Larger Than Life

10/28/2010

Larger Than Life

Photos Show Beauty Lurking Under the Microscope

Far from your typical photography competition, Nikon Small World reveals the hidden beauty of tiny things. The annual shortlist zooms in on the complexities of life under a powerful lens. This year's collection includes close-up shots of a mosquito heart, a wasp nest and even soy sauce.
The rules of the game are simple: Any adult with a light microscope and a camera can send in microscopic photographs. That is the basis of the Small World Competition, a long-running event on the scientific calendar, organized by the camera-maker Nikon.

The entrants' work often resembles science-fiction artwork more than the plants, objects or creatures lying on the microscope slide. This year's crop of winners reveals a quirky beauty usually hidden from the naked eye.
Among the subjects under scrutiny by the winners are a wasps' nest, cancer cells and even soy sauce, as photographed by a Chinese scientist.

Mosquito's Heart

The top prize this year was taken by a close-up shot of a mosquito's heart, glowing in radiant blues and greens. It was taken by Jonas King, of the biological sciences department of Vanderbilt University, in Nashville, Tennessee.

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Dr. John Hart of Colorado University won 20th place with this shot of crystallized, melted acetanilide and sulfur

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In 14th place is this image of spiral vessels from a banana plant stem, snapped by Dr. Stephen Lowry from the University of Ulster

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In 12th place: This shot was taken by Gregory Rouse from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in California. He photographed a juvenile bivalve mollusc using a technique which helps capture objects lacking in contrast, without using artificial dyes.

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lIn 11th place is this shot of cancer cells taken by Dr. Paul D. Andrews of the University of Dundee in Scotland.

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www.spiegel.de...

These are absolutely breath taking photos taken of tiny things with zoom cameras. If they were not illustrated we would have no idea what they were. I would like to have posted all 20 as they deserve to be shown here so go take a look.

The colors and patterns that are captured are certainly eye candy for the soul. They do look like science-fiction artwork that could have come from anywhere. Please take a look at the photo gallery at the link of the top 20 entrants, they are all amazing, I wouldn't want to be the judge as I wouldn't know where to begin.

Thank you for the post.

Very very interesting article, amazing the beauty that is around us everyday. This also makes me wonder what the Universe would look like if we had the capacity to see a small scale version. I bet it would take my breath away. How you take the infinite universe and make it smaller is beyond me but I still bet it would be amazing!!!

Wow the cancer cells are amazing. Beautiful disaster

reply to post by Aquarius1


I wish life at our level was as beautiful as the microscopic world.
I'd love to have those colours and shapes around me every day.
Much like the movie Avatar.

Cheers
Brady

reply to post by GetRadNZ


The Avatar movie is a great analogy, of course what they are doing with graphics today is amazing, the difference here is these pictures are the real thing.

Thanks for posting.

Those are really cool and amazing pictures.

Originally posted by Giovannetti44
Wow the cancer cells are amazing. Beautiful disaster

Yes how can something so beautiful be so awful, there our many things on this level that are not good for us, bacteria is another one, I am going to try to think of them as amazing pictures and not what they may mean.

Thanks for posting.

Awesome pictures! Thanks for the thread.

I love seeing the hidden world of microscopic photography, hi speed photography, space photography and anything else that's right in front of us that we can't see. What a bummer it is to not be able to see the fascinating world that's out of our sight. I can't help but think I'd rather live in one of these "other" amazing visual worlds. *sigh* Oh well...

I had to include my favorites.

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This is another of my favs from the group of twenty

In 13th place is this close-up of live mushroom coral taken by James Nicholson of the Coral Culture and Collaborative Research Facility, South Carolina.

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/a496976b7827.jpg[/atsimg]

reply to post by Aquarius1

Dazzling stuff in the world of micro! The mosquito heart is pretty cool, with the shapes and strands.
Here's another thread with some more pics.
www.abovetopsecret.com...

Peace,
spec

reply to post by speculativeoptimist


My search didn't come up with your thread, plus I missed it somehow..

reply to post by Aquarius1

It's all good Aquarius1, I have had the same thing happen on more than one occasion lately.
At least these pics get seen by more people and a collaborative appreciation of the beauty in our world is always good imo.

spec

reply to post by speculativeoptimist


Thank you for being so gracious, one of the problems is when these stories are released the titles are different and can be confusing, also I wouldn't have thought to post this in Fragile Earth as I look at from a scientific point of view because of the technology involved to create these amazing photos.