Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t8hqh Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-26T10:56:37.234Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Using a Sony Cyber-Shot Digital Camera for Photomicrography

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 March 2018

Gregor Overney*
Affiliation:
Agilent Technologies Inc.

Extract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

Photomicrography is the combination of photography and compound microscopy. Photographers working with compound microscopes are facing many challenges (for an introduction see [1] and [2]). Digital photography offers great advantages, but also adds additional difficulties. Digital cameras have been used in photomicrography for over a decade now. Today, we have access to many excellent consumer-grade digital cameras that are most suitable for low-cost imaging systems for light microscopy. In this short paper, I summarize my experience with the Sony DSC-S70 digital camera, which comes with a nice, large Zeiss lens. (Most of the ideas presented in this paper are also valid for the DSC-S75 and DSC-S85.)

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Microscopy Society of America 2002

References

[1] Rost, Fred and Oldfield, Ron, Photography with a Microscope, Cambridge University Press (2000). See chapter 17 about digital, confocai and video techniques.Google Scholar
[2] Nachtigall, Werner, Exploring with the Microscope, Sterling Publishing Co., New York (1996).Google Scholar
[3] One year after the introduction of the DSC-S70, Sony introduced the DSC-S75. At the time of writing, the S75 is still sold by Sony. It has the identical CCD and lens system and can therefore by used in place of the DSC-S70.Google Scholar
[4] This diatom test plate with 8 different forms is purchased from Carolina Biological Supply Company, 2700 York Rd. Burlington, NC 27215, US (see http://www.carolina.com/),Google Scholar
[5] See page 62 in [2].Google Scholar
[6] Adapter sold by Micro-Tech Lab (http://www.micro-tech-lab.de/). The adapter is called LM-Scope digital adapter #DASC70 (made in Austria). I have not used this adapter and do not know how well it performs.Google Scholar
[7] But things might change soon (see http://www.foveon.com/X3_tech.html to find out more about the “first” full-color image sensor).Google Scholar
[8] PaintShop Pro is currently sold as version 7.04 by JASC (see http://www.jasc.com/products/psp/). It cost slightly over 100 dollars. It requires Microsoft Windows operating systems.Google Scholar
[9] Depth of field (DOF) is the area in front of and behind the abject that is in acceptable focus. The depth of field is inversely proportional to the square of the numerical aperture, DOF depends on the wavelength.Google Scholar
[10] ImageJ is provided by the National Institutes of Health, US, and requires a JAVA virtual machine. It is available at http://rsb.info.nih.gov/ij/ free of charge,Google Scholar
[11] Klaus D. Kemp has a web page at http://www.diatoms.co.uk/.Google Scholar
[12] Ronchi, Vasco, Optics – The Science of Vision, Dover Publications, Inc., New York (1991).Google Scholar
[13] Clarke, Theodore M., Fitting a Student Microscope with a Consumer Digital Camera, Microscopy Today, 02-3 (2002), and references therein.Google Scholar