Yesterday I posted a shot of the Anthers and stigma of Erodium cicutarium.
Ken Nelson asked for a closer shot of just the pollen. Of course I couldn't resist the challenge.
Getting this image was a surprisingly frustrating process -- particularly since I always expect to get frustrated! Through a microscope, with strong backlighting, I could see the texture of the pollen much more strongly than I could bring out any other way. But test photos in that mode were complete duds, and I didn't think I could figure out how to fix the setup in time available.
So in the end, I backed off to a macro setup, using combined back- and front-lighting with a dual-fiber halogen illuminator.
I wish this were a bit sharper, but it definitely shows more detail than you can see in yesterday's image!
Hope you enjoy it.
--Rik
Technical: Canon 300D with 10X NA 0.25 microscope objective on 210 mm of extension, strongly sharpened and severely cropped. Stacked with Helicon Focus at 0.0002" focus step.
