I found these polished "gemstones" in a £1 bargain bin recently. Tiny little things, probably scraps from tumbling larger stones, but a quick look with a loupe revealed some with interesting occlusions so I picked them up for a high-mag tinkering session. Turned out there were only two different typ...

https://www.zeiss.com/microscopy/int/pr ... eet-7.html

I'm sure I read about lattice lighting many years ago, but it wasn't this neat. There's a couple of nice clips at the link - "double mitosis" is my favourite. A description of the tech too...

Ta Rik. My theory is that it's literally the beginnings of a splash, albeit created at hypersonic speeds. The aluminium is compressed at the centre first and melts due to the shock. This squeezes out a blast wave that propogates from the centre, thinning and buckling the molten foil which is then fr...

Or, more accurately, the after effects of a shock wave on aluminium foil. The shock was created by smartly clacking a pair of 50mm ball bearings together with the foil trapped between them. Ordinary paper works too but is less interesting. It instantly sublimes into the smell of burning paper (at th...

I can't see any missing term. If it's not macro or micro (in scale or by approach) then it's simply "photography". And even if you did find a word, (say "close-up" for example), then the next question will always be "what's that then?". As Rik said, you'll need more words...

I just call the whole lot "photo macro micro" in terms of activity and consider all of it simply "photography" when capturing images. The terms, photo, macro and micro are too vague for any useful delineation these days (IMO). The overlap of magnification ranges and equipment used in each genre has ...

They look feathery and dreamy. Lovely results, maybe I should get some to play with too. Oh -- another a9 user! Thanks. There are a few cheaply available amino acids. The pure chemicals are sold as health and bodybuilding supplements. All worth a go, but I didn't want to get sucked too far down thi...

I saw some polarised shots of glycine in a Facebook group and liked the convincing "landscape look". So I ordered some glycine to see if I could make some landscapes of my own for use in surreal composites (arty farty stuff). I simply made a weak solution and dabbed out a few dots on a coverslip, so...

Glue them in the end of a thin hypodermic needle?

Lovely shots and arrangements! It is frustrating to lose diffraction colours at higher N.A. I experimented with taking hi-res and low-res images of the same FoV, then use the lo-res one to provide "hue" and the hires for "luminance" (changing layer blend type in HSL mode instead of RGB). There can b...

Lovely. And a bonus points for the longest chemical name I've yet seen in the context of polarised crystal shots

Thank you for your comments everyone, and Rik for the definitive answer (definitive enough to satisfy my curiosity, anyway). I learnt a lot more about fly eyes in general over the course of this too. All good stuff. Cheers.

Fish-flocking available soon...

I saw one sit completely still in a penny-sized spot of bright sunlight for 10 minutes before it flew off. It prompted this thought that I've never considered before. Their compound eyes have no eyelids or irises (right?) but do have lenses. So even if bright, visible light is no issue, surely there...

Thanks, Mark, that's interesting. I think the key element is the shaft and slider sticking out at the front. Acts as linear guide for capturing a hand stack. I think it must need to be rested somewhere though, so not *quite* what I'm looking for. But that idea is filed away - certainly could be usef...