NO 1


The advancement of machinery makes the scientific photography field much more interesting. The world of space beyond our imagination - from molecules and atoms on the micro side, going infinitely large. Also, the advancement and popularization of computers give birth to many different techniques.

Mr. Kenji Kohiyama, one of the members of SSP found a unique photographic approach, the "Digital Collage"(On SSP magazine No. 33). Mr. Kunio Ichiji, also a member of SSP, applied the technique to microscopic pictures and many other challenging experiments. We will show this technique here.

(This page was created using SSP magazine No.33, Mr. Kenji Kohiyama's web page, and documents from Mr. Kunio Ichiji.)

Using pan-focus as macro photography technique(Mr. Kenji Kohiyamaj
"Light-scanning"
3 dimmensional macro object photography has the tendency to only focus on a single point. An approach to solving this problem is the "light scanning technique".
This technique uses a light emitted as a flat surface which is thinner than that of the focus depth. A picture is taken by moving the sample stage up and down with an bulb-state camera (Reference, right graphics).
This technique is said to be developed by McLachlan Dan Jr. in 1964, and exhibited at medical photographic exhibitions.

"Digital Collage technique"

On the other hand, the "Digital Collage technique" presented last year by a SSP member, Mr. Kenji Kohiyama, uses about 36 photographs taken with different points of focus. It is then put in a computer to be processed and collaged. (left picture is a collage using 20 photographs) When taking the picture, you can either move the distance between the camera and the subject, or change the focus point and take the place where it is focused.


The former is easy to collage because all the pictures are the same size. But this would produce a very flat picture. The latter is difficult to collage because each picture has its own size. But this would produce a picture with a realistic depth.

It is easy to implement the lighting techniques familiar to photography to this technique. Also, I believe that, as hardware technologies progress, this technique will be able to take extremely precise macro photographs with vivid reality.

"Digital Collage using a microscope"

Mr. Kunio Ichiji tried taking a photograph of a pollen from a lily using microscope photography.(right picture. Magnification x200. 5 picture collage)


On microscopes, the focus depth becomes extremely narrow as the magnification becomes larger. This means that the subject has to be smashed flat, or cut into thin parts. The limits for taking a 3d object such as a flower pollen is the eye-piece x10 with the object-lens from 5 to 10 times magnitude. This would produce a picture from 50 to 100 times the actual size. To focus on the whole subject with a larger magnitude is impossible. A scanning electron microscope is possible to focus on the whole subject with a magnitude much larger than 50 to 100 magnitudes, but it will lose the original natural color.
The digital collage technique is lesser than that of an electron microscope, but it is possible to capture natural colors as it is, and many other merits that cannot be obtained with a different technique.

(the copyright for each photo belongs to each individual who made it)

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