Those are some great DIC pics! Keep it up!

I did some digging and it turns out my avatar is xylitol! Perhaps when the worldwide plague situation has settled down a bit we can arrange to enjoy a beer or two.

That's a very unfair generalization Sorry, I was only kidding - although in retrospect it's 100% conceivable that someone could have said it in all seriousness, so I apologise for causing unnecessary offense. It's a pretty good joke too At least you appreciate my comedic genius! To be honest I can'...

I think you really should investigate the possibilities offered by large format. Everyone on this forum is obsessed with small things and tend to have tunnel vision with regard to larger options.

Hi Don, I assume you mean this sort of thing: https://www.instagram.com/p/BiJWTN9AsSd/ https://www.instagram.com/p/BtyDkD4hQBG/ The proportion of the two solutes is critical to achieving these forms - I generally start from a solution of 4:1 (v/v) of beta-alanine to l-glutamine and vary concentratio...

Yes. It works very well, although the arms are a bit stiff - the review posted in the OP basically has the right of it. It's also impossible to fit into any sort of camera bag or other convenient carrying arrangement! I was actually very pleased with the unit overall, and would recommend it to anyon...

2)Sony has equipped this camera with EFCS.This feature is only usable with speeds lower than 1/250.If the speed is higher you get darkening at the upper area of the frame which is getting worst as the speed increases. Are you using a LED light source in your scope? I ran into problems like this unt...

As a small update to this topic, I did end up writing a small Windows batch script for Imagemagick 6, because I wanted something that was a bit more portable that Photoshop to process image sequences. I used it to even up the field on a couple of videos I did. It worked really well - so please find ...

I have an action that I built for photo retouching in my work that does something similar. In my case, we often want to change the overall tonal distribution of an image while retaining the texture, but it can also be used to correct uneven lighting in some cases. Essentially it simply separates the...

I have used a 52mm Marumi DHG +5 achromat for this exact purpose. It was certainly serviceable, but: 1. There was some pretty marked field curvature (at least in comparison with the old Ai-s Nikkor 200mm f4 that I'm using now) 2. Sharpness off-axis was uninspiring when stacking images to compensate ...

Vimeo's paid service is very good. That said, YouTube offers a lot of functionality at a very low price ($0). In particular, I have been very pleased with their automatic stabilisation of my microscope videos which have some quite questionable stagework. Original video: https://www.youtube.com/watch...

Images of an evaporated solution of L-Glutamine and Beta Alanine. I have found Beta Alanine to be a great companion to other chemicals that are less water-soluble, and so are more difficult to flash crystallize. I quite liked the watercolour-like effect on these images in particular, so I thought I ...

This is currently a focus of my endeavours as well. I have found that Epsom salts make for an attractive subject (eg. https://www.flickr.com/photos/spongepuppy/18517601182/ ). You may also have some luck with Xylitol, a non-sugar sweetener with a very low melting point (eg. https://www.flickr.com/ph...

Do you use COL (circular oblique light), in additional to POL? In my rig, COL helps further enhance diatom's contrast and resolution. But I do lose more light. Not with that specific intent, but the overall effect of having the retarder only partially covering the field yields a similar effect. Usi...

Yes, I do this regularly - it's basically my go-to technique for video. Most of the videos on my YouTube channel have been shot with some variation of crossed polars + partially offset retarder of some description (most usually cellotape or cellophane packaging film - very scientific!). I generally ...