Imaging Control

Use

To...

Excitation

Select an excitation filter from the list of installed filters. A corresponding emission filter is automatically selected and the following parameters are set to the last values that were used for that excitation filter.

• Exposure time

• Neutral density filter

• Active illumination shutters

• Number of frames to average

• Target intensity

• Camera gain

Note:  You can choose Options | Save Settings to store the configuration. the wavelength/bandwidth of the selected filter is indicated to the right of the filter choice field.

Emission

Select an emission filter from the list of installed filters. (The wavelength / bandwidth of the selected filter is indicated to the right of the field.)

Polychroic

Specifies a polychroic to place into the active position. The selections available are displayed in the drop-down list in this field. Your choices will completely depend upon which polychroic filters are installed on your system.

%T

Select a neutral density filter from the list of installed filters.  The relative illumination intensity is indicated in the menu. (This value indicates the amount of light passing through the filter. A value of 100% indicates the light is unfiltered.)

Illumination

Indicates which light source will be used. Your choices are as follows:

• For broadband illumination, select SSI.

• For transmitted light, select TRANS.

• For laser light, select LASER.

Exposure

Specify camera exposure time, in seconds. The minimum and maximum exposure time allowed for this field depend upon the camera type.

Find

Find the exposure necessary to reach the target intensity that is entered in the Target Intensity window. (the Target Intensity window opens when the Find button is clicked.) For dim samples, 300-900 counts are acceptable. For bright samples, 3000-3600 counts provide a high dynamic range without saturating.

Focus

Use UltimateFocus to assist in finding the bottom of the sample.

Image Size

Specify the image size (pixels or CCD detector elements) for acquired images. The option list contains predefined sizes. You can enter special sizes by choosing Other from the option list. (Image size must be a multiple of four.)

Calibrate

Calibrate images when they are collected from the camera. If you use this option, you must load and activate a calibration table that fits the current imaging parameters (wavelength, image size, and bin choice) before you acquire images.

Lens

Select the objective lens name. The option list contains the lenses that are known to be part of the microscope system. (You can add lenses to this list.)

Info

Get information about the current objective lens.

Bin

Specify the number of CCD detector elements to add together to form one image element. Binning is applied in both the X and Y directions. It increases intensity but it decreases resolution. Pixel size is a function of binning.

Aux. Mag.

Use the microscope's 1.5X manual auxiliary magnification.

Pixel Size

View the pixel dimensions in microns/pixel. This value is calculated from the Lens, Bin, and Auxiliary magnification settings.