Our tank's biology up close

[Myka]

The new Accu-Scope is pretty sweet! Was it the OMAX 40-2500x you were using previously?

 

[jason2459]

I told my hubby we needed a scope like yours; he vetoed the idea. Love the resolution and detail; neat to clearly see the flagella on the dinoflagellate!

Remind him the next toy he wants or gets. [emoji1]


If I wasn't so much into the photomicrography part making it another hobby I would have been just fine with the Omax. But wanting to get better images I feel this new one was worth it to me and I don't believe I've taken full advantage of it yet.

The accuscope still is a budget microscope but definitely a step up from the omax/amscopes. But its still not a Nikon or Zeiss. Though some have compared certain aspects of the accuscope to them. The features are there and some have said the optics are close but it doesn't have some of the higher end accessories. Really only one its missing...

If I could find a used DIC Nikon/Olympus/Zeiss/etc. microscope for under 5 grand I'd have a hard time not getting it. That's what I'm lazily looking out for.

Otherwise the accuscope I got has pretty much every other accessory like darkfield, phase contrast, polarized, and fluorescence.

Which the amscopes and omaxes do as well. What the accuscope is better at is two of the most important things: better optics and brighter true kholer illumination with a condenser iris and illumination iris diaphragms. That illimination made a huge difference. Much more then I thought it would. When using the eye pieces I have to turn down the brightness of the led. Which is perfect for camera use so the exposure can be turned way down and the frame rates increased. And I think its also illuminating through the objectives properly.

The omax I was using was just fine. This accuscope is just better. [emoji6]

 

[jason2459]

The new Accu-Scope is pretty sweet! Was it the OMAX 40-2500x you were using previously?

Yep, with the bigger 5mp camera and .5x adapter. Still a great microscope and was easy to use.

 

[mcarroll]

better optics and brighter true kholer illumination

You said this scope also lets you throw 100% of that 3W LED at your eyeballs vs splitting it with the trinoc eyepiece all the time, right? If so, that's definitely another big difference.

(BTW, I noticed the AccuScope that I posted a while back for like $200 doesn't come with any lenses. If it seems too good... )

 

[jason2459]

You said this scope also lets you throw 100% of that 3W LED at your eyeballs vs splitting it with the trinoc eyepiece all the time, right? If so, that's definitely another big difference.

(BTW, I noticed the AccuScope that I posted a while back for like $200 doesn't come with any lenses. If it seems too good... )

I didn't notice the lack of objectives with that one.

The EXC-350 allows two settings for the light path with 80% to the eyes(still blinding at full led intensity) and 20% to the camera OR 100% to the camera only. I believe the Omax I was using was 50/50 to both. Some microscopes have 3 adjustments with 100% to the eyepieces, split, and 100% to camera only. Even at 80% it can be extremely bright.

 

[jason2459]

Lost internet connectivity at home this weekend so here's the video's from the other night. Lots of movement and blurring in and out and changes in objectives and filters as I'm still learning the new scopes capabilities.

 

[jason2459]

 

[jason2459]

 

[jason2459]

 

[jason2459]

 

[jason2459]

Wow, pod eating a nematode, then defecating it 20 min later?
That's a high clearance rate, and probably means they digest only a small amount of what they ingest.

Jason, when you see active bacteria in motion, about how big is it? A couple of microns? (I'm wondering if some stuff I'm seeing could be bacteria.)


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

You want some images of some bacteria. Well here you go... lol

Actually the video is much better and showing the immense population of bacteria in this sample. I grabbed some skimmate from my Davey Jones locker and let it sit for about a week. Figured this is a prime location for all kinds of bacteria.

I also found what looks like my larger dinoflagellates lacking pigment as it was totally dark in the locker and the container I had it in the past week. And they were very very active. Shows light is not a factor for at least this type. I also think I saw a flash of a red eye spot which normally can't see as their pigments are normally all colored through photosynthesis.

In fact most everything was very very active and hard to get a picture of. So, I'm hoping the video is much much better. I was also so busy trying get things adjusted as there's more to do now that I missed somethings I'm sure even on the video. It was very exciting.

Wet_Skimmate_Bacterial_Soup-0002 by Jason, on Flickr

Wet_Skimmate_Bacterial_Soup-0003 by Jason, on Flickr

Wet_Skimmate_Bacterial_Soup-0005 by Jason, on Flickr

Wet_Skimmate_Bacterial_Soup-0006 by Jason, on Flickr

Wet_Skimmate_Bacterial_Soup-0007 by Jason, on Flickr

Wet_Skimmate_Bacterial_Soup-0008 by Jason, on Flickr

Wet_Skimmate_Bacterial_Soup-0009 by Jason, on Flickr

Wet_Skimmate_Bacterial_Soup-0010 by Jason, on Flickr

Wet_Skimmate_Bacterial_Soup-0011 by Jason, on Flickr

Wet_Skimmate_Bacterial_Soup-0012 by Jason, on Flickr

 

[jason2459]

Wet_Skimmate_Bacterial_Soup-0013 by Jason, on Flickr

Wet_Skimmate_Bacterial_Soup-0014 by Jason, on Flickr

Wet_Skimmate_Bacterial_Soup-0016 by Jason, on Flickr

Wet_Skimmate_Bacterial_Soup-0018 by Jason, on Flickr

Wet_Skimmate_Bacterial_Soup-0019 by Jason, on Flickr

Cocci bacteria galore
Wet_Skimmate_Bacterial_Soup-0021 by Jason, on Flickr

Wet_Skimmate_Bacterial_Soup-0028 by Jason, on Flickr


only image of the dino I got
Wet_Skimmate_Bacterial_Soup-0030 by Jason, on Flickr




Darkfield did not do well with this set so gave up on it quick. Not very good for things that don't have pigment or large enough. Which I figured would be the case.

Wet_Skimmate_Bacterial_Soup-0017 by Jason, on Flickr

 

[jason2459]

Can still get the full 1080p HD and go full screen but warning some of these are rough as I was just in it last night for the exploration and not some much the quality as I was so excited to see so much bacteria. I was watching it for oh probably close to 5 hours till like 4am. It was like the skimmate was so nasty is made a seal around the cover slip and never evaporated away like I normally experience. lol

Just before and after the 1 minute mark are those dinoflagellates and I've never seen them this active before. Or with out pigment. Though you can just see the red eye spot here and there. . Like at 1m15s go full HD and full screen and keep pausing. Awesome. Not to mention all the fun little cocci, rods, and vibro. Then at 1m35s start PAUSING it's HAL



Edit: cool, I just noticed some videos support even higher then 1080!

 

[jason2459]

I tried darkfield but the bigger stuff was just moving to fast or was to clear and the little stuff I couldn't get the detail I was getting before to tell the different types of bacteria. but it was still kind of cool. Like little lice swimming around.

 

[jason2459]

Plenty of bacteria to go around. I would not suggest drinking your skimmate. You'll find just about every type in these video. Oh, and in some parts the video starts looking a bit wavy... that was my centrifuge going. It ended up smushing the bacteria up. It was much more impressive with out trying to separate them out that way. I may try and use my Buchner funnel and flask with various filtration papers 30, 20, 10, 5, 2, and 1 micron. See what ends up though each.

 

[jason2459]

I ran into this large "thing" at the end of the last video linked above. I'm not sure if it was actually something besides detritus that happened to end up in this very peculiar shape or if it was actually some kind of micro organism like an amoeba. It never moved or did anything. But looks like if it was something like an amoeba of some kind it was possibly splitting. But I was having fun watching a particular cocci swim around and got multiple pictures of it above. 3 or 4 coccus together I think I counted

 

[jason2459]

Still just so cool to see so much life thriving in death.




I tried going darkfield again on this cool flagellated critter and would have been good if it was bigger. I tried pushing my darkfield stop to 60x and just couldn't. With darkfield the NA value of the condenser has to be higher then the NA value of the lens. The NA value of my condensor is 1.25 BUT what they don't tell you is that is for OIL. For dry it's .9 and my 60x is .9. So, I could just get images but not very good ones. To be able to use an objective of the same NA value or higher you there are objectives with built in iris basically that will allow you to adjust that NA value down.

 

[jason2459]

Then while following along I ran into probably one of the most active/busy specks of detritus I found the entire time. I was just blown away

 

[jason2459]

Finally caught one of the very active dinos in one spot for more then a split second but that didn't last long.

 

[mcarroll]

The pics, man! The pics. Keep em coming.