Eyespot scales of Haetera piera

[Charles Krebs]

These are some scales in the "eye-spot" on the wing of a Haetera piera. I had photographed lower magnifications of this wing previously ( here, and here. )

I found the shape of these scales to be quite beautiful, and a bit unusual, so I decided to try a higher magnification shot. The location of these scales is indicated by a blue arrow in the overview image.



The picture below was made using darkfield illumination and a Zeiss Plan Apo 40/1.0. It was made from a 36 image z-stack.

[RogelioMoreno]

Wow, very nice!

Rogelio

[johan]

Interesting that some of the scales have 5 pointy ends, some 4 and some 3. I wonder why? I suppose it's a bit like our hair, lots of individual components growing at somewhat irregular spacing (as opposed to hands which always have 5 fingers).

[ChrisR]

Just checking ... This is transmitted, not reflected, darkfield, yes?

So in principle should be available (to a point!) without the correct condenser and opaque disc, by backlighting obliquely with a shade positioned to avoid light hitting the objective directly?

Certainly suits the subject

[Charles Krebs]

Just checking ... This is transmitted, not reflected, darkfield, yes?

Yes, transmitted light. I was using a darkfield condenser, but since the entire subject subject fills the frame it does seem perhaps a little confusing to call it "darkfield". It is basically transmitted "backlit" at this point. But there is a difference in appearance when the light is coming in from all sides, but none is directly behind subject (due to the use of the darkfield condenser), compared to what would be obtained with simple "backlighting" as would have been the case using a brightfield condenser. (Does that make sense? )

[ChrisR]

Sure!