Nanoscapes
July 15, 2024 11:38 PM Subscribe
Nanoscapes: Making the invisible, visible! "Images of butterfly wings at the microscopic scale are stunning, and at the nanoscopic scale they become otherworldly. Shot with light and electron microscopes at magnifications up to 50,000x, Nanoscapes reveals the elaborate topography of butterfly wings, which have produced a wealth of data on the surprisingly little known story of structural coloration."
These are beautiful and structural color is amazing, but people need to internalize that most if not all all the colors you see on this video are likely false colors, added in post production.
A neato fact: If I wanted to evolve different-colored animals or plants that used traditional (small-molecule absorption) pigmentation, this would require difficult exploration of chemical space & biosynthesis in evolution to make new pigments.
however.... to evolve different structural color into something else, you just need to "make these tiny spikes a little longer/shorter/fatter/more spaced" - an easy trick for evolution to master so you can use evolutionary pressure to change the color of your butterflies in a few generations.
posted by lalochezia at 4:33 AM on July 16 [7 favorites]
A neato fact: If I wanted to evolve different-colored animals or plants that used traditional (small-molecule absorption) pigmentation, this would require difficult exploration of chemical space & biosynthesis in evolution to make new pigments.
however.... to evolve different structural color into something else, you just need to "make these tiny spikes a little longer/shorter/fatter/more spaced" - an easy trick for evolution to master so you can use evolutionary pressure to change the color of your butterflies in a few generations.
posted by lalochezia at 4:33 AM on July 16 [7 favorites]
To push back slightly on the comment above that brushes this off because it's false color ... They likely used ultraviolet light for its shorter wavelength and thus better ability to resolve finer details. "False color" processing usually is just shifting the color spectrum into the visible, but maintaining the relationship between the colors in the original.
For example, infrared images from space telescopes (e.g. JWST) are typically released as composites of multiple IR bands, such as near IR (e.g. 800 nm wavelength), mid IR (2400 nm) and far IR (5000 nm). The color mapping they'll use is then blue (e.g. 470 nm), green (540 nm) and red (650 nm), respectively, maintaining the wavelength sequence of the original image but shifting it down to where our retinas can see it.
False color isn't as "false" as that name implies, especially when real scientists are involved, and they were quite involved in the production of these videos.
I noted that the music is by Nate Kinsella, brother of Mike and Tim. All three of them have been involved in indie music for a long time.
This is beautiful and thanks dhruva for sharing it.
posted by intermod at 6:54 AM on July 16 [1 favorite]
For example, infrared images from space telescopes (e.g. JWST) are typically released as composites of multiple IR bands, such as near IR (e.g. 800 nm wavelength), mid IR (2400 nm) and far IR (5000 nm). The color mapping they'll use is then blue (e.g. 470 nm), green (540 nm) and red (650 nm), respectively, maintaining the wavelength sequence of the original image but shifting it down to where our retinas can see it.
False color isn't as "false" as that name implies, especially when real scientists are involved, and they were quite involved in the production of these videos.
I noted that the music is by Nate Kinsella, brother of Mike and Tim. All three of them have been involved in indie music for a long time.
This is beautiful and thanks dhruva for sharing it.
posted by intermod at 6:54 AM on July 16 [1 favorite]
eh. uv visualization? what? do you know about UV microscopes - they are nontrivial and extremely niche instruments, unlikely to be used for imaging animal specimens.....
most of these are electron, likely SEM microscope images. what "spectrum" do they represent?
posted by lalochezia at 7:45 AM on July 16
most of these are electron, likely SEM microscope images. what "spectrum" do they represent?
posted by lalochezia at 7:45 AM on July 16
The video intro talks about UV a lot, and the video's description links to Martin Lab published research on UV coloration, and with all that mention of UV light and the false color comment above, I got carried away in my defense of false color :)
posted by intermod at 11:31 AM on July 16 [1 favorite]
posted by intermod at 11:31 AM on July 16 [1 favorite]
No worries! I just like to push back about misconceptions, something something accurate science.
posted by lalochezia at 1:25 PM on July 16
posted by lalochezia at 1:25 PM on July 16
Hi Dinesh and all,
Thanks for sharing and your interest. I'm the filmmaker (Biopixels and Nanoscapes). Biopixels consists of light microscope images, which make use of a pretty amazing machine called a Keyence VHX-7000N, at
magnifications of 20x-1000x, and stills taken with a Nikon D-90. The images toward the end of Nanoscapes were also taken with the Keyence, and just as with many of the images in Biopixels, the microscope is able to do quick focus stacking, which allows images to be captured under the microscope while focusing on different parts of the image, and then stacking them together into one clearly focused image. But I left some of these "unstacked" so that the animator could show what it looks like when the microscope rolls across the butterfly wing. We also used 3D stitching for the full breadth of the animal, and for the zoom ins. In Nanoscapes, the initial images are SEM, as mentioned above, and yes the colors are an artistic choice, as there is no light at that depth. We based the color palette off an image we all liked that was colorized by one of the Martin Lab's graduate students, Anna Ren. This is the thumbnail image! And nice work on locating the Martin Lab's paper! That was where we started with Nanoscapes and then branched out to include structural coloration more broadly. Thanks again for your interest. If you're curious about more or would enjoy having any of the original images from the film here's a DP link to the press-kit. https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/xwjxck3a733hu9amw7hxl/APcp3waIYNk9einggTYC6-g?dl=0&e=1&preview=EPK%2C+The+Making+of+Biopixels%2C+Nanoscapes.pdf&rlkey=590szd120k1os8vbc616kqh2y&st=6s4jm8l0
posted by kdutton at 12:42 PM on July 17 [3 favorites]
Thanks for sharing and your interest. I'm the filmmaker (Biopixels and Nanoscapes). Biopixels consists of light microscope images, which make use of a pretty amazing machine called a Keyence VHX-7000N, at
magnifications of 20x-1000x, and stills taken with a Nikon D-90. The images toward the end of Nanoscapes were also taken with the Keyence, and just as with many of the images in Biopixels, the microscope is able to do quick focus stacking, which allows images to be captured under the microscope while focusing on different parts of the image, and then stacking them together into one clearly focused image. But I left some of these "unstacked" so that the animator could show what it looks like when the microscope rolls across the butterfly wing. We also used 3D stitching for the full breadth of the animal, and for the zoom ins. In Nanoscapes, the initial images are SEM, as mentioned above, and yes the colors are an artistic choice, as there is no light at that depth. We based the color palette off an image we all liked that was colorized by one of the Martin Lab's graduate students, Anna Ren. This is the thumbnail image! And nice work on locating the Martin Lab's paper! That was where we started with Nanoscapes and then branched out to include structural coloration more broadly. Thanks again for your interest. If you're curious about more or would enjoy having any of the original images from the film here's a DP link to the press-kit. https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/xwjxck3a733hu9amw7hxl/APcp3waIYNk9einggTYC6-g?dl=0&e=1&preview=EPK%2C+The+Making+of+Biopixels%2C+Nanoscapes.pdf&rlkey=590szd120k1os8vbc616kqh2y&st=6s4jm8l0
posted by kdutton at 12:42 PM on July 17 [3 favorites]
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