Project in progress

The wonders of the internet bring you into contact with so many interesting people. Through one such encounter  I became the recipient of  lovely little butterfly, a Common blue (Polyommatus icarus). I have a number of unrealised projects, and one of them is to look the scales on the wings of butterflies and moths. So when the butterfly arrived, I made a start.

 I set up the stereo microscope for those first views, and took pictures with a Dinoscope lens that replaces one of the eyepieces and is directly connected to the computer. Other pictures were taken with the set up as shown below.

The following pictures show the start of the project. Lighting is always a problem, getting sufficient light with no shadows. Then there is the problem of depth of field.

Common blue butterfly (Polyommatus icarus) -eye

Common blue butterfly (Polyommatus icarus) eye

Common blue butterfly (Polyommatus icarus) wing

Common blue butterfly (Polyommatus icarus) wing showing scales

Common blue butterfly (Polyommatus icarus) wing scales

Common blue butterfly (Polyommatus icarus) wing scales

Common blue butterfly (Polyommatus icarus) edge of wing

Common blue butterfly (Polyommatus icarus) edge of wing

 A start has been made, I now want to improve the clarity of the images so will use the compound microscope.