I need a proper video microscope.

[TheEPROM9]

One thing I would suggest, is pulling lenses from old camcorders and cameras, the big front lens makes an excellent macro lens. I have done this with cameras before to get nice close ups. Might be worth trying to use these or build your own array, not sure what your knowledge is on optics but experimentation is always fun =-)

[EEVblog]

Holy post batman!
Technical post of the week from Rick 

[jmole]

Holy post batman!
Technical post of the week from Rick 

Indeed. And a great argument for the DSLR/Video Camera approach. A microscope is great if you want to look at cells, but not so great if you want to see both the top AND the bottom of a 0402 component.

Basically, you want tons of light, a small aperture, and a very sensitive photosensor. You're not going to get much better sensitivity than a consumer/prosumer DSLR (or the new Blackmagic pocket cinema camera), unless you spend a LOT of money.

It's one of the main reasons I use a Panasonic GH2 for my video stuff. Small sensor gives good DOF, good 4/3s and micro 4/3s lens selection, and GREAT sensitivity. Shot a video of our at ISOs of up to 12800

[Rick Law]

Holy post batman!
Technical post of the week from Rick 

Indeed. And a great argument for the DSLR/Video Camera approach. A microscope is great if you want to look at cells, but not so great if you want to see both the top AND the bottom of a 0402 component.

Basically, you want tons of light, a small aperture, and a very sensitive photosensor. You're not going to get much better sensitivity than a consumer/prosumer DSLR (or the new Blackmagic pocket cinema camera), unless you spend a LOT of money.

It's one of the main reasons I use a Panasonic GH2 for my video stuff. Small sensor gives good DOF, good 4/3s and micro 4/3s lens selection, and GREAT sensitivity. Shot a video of our at ISOs of up to 12800

Thanks for the kind words.  These kind words inspired me to go back and corrected a typo I noted but couldn't find it again when I went back to reedit last time...

Yeah, a good macro with extension is hard to beat.  There are however a few more factors to consider for Video application.
1.  The video encoder.  A bad video encoder will eat up any sharpness and contrast you have in your image.  Some video encoder are really bad.  On a few occasions,  I use the camcorder as pure frame-capturer to capture uncompressed frames via firewire to laptop, then I use software video encoder to with the control and quality I need to do the actual encoding.
2.  If you choose to get new equipment: When you go shopping, make sure you choose equipment with REAL aperture control.  REAL aperture control means actually changing the aperture such as using a shutter a make the aperture smaller.  Many video camcorders, many cheaper camera, and almost all cell-phone/i-Something cameras simulate a smaller aperture (larger f-stop) by making the exposure shorter.  With those, you don't get the better benefit of Depth of Field or reduced edge effect.  It is easier to shorten the timing of the capture digitally whereas reducing the aperture mechanically takes hardware and expense.

Set the camera (camcorder) to manual exposure and look at/into the lens while you change the f-stop, you should see something like your iris in your eye making the lens aperture bigger/and smaller to adjust to the light.  If you don't see a shutter moving to change the aperture, you need to check the manual and other documents/spec-sheets to check if the camera/camcorder is using a faster exposure to simulate a smaller aperture (large f-stop number) setting.

Rick

[Rick Law]

One last little trivia.  Lighting is always important - very very important.  So important that what you see in a photo is not what it seems.

Incandescent produce better spectrum than other lights like LED but it produce a lot lot lot of heat.  Photo of a slice of pie you see in a restaurant menu and many other display photos are not real because the item cannot stand up to the heat.  A milk-shake will be unrecognizable in seconds under the intense light.  Besides, by the time you arranged the french toast to be photographed, your french-toast will be sagging and the perfectly square piece of butter looks like hell.  So, many of these "food" are crafted out of other material such as wax and and then painted to look like something you want to eat.

With LED rapidly improving, perhaps cooler lights with better spectrum will fully replace photo-incandescent lights.  But next time when you point at the picture in the menu and tell the waitress you want exactly that but with extra wiped cream...  remember, it is just painted wax.  That thought should help keep anyone keep his/her weight down...

Rick

[lgbeno]

Wrt lighting, nothing beats the fiber optic  light ring with the light box, noisy, hot and VERY bright.