the pictures separate from too much scope talk.

SiBurning said:
I'm wondering if you have all matching parts. Is there an infinity symbol or 160 or 180 on the objectives and the illuminator? (It'll be 180 for refelected light because the illuminator extends the path.) I'm trying to remember & look things up, but I think it use a 180mm tube length. I thought it was infinity corrected at the tube lens, but now I'm no longer sure. On the BH stand, there might be an adapter, but I thought the UMA had that all built in. Just not sure.

If the parts all match, it might be the distance to the camera, or the lens on the camera or lack thereof.
Click to expand...



  • OLYMPUS NEOSPLAN 20 0.46 ∞/0 f = 180
  • OLYMPUS NEOSPLAN 10 0.30 ∞/- f = 180
  • OLYMPUS NEOSPLAN 5-2 0.13 ∞/- f = 180

Parafocal 45mm
Threads 26mm
Metallurgical achromat, brightfield/darkfield, superwide flat field up to F.N. 26.5

Thanks for any help
 
I

Inkidu

SiBurning said:
I assume the illuminator also says 180. There might have been an infinity model, too. What about the camera? Are you using a lens, or projecting direct to the sensor? Look over Charles Krebs' website thoroughly and the photomacrography.net forum.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the links
Light coming from the top of the illuminator goes into the NFK 5X in a PM-ADF adapter (bottom right 2nd pic). That adapter is placed on top of the photo tube(BH2-PT). The MTV-3 with lens (pictured in hand) is placed over the PM-ADF. The light coming from NFK goes into the MTV-3 lens and lands directly on the camera sensor. (17mm from flange). The camera, with a thin Nikon 1 to C-mount adapter that doesn't add much if any distance, screws to the top of photo 3.

Hope this helps and thanks again for any help.
I will continue to research.
 

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Gamma

Gamma

SiBurning said:
Continued from: http://badgerandblade.com/vb/showth...ith-my-new-microscope-My-Boker-straight-razor

re: green around edges on Oympus BH/BH2 microscope setup

I'm wondering if you have all matching parts. Is there an infinity symbol or 160 or 180 on the objectives and the illuminator? (It'll be 180 for refelected light because the illuminator extends the path.) I'm trying to remember & look things up, but I think it use a 180mm tube length. I thought it was infinity corrected at the tube lens, but now I'm no longer sure. On the BH stand, there might be an adapter, but I thought the UMA had that all built in. Just not sure.

If the parts all match, it might be the distance to the camera, or the lens on the camera or lack thereof.
Click to expand...

The fringing or CA is normal - have to take it out in PS.
 
SiBurning

SiBurning

There's no reason to have that much CA with that rig. Something's not set up right. Could be the extra adapter that you mentioned in the other thread giving an incorrect focal length. I certainly don't get it on my BH-series BHM.
 
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I

Inkidu

I used the MTV-3 because I wanted to get the most field of view with a 1" sensor. A $1000 full frame senor Sony A7 would be tempting, but I got to stop spending money somewhere. An adapter and a few mm of spacers would get the exact flange focal distance as the original 35mm. Also would be nice to gain more control remotely for stacking shots. Right now I am limited with only commanding the picture to be shot. So my idea was to use the Nikon 1 with a flange focal distance of 17mm. (wiki) The MTV-3 was made for C mount video camera with a 1” sensor. Very similar to the Nikon 1. I got the MTV-3 with the MTI ccd72 and it appears to have a ½” sensor and it could have (hard to measure) a 12.5mm FFD. This FFD is what wiki has indicated for the CS-mount cameras. It is 17.526mm for a C-mount 16mm camera. This is why I thought a thin Nikon 1 to C-mount adapter and a shim would work well. While I did find some people eluding to the idea it was hard to know until I got these things in my hands. So to the problem. Is the green in some of my pictures something with the setup, my inexperience, and/or normal aberrations that happen without a $2000 objective? I always tried to stay within specs. Like parts or ones with similar specs seemed the most appropriate to get results that the scope was designed to achieve. This is where I thought of a few tests that might answer my questions. First would the scope remain in focus if I change between the head unit and the camera? (Designed to do) Secondly, would changing the distance between the top of MTV-3, and the camera be needed to achieve this design spec?
So I proceeded to go with my highest magnification objective focused in on a feather and then changed to the head unit. To quantify this the scope dial needed to be changed about 3 units up to get back into perfect focus. So very close, and I’m quite happy with that, but now to the interesting part. What effect will changing the distance mentioned have? So first I added 5.25mm of spacers. Same test as before only I had to adjust up about 10 units. Getting somewhere now. So I removed the C-mount to Nikon 1 adapter in order to achieve the smallest distance and held it in place with my hand. Voila, the scope needed only one unit of adjustment up. Hard to measure at this point very close to being in focus with either the head unit or the camera with no adjustment.
So was this the source of the green color, on the blade edge, on some of the photos? Not sure will need some more time with the scope. More importantly what measures will I take to bring it more closely within spec? I could possible get the top machined down. There seems to be room for it, and I do have a machinist friend who would help me. Not so keen on changing stock parts for something that might be minor to insignificant, especially since I only use the head unit or the camera at any one time.
I could use some help figuring out if my field of view I am getting now is what should be expected. The picture, with the 5X objective, is of the parallel space between a Feather DE. It just barely catches the metal i.e. mostly the clean room wipe. I did notice, that as I move the camera away from the top of the MTV-3 I would not catch any of the metal. As far as the FOV with the eyepieces in, the part of the picture does seem close, maybe a little less, than what a cut out rectangular slice would appear like. So, I figure some machine work would optimizing getting the biggest part of the normal view through the eyepieces.
Thanks for any help.

I should of kept going with the stack i.e. the top of the fibers and the metal are still out of focus. I see a gecko step motor driver in my future.
 

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I

Inkidu

After reading Procedure for Making Camera and Microscope Eyepieces Parfocal Charles Krebs 12/10/10 v1.5 I will try to do this with the lowest (5X) objective. Charles wrote "It is best to use a 4x or 10X objective for this procedure. Higher power objectives will give less accurate results. It’s somewhat counterintuitive, but the higher the power of the objective, the greater the depth-of-focus (at the film/sensor plane) even though the depth-of-field (at the subject plane) decreases dramatically. Since the purpose of this procedure is to position the camera body for most accurate focus, it is desirable to perform it with minimal depth-of-focus, which is obtained with low power objectives."

If your reading this Charles thanks for all the effort you put into making life a little easier for the rest of us.

Will machining the piece, with the reducing lens, be effected by the heat generated by the process? It is fairly chunky so it has some heat sinking capacity. I could ask him to do the machining in steps to allow it cool off. Until I know exactly how much to cut off the MTV-3 it would be hard to go ahead with such an extreme measure.

I also had the idea of taking the photo and then zooming in to see how in focus I am. Trying also to understand how adjusting my eyepieces effects focus.
More research and more things to learn.
Eventually I will get to the point were I have some reasonable understanding.
 
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Gamma

Gamma

By using the MTV-3 you're introducing an additional optical stack that isn't needed.
Generally speaking - the less stuff between the photo relay lens and the sensor - the better.
But the slr adapters are not easy to come by or inexpensive.
The MTV-3 is a reducer, so you're taking a the projected image, magnifying it and then constricting it.
Given the terms of engagment though, it seems that you have to make do with the tools at hand. That's just how it goes. I considered the CCTV adapter as an option, and was prepared to deal with a cropped view but I had an SLR adapter made instead. Putting anything beween the lens and the imaging plane is heresy to me.

Remember - these scopes, the Neo SPlan, etc - were all designed for viewing 1st, imaging second - and the imaging concerns were, predominantly - film-based.

From what I see - CA is just going to, sometimes, be part of the game. Sometimes it's there - other times it's not. Depends a lot on how the UMA is set up and some other factors.
Using a semi Apo lens helps to some degree. Spending 3k on a 20x obj to look at or image a razor blade isn't my game plan. I have a nice 5x semi-apo and while it's sharper and less prone to artifacting and so on, I'd rather use the Neos so I can get the benefit of the UMA illumination.

Making the BH-2/camera set up to be parfocal is, IMO, easier with a focusing eyepiece for the right side.
I have one but I don't use it - I prefer the standard oculars. I just focus through the camera's eye piece, or live view on the LCD.
 
I

Inkidu

Thanks for the reply and info.

Gamma said:
Putting anything beween the lens and the imaging plane is heresy to me.
Click to expand...

I know
I hear you
I wasn't so keen on it either, but wasn't so sure on the cropping.
What could I expect with an APS-C sensor. And either supporting the camera or using a hollow tube adapter?
This is why I posted the picture above. Not enough experience to know what to expect.

Assuming that is what you have. (APS-C) Can't quite tell from the picture.
Thanks for any help.
 
SiBurning

SiBurning

For low power, I switched to a bellows and a newer nikon objective that doesn't need any other correction. (B&B thread) Just set the objective 160mm from a digital camera sensor. No other optics at all. It works well with up to a 10x objective, but you need a very stable frame at 40x and higher: Heck! At 40x it's hard with a microscope frame. I bought the most inexpensive objectives, but they also make better ones like this. I don't know if they make these in reflective style, so lighting is a challenge, as in anything else you want in the path, such as polarizers, dic, or darkfield.

attachment.php


I also have a "photo enlarger" stand for my camera. A track is mounted on the stand to give finer adjustment than the stand allows, and the camera gets mounted on the track. It needs a something to keep light out (not a bellows which gets attached, but anything to block out light). On my BH era system, at least, it needs an eyepiece or photo-lens, but there's several photo quality eyepieces that aren't the actual photo tube lenses, so it gives me more choice. This gives me more options in choosing the level of vignetting. The picture below is my nikon scope, for which I have very few lenses of any type, but it works the same on the olympus.

attachment.php
 
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Gamma

Gamma

Inkidu said:
Thanks for the reply and info.



I know
I hear you
I wasn't so keen on it either, but wasn't so sure on the cropping.
What could I expect with an APS-C sensor. And either supporting the camera or using a hollow tube adapter?
This is why I posted the picture above. Not enough experience to know what to expect.

Assuming that is what you have. (APS-C) Can't quite tell from the picture.
Thanks for any help.
Click to expand...

I have both full-frame and APS-C, I usually use the D7000 because, well - it's out on my bench all the time and the D810 is in my bag in another room. I use a 2.5x NFK & there's significant cropping, but I"m used to it. The camera's FOV is above the center of what I'm seeing through the oculars - With the 2.5x NFK, and a 5x obj, the view is about 1mm across. A bit more but not enough to make a difference.

What to expect - hard to say, I've not done what you're doing so I can't make a comparison in that regard.

What I was going to do originally, was gut an MTV-3, epoxy a cheap macro lens onto it (having taken the glass and aperture out first), and use it as a focusing helicoil. I have the measurements that I needed for the length of the assembly here somewhere - and I'm pretty sure I could make that set-up work.
Eventually though, I just had a tube made for me so I could be done with all of the futzing around.
 
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