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ArjinFerman  Tinfoil Gigachad  14d ago (text post)   277 thread views

Tinker Tuesday for December 31, 2024

This thread is for anyone working on personal projects to share their progress, and hold themselves somewhat accountable to a group of peers.

Post your project, your progress from last week, and what you hope to accomplish this week.

If you want to be pinged with a reminder asking about your project, let me know, and I'll harass you each week until you cancel the service

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I bought an adapter for my microscope, which allows me to affix my phone camera to the eyepiece and take photos/videos of reasonable quality.

https://imgur.com/a/dMzV2Vq

https://imgur.com/a/9uCJSW6

The photos/videos are at 1000x from the microscope with maybe 2x (?) optical zoom from my phone camera. Two are from standing water samples from the garden. The yellowish one that looks like modern art is a stool sample. The second link contains an earwax and dandruff sample. No eyebrow-mites to be seen.

As suggested by @5434a and inspired by a story from @George_E_Hale, I acquired a sample of semen and found, surprisingly, that the sperm were quite visible. Of particular note was the variety of behaviors that they had - some had broken tails or were stuck or sluggish, while others were quite energetic. If only they knew how futile their efforts would be. It was also interesting to see that the heads were more computer-mouse shaped rather than egg-shaped. I was always under the impression that the heads were radially symmetrical.

I was rather enthusiastic to see that sample, so the deed was done before the adapter arrived in the mail, which means I don't have any photos or videos to share. Perhaps another time.

Ah yes, the small and entirely unexpected differences we make in one another's experience.

I bought an adapter for my microscope

Nice!

Was wondering in previous threads if that was an option, so you share.

Yeah, I ended up buying a 3-axis adapter from a company called Move Shoot Move. I think it was a bit pricey for what amounts to be a few pieces of CNC'd aluminum and some screws, but most of the cheaper adapters on the market don't really allow for adjustment on the third axis (bringing the phone closer/farther from the eyepiece). It's high-quality and I'm pretty satisfied with it, and I can even use it on other devices in the future as well, such as a telescope or binoculars.

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