Eye of fruit fly

[rjlittlefield]

I thought I'd try an eye with setae, just for comparison.

Compare this with the naked fly's eye at http://www.photomacrography.net/forum/v ... php?t=7373.

This is a fruit fly, about 1/2 frame.

Canon 300D camera, Olympus CH microscope base, Nikon CF M-Plan 20X NA 0.40 ELWD objective at 21X, pingpong ball diffuser with dual fiber halogen illumination, 0.5 second at ISO 100, 106-frame stack at 4 microns focus step, Zerene Stacker PMax, no retouching.

It's interesting to notice, in this picture, the ommatidia at lower left. They appear to be very complicated. But in fact, they are just smooth shiny bumps --- it is their environment that is very complicated! In each ommatidium, the dark disk is a reflection of the microscope objective, while the lighter ring is a reflection of the illuminated pingpong ball. The radial rays are simply reflections of the surrounding setae, of which there is one at almost every junction between ommatidia. One of the advantages of electron microscopy, such as shown at http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File: ... d_eye_.jpg, is that there are no confusing reflections.

--Rik

Edit: to provide a new link to a scanning electron image, since the previous one disappeared.

[NikonUser]

That's amazing detail. I reckon such detailed, high mag, high resolution, images of parts of bugs would be effective in separating sibling species. I can't imagine that sibling species that defy separation based on viewing under a low power stereo scope would not show reliable differences with images such as yours. The trick, of course, is to know what bits to look at.
Jeff Freman and I used the arrangement of ommatidia in the eyes of male greenhead flies (Diptera, Tabanidae, Tabanus nigrovittatus complex) to unequivocally separate/identify 2 of these species.

[rjlittlefield]

The trick, of course, is to know what bits to look at.

Very true. I can write software and arrange lenses, but I have no idea what images would be useful to an entomologist.

So I figure the best thing I can do for you guys is to develop technology and illustrate a few possibilities.

Figuring out what to do with the technology . . . that ball is in your court.

--Rik

[rjlittlefield]

Here is a stereo rendition of the eye. This is to complement recent discussion of rendering issues regarding an eye shot earlier at lower magnification, HERE.



Zerene Stacker PMax, synthetic stereo at +-2.5%.

--Rik

[svalley]

Interesting shots, Rik.

I have been shooting a few Fruit Flies lately myself.We are dealing with a nasty invasive pest, Drosophila suzukii and trying to teach people to be able to identify it compared to numerous other small flies.

Steve