Showing posts with label nikon. Show all posts
Showing posts with label nikon. Show all posts

Thursday, 18 October 2018

Nikon Small World photo competition reveals nature in minuscule detail

Microphotography has come along way since Nikon staged the first Nikon Small World competition in 1974. Finalists in 2018 harnessed a dizzying array of photographic techniques to achieve the spectacular results displayed here. A full-colour calendar of the winners is in the works, and people in the US can look forward to a national tour of the top images.

Look into the eye of this stunning weevil Yousef Al Habshi/Nikon Small world
Yousef Al Habshi from the United Arab Emirates won first prize with the image above of the compound eyes and surrounding greenish scales of a weevil, Metapocyrtus subquadrulifer.  It was made by stacking together 129 micrographs — photographs taken through a microscope. “I feel like I’m photographing a collection of jewelry,” said Al Habshi of his work with these beautiful Philippine beetles, which are more usually considered agricultural nuisances and targets for pest control.

These are fern sorus — structures that produce and contain spores Rogelio Moreno/Nikon Small world
Rogelio Moreno from Panama won second prize for capturing the spore-containing structures of a fern (above). He used a technique called autoflorescence, in which ultraviolet light is used to pick out individual structures. Spores develop within a sporangium, and Moreno has successfully distinguished a group of these containers from the clustered structure called the sorus. Sporangiums at different stages of development show up in different colours.

A spittlebug nymph in its bubble house Saulius Gugis/Nikon Small world
Saulius Gugis from the USA photographed this spittle-bug in the process of making its “bubble-house”. The foamy structure helps the insect hide from predators, insulate itself and stay moist. The photograph won third prize.

A spider embryo with the surface nuclei stained Dr. Tessa Montague/Nikon Small world
Other highlights from the prize include a portrayal of the first stirrings of arachnid life by Tessa Montague at Harvard University. The surface of this spider embryo (Parasteatoda tepidariorum) is picked out in pink. The cell nuclei are blue and other cell structures are green.

The mango seed weevil Pia Scanlon/Nikon Small world
As well as this image of the mango seed weevil (Sternochetus mangiferae), looking for all the world like an extra from Luc Besson’s sci-fi film The Fifth Element. It was taken by Pia Scanlon, a researcher for the Government of Western Australia.

(Source: NS)

Thursday, 9 November 2017

Winners of Nikon Small World 2017

Fascinating images of creatures, substances and structures at a scale so tiny that they normally go unseen by human eyes.

Nikon just announced the winners of the 2017 Small World Photomicrography Competition, and below are some of the winning and honored images. The contest invites photographers and scientists to submit images of all things visible under a microscope. More than 2,000 entries were received from 88 countries in 2017, the 43rd year of the competition.

The 12th place winner shows a closeup of the eye of an Opiliones (daddy longlegs)
magnified 20x.Charles Krebs, Issaquah, Washington
2nd Place: A Senecio vulgaris (a flowering plant) seed head, magnified 2x.Dr. Havi Sarfaty, Yahud-Monoson, Israel
11th place shows an image of plastic fracturing on a credit card hologram magnified 10x.Steven Simon, Grand Prairie, Texas
Image of Distinction: Nsutite and Cacoxenite (minerals), magnified 5x.Emilio Carabajal Márquez, Madrid, Spain
Honorable Mention: The eyes of a jumping spider, magnified 6x.Emre Can Alagöz, Istanbul, Turkey
The 15th place winner is an image of a 3rd trimester fetus of a Megachiroptera (fruit bat), magnified 18x. Dr. Rick Adams, Greeley, Colorado
Image of Distinction: Moth eggs in spider silk, magnified 16x. Walter Piorkowski, South Beloit, Illinois
Image of Distinction: A natural bridge (petiole nodes) connecting the abdomen and thorax of an ant, magnified 5x.Can Tunçer, Izmir, Turkey
8th Place: An image of a newborn rat cochlea with sensory hair cells (green) and spiral ganglion neurons (red), magnified 100x.Dr. Michael Perny, Bern, Switzerland
5th Place: Mold on a tomato magnified 3.9x.Dean Lerman, Netanya, Israel
Honorable Mention: A Taraxacum officinale (dandelion) cross section showing curved stigma with pollen, magnified 25x.Dr. Robert Markus, Nottingham, United Kingdom
Image of Distinction: Simple eyes of an Ectemnius (digger wasp), with condensation, magnified 20x.Laurie Knight, Tonbridge, United Kingdom
The 7th place winner shows individually labeled axons in an embryonic chick ciliary ganglion magnified 30x.Dr. Ryo Egawa, Nagoya, Japan
Image of Distinction: A Cladocera (water flea) magnified 10x.Rogelio Moreno, Panama City, Panama
Image of Distinction: A group of rotifers magnified 20x.Frank Fox, Konz, Germany
Image of Distinction: The face of a small moth magnified 5x.Jan Rosenboom, Rostock, Germany
9th Place: Growing cartilage-like tissue in the lab using bone stem cells (collagen fibers in green and fat deposits in red), magnified 20x for collagen; 40x for fat deposits.Catarina Moura, Dr. Sumeet Mahajan, Dr. Richard Oreffo & Dr. Rahul Tare, Southampton, United Kingdom
Image of Distinction: Abdominal proleg of a Lasiocampa (caterpillar) magnified 3.7x.Dean Lerman, Netanya, Israel
The 4th place winner shows the everted scolex (head) of a Taenia solium (tapeworm), magnified 200x.Teresa Zgoda, Rochester, New York

18th place shows Synapta (sea-cucumber) skin magnified 100x.Christian Gautier, Le Mans, France
Honorable Mention: Warp knitted curtain fabric magnified 10x.Marc Van Hove, Zwijnaarde, Belgium
Honorable Mention: Liquid crystal magnified 500x.Michael Tuchband, Boulder, Colorado
Image of Distinction: Mosquito larva, early development, magnified 10x. Charles Krebs, Issaquah, Washington
(Source: The Atlantic)

Monday, 17 July 2017

Nikon Recalls the D750 a Third Time for the Same Shutter Issue

Unfortunate news from the Nikon camp this week: Nikon has issued yet another recall notice for the D750 DSLR, informing owners that the shutter problem first reported in 2014 may still be present in cameras manufactured recently.

Back in 2014, D750 owners began reporting that some of their photos had a strange flare issue that caused a noticeable dark shadow band across the tops of photos that contained flare.


After looking into the issue, Nikon began offering free repairs for the problem and started quietly pulling the D750 from store shelves before issuing an official service advisory.

That was in December 2014 and January 2015, and Nikon said the issue was only present in D750s made between October and November 2014. In early 2016, however, Nikon issued another recall notice for the exact same D750 shutter issue, expanding the original recall to D750s made between December 2014 and June 2015. It seems the problem still hadn’t gotten fixed.

And that brings us to Nikon’s latest announcement this week. It’s recalling the D750 a third time, expanding the list of affected cameras yet again to those made between July 2015 through September 2016. So basically, if you purchased a D750 anytime since the original two recalls, you may want to see if your camera is affected.

To see if your D750 is included in any of Nikon’s 3 recall notices, find the serial number on the bottom of your camera and enter it into this website. If your camera is one to which this issue applies, Nikon can repair it free of charge at its service centers.

“We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this issue may have caused,” Nikon says.

With photographers already grumbling about Nikon’s quality control after the original recall was announced, this latest news doesn’t look good for a company that has already tried and failed twice to fix this widely publicized issue in newly produced cameras.

(Source: PetaPixel)