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Creating images that are
more than good enough

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is what this case
study is about.

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This happened quite a
while ago, about-- I can't

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believe it's 20 years ago.

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In this lab, this is the image
that the researchers came up

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with on their own.

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You're seeing a surface that has
etched-out hydrophobic lines.

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And so when you drop
water on the surface,

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the water stops at
these hydrophobic lines.

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This measures across
about 4 millimeters.

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So these are drops
of water that are

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taking on the shape of
the hydrophobic lines.

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And this is how it was used in
the article that was accepted.

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I luckily came across
it, because this sort of

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started my whole career 20
years ago in science imaging.

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What I did with this image,
as you've seen before,

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is I asked them to please make
a triangle so I could start

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working a little bit with this.

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And I dropped some water on
that triangle, also etched out.

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Here, as you remember,
I made the picture

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with direct lighting.

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Here I diffused the lighting.

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And I was playing
around a little more.

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Another chip was
etched out as well,

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and I started using fluorescing
material to drop on the chip.

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This gold, it's called a
self-assembled monolayer.

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In this image, I wanted
to show a sense of scale,

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so I used the
syringe with which I

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dropped the water
on the surface,

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just to give you
a sense of scale.

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Finally, getting around to
submitting for a cover design,

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I asked the researchers,
could you please

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at least give me a grid
of the etched lines

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so I could then drop onto the
grid fluorescing green water

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and fluorescing blue water?

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And you could actually
see the etched marks

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creating the hydrophobic lines.

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I didn't like
seeing it too much.

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Those lines were in the way,
so just moving the camera ever

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so slightly gave
me a cleaner image.

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And again, I was imagining
the journal's logo at the top.

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What was really important
was that the editors

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felt that the way I photographed
it was misinformational.

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That is, you're seeing two tones
of green and two tones of blue,

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and that was
miscommunication for them.

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It turns out that's
really the way it was.

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But in the end,
what we did decide

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to do was give them
a simplified version,

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where I focused in tightly
onto the square drops of water,

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as we call them. (They're
colored water with fluorescing

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dyes.) Each square is
about 4 millimeters across.

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And it was a simplified
image, as what we strive for.

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And in the end, we were lucky,
and it did get the cover.