Site of the Week
Image Quest 3-D Plankton http://www.imagequest3d.com/pages/plankton/plankton.htm
This week’s site is many things - as well as being a ‘launchpad for all things planktonic’, it’s an amazing source of photographs, and an opportunity to exercise your eye muscles in new and unusual ways…
Set up by a pioneering photography expert, the Image Quest 3-D site is divided up into many areas, all of which are well worth a visit, though only some are strictly ‘wildlife’ related. The plankton section is especially striking, featuring hundreds of high quality macro photographs of the minute creatures found floating in the world’s oceans. Looked at closely, these highly complex microscopic organisms, some of which are the larval forms of larger animals, are incredibly beautiful. The bottom of the food-chain is an amazing place.
As well as the normal 2D galleries, and the other sections of the catalogue, there is a separate collection of photos taken as ‘stereograms’ - images which you view by staring through the picture so that the left and right halves of the object are superimposed, giving the illusion of three dimensions. It’s not an easy trick to do at first, but there are instructions on the site to get you started, and once you get the knack, the effect is amazing. Once you’ve seen all your eyes can handle, you can read about plankton and several other types of organism in the illustrated ‘Articles’ section.
Richard Northover
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