In the discussion that followed Rik made the following comment regarding how the sample was gathered...
I have shaved with an electric razor for the past 50 years and I wondered how mangled the whiskers would be. My current Norelco rotary head model has been going strong for about 10 years. It has the original shaving heads, occasionally disassembled and brushed off (annually) and rinsed with alcohol (every 3 years or so...) No complaints."safety razor" -- that also explains the cleanly cut ends, versus the crushing I might expect from an electric razor.
I gathered a sample as I had a 5 day growth of stubble and processed it as lothman described. A soapy water rinse (3X) followed by an isoporpyl alcohol rinse. I must say that the rinsing of whiskers was an interesting process. The "floatation" impact of soapy water and alcohol on the whiskers were distinct and interesting. And the comentary from the peanut gallary about whiskers being rinsed in the kitchen was lively... But I digress...
After decanting the alcohol following the final rinse, I warmed the small 2 oz sauce cup with a blow dryer and evaporated the remaining water and alcohol. I then blackened the tip of a toothpick with nail polish and allowed it to dry. Then I dipped the black tip of the toothpick into some UV cure lacquer which is rather viscous. I then carefully sprinkled the rinsed whiskers onto the toothpick creating some grey flocking then I zapped it with my UV flashlight. The lacquer cures in about 5 seconds.
I installed the sample in my rig and used my 10X OLY mounted to 200mm Pentax telephoto lens.
Bottom line is that Rik was right, about half of the whisker ends are quite mangled. The degree of mangling appears to be inversely proportional to the hair’s diameter. But even the larger whiskers show the crushing Rik predicted.
I attach a stereo image.
Keith