Several recent posts focused on small things like a damaged ESP32 module. Trying to document these projects presented a challenge because it's been difficult to take good clear pictures of fine detail. I did the best I could with what I had on hand, but the right tool for the job is a camera lens designed for macro photography. When one such lens for my Canon EF-M camera was on sale during the holiday shopping season, I could not resist.

Here's the LED on the Introduction to SMD kit, with the entire image scaled down to 1024 pixels wide.

SMD intro kit scaled 1024

If I crop out the center of the original picture instead, this is what I see:

SMD intro kit LED 1024

A lot of detail are visible, certainly far better than what I could get before, but I think the focus could be a little sharper. I hope the lens is limited by operator skill rather than optical characteristics, because I could learn and improve my skill.

Here is a picture of the LED array from my recent freeform SMD experiment, again scaled down to 1024 pixels wide. The solder joints - which I could barely manage with the naked eye - look really uneven at this magnification. But wait - there's more!

Freeform SMD 7 scaled 1024

Here's the cropped-out center of that image. Tiny beads of solder look like monstrous blobs of invading space aliens, not at all attractive. But the wire inside the left side LED is clearly visible, and multiple diffractions of the right side LED can be seen. This picture represents a combination of two novice skills: freeform SMD soldering and macro photography. I'm pretty happy with the detail and clarity of these pictures, but not at the quality of these solder joints. That's OK, it just means I have lots of room for improvement.

Freeform SMD 7 cropped 1024.jpg