Where Beauty & Science Meet
Show Me the Trigons! Orange Diamond octahedral rough weighing 1.03ct - Courtesy of David Baker, G.G., AGTA (personal collection). Trigons on the surface of an octahedron rough diamond crystal pop out with the use of direct overhead LED lighting. The diamond sat resting on a circular polarizing filter that was also illuminated with dark field illumination. FOV 4.5mm. Courtesy of David Baker.
Diamond Trigons. In this photo the diamond is displayed on a polarizing filter that sits on my well. The fiber optic light is reflecting off the surface to show.... TRIGONS! 0.97ct light green diamond rough octahedron illuminated with fiber optic and dark field illumination. FOV 10mm. Courtesy of David Baker.
Surface of an octahedron diamond crystal that is showing green radiation staining and trigons. Curtesy of David Baker.
Chrome Tourmaline. Negative crystal inside of a chrome tourmaline Courtesy of Sid Tucker
Swimming through time... This little guy is frozen in time, inside of a piece of copal. You can see the strain as he swam through the sap trying to be free. The trail is longer than you see here, maybe four times his length. The fiber optic light I used shined off of his wings causing an iridescent sheen. And the darkfield illumination allowed us to see his head in nice detail. FOV 7mm
Garnet Galaxy. Rutile needles intersecting each other in a pyrope almandine garnet.
Green Tourmaline Surface with Reflected Light. Darkfield illumination shows the green body color and included crystals noticeable on the right side. Overhead illumination shows as blue due to the light reflecting off the etching. Courtesy of Sid Tucker.
'Etched' Garnet Surface of an 'etched' spessartine garnet from the Navegadora Mine, Brazil. Illuminated by brightfield and overhead illumination FOV-10mm
Helvite Trio. A trio of helvite inclusions, each measuring approximately 1mm, inside of an Afghan tabular morganite. Courtesy of Sid Tucker
Monoammonium Phosphate Crystal. I decide to photograph monoammonium phosphate crystals from my son's mineral growing kit. You are seeing the blue dye inclusion surrounded by a clear crystal.
Grossular Garnet Crystals. Rough unpolished natural grossular garnet crystals
Rainbow Lattice Sunstone. Light reflecting from the ilmenite inclusions.
Hummingbird in Topaz. Rheinberg illumination highlights cleavage resembling hummingbird in a rough Topaz Crystal. Namlook mine, Shigar Valley, Skardu Pakistan. FOV 5mm. Courtesy of my friend Sid Tucker
Starships Approaching. Many inclusion photos seem to bring up images in our mind of space. I used Rheinberg Illumination again to highlight the details and texture of the inclusions in this rough topaz crystal showing 2-phase inclusions. Namlook mine, Shigar Valley, Skardu Pakistan. FOV 4mm. The topaz is courtesy of my dear friend SidTucker.
Polarized Topaz Inclusions. The golden and dark colored platy inclusions, likely mica, inside Topaz popped out under crossed polarized light.
Tiger Stripes. An inclusion in topaz that is likely biotite. Approximately 54x with dark field illumination.
Surface of Ukrainian Heliodor.
Hummingbird inclusion inside of a spinel crystal.
Anthill Garnet with needles reflecting the light. Courtesy of Sid Tucker.
Anthill Garnet with needles reflecting the light. Courtesy of Sid Tucker.
A rough topaz crystal with a triplite inclusion from Namlook mine, Shigar Valley, Skardu Pakistan courtesy of Sid Tucker. This one I struggled with, there were so many 2 phase inclusions in front of the crystal and the optics did not let me get it very sharp. The triplite crystal measures approx. 2.5mm.
Platelets in Sunsunstone.
Helvite Comet. Morganite from Northern Pakistan. It is a tabular crystal with the most fantastic Helvite inclusions! Notice the comets coming from the tips of the triangle, as well as the multi phase inclusion inside of the negative crystal. The FOV is 4mm each triangular Helvite is 1mm. Courtesy of Sid Tucker