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Hi everyone.

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Welcome to the first week
in our series of classes.

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In this tutorial, we're
going to take a look

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at how you can use a flatbed
scanner, believe it or not,

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to create some very fine images
of three-dimensional objects,

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like microfluidic devices,
Petri dishes, and other sorts

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of material you're creating
or working with in the lab.

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Now you might be
wondering why we're

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starting this course with
a tool that you probably

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wouldn't think of
for creating really

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fine images of your work.

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Well, we want you to experience
the fun part of creating images

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at first, and
frankly, we wanted you

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to start off with some easy
stuff-- well, relatively easy--

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and not having to worry too much
about technical issues, which

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believe me, will come later.

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That's a promise.

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This course is
meant to encourage

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you to capture your material
in a number of ways.

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And probably most important,
to learn to see in the process.

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So you're seeing, and
will continue to see,

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all sorts of images that I
made on the flatbed scanner

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with different approaches.

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I'll go into detail for a few of
them in all of these tutorials

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and we'll call
them case studies.

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You'll see things
that will surprise you

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and you'll discover
new perspectives, that

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is new points of
view, which might

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lead to new thinking
about your work.

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Try out your ideas
about imaging.

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It won't take long.

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That's the nice part
about the flatbed scanner.

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Some of your ideas will
work, and some won't.

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Believe me, a lot of them won't,
from my personal experience.

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And emphasizing what I said
in the general overview,

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most of this is
about experimenting,

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or in a way playing.

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The process, I hope, will
become an active discovery,

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as it did for me when
I made these images.

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You should think of this
process in a similar way

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as you do with your
own investigations.

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So using the scanner can, if you
choose, come close to imaging

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with a microscope, if you make
sure you capture your image

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at a high enough resolution.

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You can start zooming in to
your image on your screen

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and see things that you
could not see with your eyes.

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And I'll show you that
a little more later on.

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One thing-- I wanted to let
you know that I digitally

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cleaned some of these images
so that your eye wouldn't be

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distracted with dust particles.

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That's important
for you to know.

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The decision of whether to use
a flatbed scanner is yours.

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First think of the size of
your device or material.

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I'd say a safe bet
is, if you're planning

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to see details from
a few millimeters up

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to a few centimeters.

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But as you'll see
in a few moments,

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you'll be able to capture detail
in the 30 to 50 micron range.

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What you'll see and
show in your image

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will depend on how you set
the resolution in the scanner

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setting.

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For the time being, just think
about it this way-- the higher

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your DPI setting, that is dots
per inch, the more information

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you're sending to the sensor.

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The more information
you're sending,

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the more detail you'll
be seeing and capturing.

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You'll find all about this
in our HOW-TO-DO-IT tutorial.

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Take a look at that after you've
completed this week's tutorial.

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You'll see how changing the DPI
settings, as we are seeing here

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in these three images, will have
a direct effect on capturing

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details.

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Why use it instead of a camera?

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Well first of all,
you can very quickly

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make some very fine
images without going

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to more complicated
setup with your camera,

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as you'll see later
in the next few weeks.

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You can show evidence
that you've made something

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or that you're
observing something.

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You might want to show
a part of something

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larger, a small
structure for example.

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You'll be able to share
some observations quickly

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with your colleagues.

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You can consider
it as a draft image

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that you will eventually use
in a figure for a submission.

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Perhaps you can even use the
image as a patent submission.

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That's something to think about.

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The wonderful surprise
here is that you

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can put a three-dimensional
object on the scanner

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and create images that suggest
their three-dimensionality.

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Yes, you will lose
depth of field,

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which we'll discuss in the
next tutorial about cameras

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and lenses.

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But still, eventually
you'll create sometimes

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a knock-your-socksoff image.

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Hopefully you're interested
in that sort of thing.