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Bob Saunders

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I have had this   Officine Galileo=Italy measuring type in my collection for a long time. 1 div=0.05 mm. The objective has many bubble in the glass? I plan to make mount to hold it as it easily falls over. I plan to use it to measure tiny fossils and or fossil inclusions. it was used for measuring surface flaws, scratches etc.  Not found anything as to how old is is? I welcome your thoughts. I cut the ends off of a allergy pill bottle which fits my old Nikon digital camea. I mage with camera lense resting against the plastic eye piece. 

Bob

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I made a tripod mount. Tried again to clean the out side of the lenses.

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  • 1 month later...

We stopped at a small antiques and junk shop. Bought this Motic stereo digital microscope, the owner said he would take $20.00 for it. Quite the optics. Not my picture of it.  A photo holding my camera to one eye piece. I need the software for it and a new bulb. 

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I found that the video and USB is not working so I will call the company and ask if any hope? To the TV it puts out like a snowy picture with three white dots. There are cameras made for scopes that might fit. It is also likely that the lab whipped the software so no corporate info will stat with it. Or I will just use my camera adapter.  

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Motic scope with my Nikon digital. It is a depression so a slight fuzziness. Tried several camera settings. 

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Motic scope, the upper Halogen lamp did not work, Put the bulb in the base and it worked as did the dimmer control. Went to work with my volt ohm meter. Found the plug to the lamp socket wires were okay. Maybe the switch? Removed the base cover and found the switch was good and the wire to the plug at the top of the stand, leaving the black ground wire. Several wires held together with a crimp connector, so I tried tightening the crimp and now the lamp works again. Wife said I don't have room for another scope with that size base! 

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On 7/5/2020 at 10:57 AM, Bob Saunders said:

I found that the video and USB is not working so I will call the company and ask if any hope? To the TV it puts out like a snowy picture with three white dots. There are cameras made for scopes that might fit. It is also likely that the lab whipped the software so no corporate info will stat with it. Or I will just use my camera adapter.  

So try again, I did not pull out a control knob on the back of the head to direct the image to the camera. In both lenses, midway one eye piece and out for video out. I do find that hooked up to my around a 35 inch TV it is fuzzy, so I assume with a small screen or or around 15 inch TV with video in it will be much better?  Does anyone here have input on this?

Thanks, Bob

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  • 2 months later...
On 7/12/2020 at 1:35 PM, Bob Saunders said:

So try again, I did not pull out a control knob on the back of the head to direct the image to the camera. In both lenses, midway one eye piece and out for video out. I do find that hooked up to my around a 35 inch TV it is fuzzy, so I assume with a small screen or or around 15 inch TV with video in it will be much better?  Does anyone here have input on this?

Thanks, Bob

I see this is a bit older thread, so sorry for the resurrection, however, the Motic cameras are notorious for poor image quality and failure. I have a box of junk Motics here in the lab- all less than 4 years old. The scopes themselves are pretty good though.  The good news is that replacement cameras are easy to get and range from cheap to expensive. The 'scope you have is very, very easy to modify with a new camera. In fact, I swapped out a total of 48 motic cameras with AmScope USBs on both our compound and stereoscopes. I just used standard PVC fittings from the hardware sore and some matte black spray paint to adapt them. 

 

On the scope pictured, just remove the white box with the cable running out of it, that is just a cover for the actual camera inside.

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I did find that Menards carries both of the Halogen lamps bulbs for under $5.00 each. Thanks for the information on replacing the  video cameras with Amscope.  

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On 9/29/2020 at 3:05 PM, LabRatKing said:

I see this is a bit older thread, so sorry for the resurrection, however, the Motic cameras are notorious for poor image quality and failure. I have a box of junk Motics here in the lab- all less than 4 years old. The scopes themselves are pretty good though.  The good news is that replacement cameras are easy to get and range from cheap to expensive. The 'scope you have is very, very easy to modify with a new camera. In fact, I swapped out a total of 48 motic cameras with AmScope USBs on both our compound and stereoscopes. I just used standard PVC fittings from the hardware sore and some matte black spray paint to adapt them. 

 

On the scope pictured, just remove the white box with the cable running out of it, that is just a cover for the actual camera inside.

Thanks, can you give me the Amscope part or model number and a picture of one installed. Bob 

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Sure!

 

One thing to consider is there are a wide variety of prices. As I was browsing today, I thought of this one, as it is the absolute easiest to install and the price is very friendly. For your scope you will need one additional part however.

https://www.amscope.com/0-3-mega-pixel-usb-live-video-microscope-imager-digital-camera.html?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_channel=free-shopping

 

Now, this one is designed to adapt scopes which are not camera ready-however- yours is, so you can use it right out of the box OR spend a few bucks more and get the eyepiece tube for the camera port hiding under that cover. However, you will need to remove the camera first so you know what diameter tube to buy. Scopes such as yours are called "trinocular stereo microscopes". With the advent of affordable digital cameras, many companies ditch the third eyepiece tube for a camera. In you case this is a good thing, as you can easily remove that non-functional motic and swap it out!

I buy these through that auction site named after a body of water- very inexpensive once you know what size to buy!

 

Another option is a bit more pricey, but is what I converted ALL of our student use scopes over to (with an adapter for the trinoc hole!)

https://www.amscope.com/cameras/usb/3mp-eyepiece-camera-with-built-in-reduction-lens-for-microscopes.html

 

For my personal  trinoc stereo in my worm lab, I use the 10MP camera with video and the like, which is NOT cheap, but necessary for my research particularly when looking for the male reproductive organs on worms less than 1mm long...however, if you aren't afraid to spend the cash, it doesn't get much better than this. You may notice this one is branded as "Swift" but more on that later...

 

 

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My personal trinoc:

 

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So the story behind this guy is simple...there are only three microscope camera makes in the world, and two of them are the same company, which gets paid to liscense and rebrand their products. This Swift camera is the EXACT same camera as the like branded AmScope, however it was 300$ cheaper... The head on this Scope is also swift branded as I swapped the motic head out for better optics...which I then swapped with Zeiss lenses and Leica prisim and mirrors, effectivel building a 10k$ scope for under 500$. Truth even Zeiss doesn't actually make scopes any more...they are all made in chinl and painted/badged accordingly by the ultimate seller...but lenses are what you pay for. For general use, Motic optics are fine.

 

So, in short, with microscope bodies, brand name means nothing. buy for price. For lenses, brand does matter, but I have no-name auction site specials that perform just as well or even better than their branded counterparts. Unless you do the sort of work I do, there is no need to buy Zeiss or Leica optics. For instance, Motic equipped scopes tend to use the Nikon "C" mount.

 

Anyway, your next step should be to remove the existing camera from your scope. You will likely need small phillips screwdrivers and a set of hex key wrenches-likely metric as all science is metric. once you have it removed from the scope head, you will need to determine the mount type and diameter. Good news is, just post a picture of it disassembled showing the camera itself and the trinoc mounting hole, and Ill be more than happy to help you find the right parts!

 

Last but not least, while I plug AmScope products, I don't buy direct from them....I use the single breasted "fe-mail" warrior site and/or the body of water auction site. For work, I use scientific vendors, but they do not sell to the general public. Also, if you have a DSLR camera, you can save a ton of time and work by just buying a microscope adapter for it! I do this on some of my lab scopes too, particularly when I need HD timelapse footage. There is a bit of a learning curve to this method, but why buy an extra camer if you already have an expensive one?

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  • 10 months later...

@LabRatKing

 

Hi 

sorry for jumping in on this conversation, but I have the swiftcam 10mp shown above and I really am struggling to get good images and video from it, do you know of any resources or tutorials to help me get decent video and images (similar to what I see through my eyepiece) on my swift 380T ?

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3 hours ago, Lostboys said:

@LabRatKing

 

Hi 

sorry for jumping in on this conversation, but I have the swiftcam 10mp shown above and I really am struggling to get good images and video from it, do you know of any resources or tutorials to help me get decent video and images (similar to what I see through my eyepiece) on my swift 380T ?

There are a number of issues that can cause bad images. In my experience it is usually due to the lenses in the scope itself. First order of buisness is to get the scope professionally cleaned.

 

from there it’s all about the lenses and the fact that most images are photoshopped stacks.

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9 hours ago, LabRatKing said:

from there it’s all about the lenses and the fact that most images are photoshopped stacks.

 

Yeah, I've heard that. Yet, even though I used to be a multimedia producer at some point in my life and thus know my way around Photoshop, I really wonder how this is supposed to work and it would be great to see a tutorial about this somewhere...

'There's nothing like millions of years of really frustrating trial and error to give a species moral fibre and, in some cases, backbone' -- Terry Pratchett

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15 hours ago, LabRatKing said:

There are a number of issues that can cause bad images. In my experience it is usually due to the lenses in the scope itself. First order of buisness is to get the scope professionally cleaned.

 

from there it’s all about the lenses and the fact that most images are photoshopped stacks.

Thank you for your reply, it’s a brand new microscope (arrived Sunday), so I am hoping these objective lenses are clean, thank you for your advice

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11 hours ago, pachy-pleuro-whatnot-odon said:

 

Yeah, I've heard that. Yet, even though I used to be a multimedia producer at some point in my life and thus know my way around Photoshop, I really wonder how this is supposed to work and it would be great to see a tutorial about this somewhere...

I do focus stacking all the time for my microfossil pictures. There are two tutorials below, one for Photoshop, and the other for Affinity Photo, the program I use. Hope this

helps! :)

 

Regards,

Asher

 

 

 

 

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The more I learn, the more I find that I know nothing. 

 

Regards, 

Asher 

 

 

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13 hours ago, pachy-pleuro-whatnot-odon said:

 

Yeah, I've heard that. Yet, even though I used to be a multimedia producer at some point in my life and thus know my way around Photoshop, I really wonder how this is supposed to work and it would be great to see a tutorial about this somewhere...

Simply, one takes a series of images, each with the focus adjusted slightly, often fractions of a degree on the fine focus. For biological images this is usually 7 - 20.

 

then stack them up in layers.

 

this compensates for depth of field replicating the 3D view our eyes see in a flat format.

 

 I have a photoshop guy at the labs, but admittedly haven’t done the stack myself.

7 hours ago, Lostboys said:

Thank you for your reply, it’s a brand new microscope (arrived Sunday), so I am hoping these objective lenses are clean, thank you for your advice

That’s good! That means now it’s just lost of practice and some software work.

 

pro tip: keep in mind your eyes are better than any camera.

 

I always draw my micro images so my shop guy can do the stacks to reflect what I saw.

 

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12 hours ago, Mainefossils said:

I do focus stacking all the time for my microfossil pictures. There are two tutorials below, one for Photoshop, and the other for Affinity Photo, the program I use. Hope this

helps! :)

 

Thanks! That sure helps... in a way! That is, it's not quite what I imagined...! In thought people were creating these focus stacks by hand, while, in fact, these are - of course, should've guessed :duh2: - automated tools. In doubt that they're included in my old version of Photoshop Elements, though (I'm one of those old-fashioned people who actually like owning the software you pay for, so never bought into the Adobe Cloud and bought the last standalone version of Elements, of course, as it perfectly suffice for my needs bsc book then). But I'll have a look around once I'm back from holiday ;)

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'There's nothing like millions of years of really frustrating trial and error to give a species moral fibre and, in some cases, backbone' -- Terry Pratchett

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Of focus stacking, Many people use a micro adjustable cross slide rail with the camera mounted or it and a  super macro lens. Works god for a rock or fossil with holes and depressions for images of things inside.   Or a bellows with a lens reversing ring. I/e a 50mm fixed focus lens turned backwards. I have such but have not shot film in years. For a microscope with a digital camera it may be a matter of a lot of trial and delete. I do not have video out and monitor screen image capture software. 

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  • 4 months later...

My recent find was at an antique shop where the owner has sold the building to another dealer. He said that he had a parts microscope. Bausch & Lomb stereo zoom 4 with miss matched eye pieces for $15. One is a 10 X with internal pointer. Point to the item you want someone to look at. It was very dirty and dusty. Cleaning has done lots for it including the internal mirrors which mostly just needed caned air. 

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  • 1 month later...

I took another look into the poor picture from my Motic camera and found that the video out jack was very dirty. Using a worn piece of 400 grit wet or dry sandpaper I cleaned it up and now have a very nice picture on my monitor. 

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