The standard lighting set up is for lights at 45° to the specimen. It can be varied using a light box with coloured gels in place of coloured card. Most papers will show one of two set ups with the specimen on glass above a sheet of coloured card as below:

Or the specimen on a light box (Vetter VP 1983) as below:

It is possible to vary the colour contrast or shades of grey of a light box using polarizing filters (Marshall RJ 1957). By having a sheet of polarizing filter on the lightbox then rotating the analyzer at the camera it is possible to change the tonal range of the background independently of the specimen.

Tip - If you don't want to see your face, the camera and cable release on your photographs you need to use a sheet of black paper, with a hole cut out for the lens, to avoid reflections in the glass.

Filters for lightboxes

Don't forget older lightboxes will not contain daylight fluorescent tubes the Kodak guide below gives starting guide for colour and exposure correction.

Suggested starting filters and exposure increases for test series with fluorescent light (Kodak Professional Data Guide 1978)

From Kodak Professional Data Guide 1978

Superimposition or double exposure techniques 

It is possible to use two exposures to record a specimen and X-ray or diagram (Gibberd GF 1954). The light box can be used to transilluminate the X-ray to ensure accuracy of positioning. The lighting should be carefully balanced for each exposure. Obviously this can also be accomplished using digital imaging techniques and PhotoShop layers as was used for the image below.

Mounted museum specimens

• These are difficult to light due to refraction problems.
• Do you show the container or not?
• Good to use a light box so don't see the container then light the specimen separately.
• It is more difficult to photograph when showing the container as the perspex gives rise to scintillation.
• All cut ends of glass or perspex will look bright as light escapes with the scintillation.
• Using black card behind the specimen prevents this effect being seen on the background.
• Scratches can be eliminated by applying an oil of high refractive index, i.e. as used for oil immersion microscope objectives.

Including or excluding the container