Tomopteris -Planktonic marine worm

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Cactusdave
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Tomopteris -Planktonic marine worm

Post by Cactusdave »

I recently obtained a slide by Victorian slide mounter Abraham Flatters of the marine planktonic polychaete worm Tomopteris. The slide has Flatters' logo label 'Accurate' on it and the description is in his hand writing, dating it to the 1890s. Tomopteris is a curious and beautiful creature, using parapodia at the end of its limbs to swim actively in the open ocean. Relatively little is known about the Genus, but some striking video of a swimming specimen is here. http://www.realmonstrosities.com/2012/0 ... teris.html The slide is in good condition for it's age, and some drying of the mountant away from the subject, which might reduce its attraction for a collector, doesn't affect it from the point of view of a microscopist.

There was a fair amount of mounting debris scattered under the coverslip, which necessitated replacement of the background in Photoshop. I took two image sets of 20 and 21 images using polarised light with a home made plastic film retarder and a red/green selenite retarder slide and stitched them into a composite with Microsoft ICE. The objective was a Zeiss X4 planapochromat and the microscope a Nikon Diaphot with 0.52 phase/DIC LWD condenser. Camera was a Canon 40D. Magnification was X10 at the sensor.

Image

Polarised light plus plastic film retarder. 35MP version here http://photosynth.net/view.aspx?cid=ebb ... f35f3cf843

Image

Polarised light plus red/green selenite slide. 35MP version here. http://photosynth.net/view.aspx?cid=66b ... 734524cc3b
Leitz Ortholux 1, Zeiss standard, Nikon Diaphot inverted, Canon photographic gear

Mitch640
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Post by Mitch640 »

Just amazing. Beautiful work.

Linden.g
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Post by Linden.g »

Incredible images and complex creature

Cactusdave
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Post by Cactusdave »

Thanks Mitch and Linden. It's certainly an amazing creature and I was surprised and delighted to find such a well preserved mounted specimen showing such good detail. There was a lot of Photoshop work involved in cleaning up the images though, as numerous particles of debris that showed up as very bright spots under polarised light, were scattered all over the specimen and had to be carefully cloned out.
Leitz Ortholux 1, Zeiss standard, Nikon Diaphot inverted, Canon photographic gear

RogelioMoreno
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Post by RogelioMoreno »

Beautiful work!

Rogelio

Cactusdave
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Post by Cactusdave »

Thanks Rogelio.
Leitz Ortholux 1, Zeiss standard, Nikon Diaphot inverted, Canon photographic gear

arturoag75
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Post by arturoag75 »

very nice :wink:

Cactusdave
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Post by Cactusdave »

Thanks Arturo.
Leitz Ortholux 1, Zeiss standard, Nikon Diaphot inverted, Canon photographic gear

Wim van Egmond
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Post by Wim van Egmond »

That is wonderful! Amazing that it still lasts over a hundred years. Just for information. Could you also show us the version without the retouch?

Wim

Cactusdave
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Post by Cactusdave »

Thanks Wim

Here it is pretty much straight output from the stitching program. Quite a lot of work to do to produce a reasonable image as you can see, thought it's not quite as 'spotty' as I remembered.

Image
Leitz Ortholux 1, Zeiss standard, Nikon Diaphot inverted, Canon photographic gear

Wim van Egmond
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Post by Wim van Egmond »

Thank you for showing how you made it. Great job!

Wim

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