Robert, I cannot help with your question, but it sure is good to see that you are back online asking it.

For those of you who will be in Edinburgh this summer, you may wish to visit the new Levon Biss exhibition entitled Microsculptures. I was lucky enough to be at the preview yesterday evening. The exhibition opens tomorrow and will run until September. It is in Inverleith House, within the Royal Bota...

That is good news. When you are fit enough to read this Robert, all my best wishes for your health.

Delighted that Robert is on the mend. Let us all hope that his recovery continues.

It is a simple matter to try immersing the amber in fluid to see if Enrico is correct. I rather suspect that he is. The easiest and cheapest liquid with a very similar refractive index to amber, at least here in the UK, is to use Johnson and Johnson Baby Oil. The citrus scented version is quite plea...

Mawyatt,

even if you have to use inkject output, just take the output to the local copy shop and get a photocopy of it. Normal photocopiers use the same process as laser printers.

Peter

Chris,

Interesting to know that acetone can be used as a transfer for a laser print.

Like your idea of labeling the holes with their drill sizes.

Peter

Laying out for hole punching and drilling using scribes can be difficult. It is often easier to do the layout on a computer first. This can be in any software which allows the precise placing of small dots at the centres of the desired drilling positions. Then print out, either on large sticky label...

Robert, these are lovely. I always like good darkfield pictures of radiolarian.

Are your samples from Germany coming from a commercial source?

I am away from home for a few days at the moment, so do not have access to scope or adaptor. However, when I got it there was a Leica bayonet adaptor attached at the camera end. I took it off and replaced it with a cheap T2 Canon adaptor. I assume that is why there is a small amount of adjustment bu...

That is the adaptor which I have. It looks as though it has lived a bit. May be as well to make sure that you can return it in the event that the optics are as beaten up as the paint. You will see in the first of the six pictures on ebay that there is a spherical knob on a small slider. This seems t...

Another way to adapt a Leitz microscope to a camera would be to get hold of a Leitz microscope adaptor. These come up on ebay from time to time and are usually not very expensive - c £100. http://www.photomacrography.net/forum/userpix/637__MM07196_1.jpg This was the way in which Leitz intended for 3...

Lovely picture from you as usual. If you post it at https://diptera.info/forum/ someone will tell you the fly's identity.

Clearly an organic structure with regularly repeating units meaning that we are looking at a colonial animal. That lowers the possible cast to bryozoan and corals. The series of vertical scratches suggests that this is a fossil specimen which has been polished, but the fine polishing has not been ta...

Jen,

I am glad that your long journey seems to have reached a satisfactory destination. Well done for persevering.

Peter