MICROCOSMOS.nl - questions and answers

WHY THIS SITE?
Because I've got a lot of nice slides and photo's of creatures living in pond and stream and I found it a waste to let them age in dark boxes. I hope that showing them on this site will contribute in keeping people interested in the nature surrounding them. There are quite a lot of scientific pictures of insects on the web, but they often represent dead specimen, to show specific detail. Other pictures show then in a net or jar, or they show all insects out of the water. I try to make my pictures give the impression of the animals in their natural habitat and, with a few exceptions, the animals are alive.

WHY THE NAME MICROCOSMOS?
There's the famous French movie MICROCOSMOS which zooms in on the insect life of a meadow in the Aveyron region. The word Microcosmos is already decades used in connection with microscopic life. When I saw the name of the film I knew I had to use this word for my site. People who have seen the movie will expect something on insects with this name, and so they will find. It's a bit pity that there also sites on computer technique called MICROCOSMOS, they the cosmos (universe) of the micro (-processor) of course.

HOW CAN I FIND OUT WHICH CREATURE I HAVE FOUND?
Click HERE to go to the main index of the picture-gallery's. If you are pretty sure it's a water beetle, you could go directly to one of the beetle pages. (Mind though: some bugs resemble beetles, and beetle-larva don't look like a beetle at all and are difficult to distinguish from the larva of a dragonfly for many people..) If you haven't the faintest idea, you could browse through all the pages with the top-tabs. If you still can't find it, you may e-mail me. A photo of the animal could be helpful. I am NOT a biologist, so sometimes I can't provide the exact name either...

HOW WERE THE PICTURES CREATED?
Most of them with a macro lens (on a bellows attachment sometimes), a reflex camera and a speed light. The slides and negatives I made this way were scanned with a flimscanner. More on this subject is to come on a separate page.

HOW MAY I USE THESE PICTURES?
You may use the picture for your private use freely, look at them, download them, or print them. But for public presentation, either on a beamer, in a magazine, a book, CD or whatever, you MUST ask my permission in advance by e-mail. I am very happy with the fact that the pictures here have already contributed to educational purposes and nature-projects, these initiatives I strongly encourage. I emphasize that my pictures may NOT be placed on a website or linked to it without my permission AND giving respectful credits.

HOW DID YOU MAKE THIS WEBSITE?
In a monk's (monkey's?) way with Notepad and a gallery-generator I wrote in the dark-aged Qbasic... As of late I use HMTL-Kit for the HOME, faq and other pages, which helps somewhat A page for you CSS- and HTML-lovers is still to come....