microphotographn.

1857 W. Hislop in Liverpool & Manchester Photogr. Jrnl. New Ser. 1 264/1 The term ‘micro-photograph’, has been improperly applied to enlarged pictures of microscopic preparation... I conceive that the word micro..can only be correctly applied to reduced..figures.

1858 G. Shadbolt in Sutton's Photogr. Notes III. 208 The word microphotograph originated, I believe, with myself, and is applied..to very small photographs, not to photographs of small objects, which would more correctly be photomicrographs.

1867 Pop. Sci. Rev. 6 54 ‘Microphotograph’ is a very long name, recently introduced, to denote a very small object; it refers to the minute photographic reductions of portraits or views so often shown as curiosities under the microscope.

1878 Jrnl. Royal Microsc. Soc. 1 300 Microphotograph.—Mr. Langenheim..has photographed the Lord's Prayer on the ten-thousandth of a square inch.

1933 W. K. L. Dickson in Jrnl. Soc. Motion Picture Engineers Dec. 438 Edison's idea..was to combine the phonograph cylinder or record with a similar or larger drum on the same shaft, which drum was to be covered with pin-point microphotographs which of course must synchronize with the phonograph record.

1940 A. Huxley Let. 14 Oct. (1969) 461 I would like to have..micro-photographs suitable for reading by means of a reading machine (all the big libraries make these micro-films now) of Part III of this book.

1957 R.A.E. News Nov. 8/2 The National Coal Board publicity office tried to excuse..an advertisement that described a picture, about four inches by six, as a ‘microphotograph’. In the O.E.D. this word certainly denotes both a small photograph of a large-or-small object and a large-or-small photograph of a small object. However, the ambiguity proved such a nuisance that after international discussion between various bodies, the words ‘microphotograph’ and ‘photomicrograph’ respectively were agreed on.

1966 M. R. D. Foot SOE in France viii. 181 A microphotograph in the false bottom of a matchbox.

1969 Proc. Royal Microsc. Soc. 4 142 Sixth Report of the Nomenclature Committee. The Committee recommends the following names and definitions:… Microphotograph. A very small photograph, intended to be viewed with a microscope.

1994 New Scientist 12 Mar. 44/2 J. B. Dancer..produced hundreds of microphotographs using the wet collodion process, each of which needed to be magnified fifty-fold to become visible.

1860 Photogr. News 13 Jan. 228/1 The production of good micro-photographs appears very much to depend on the employment of a suitable collodion.

1872 Amer. Naturalist 6 185 Mr. Stodder applies the name of microphotograph to the enlarged photographic representation of a microscopic object.

1875 tr. H. W. Vogel Chem. Light & Photogr. xiv. 208 The beauty of the micro-photograph depends essentially on the beauty of the preparation to be photographed.

1896 T. C. Allbutt et al. Syst. Med. I. 183 Microphotographs of two pyramidal cells from a case of general paralysis of the insane.

1927 J. B. S. Haldane & J. S. Huxley Animal Biol. ii. 51 (Fig. 18) Micro-photograph (×150) of a section through the ovary of a mammal (cat).

1944 R. South Caterpillars Brit. Butterflies 5 Of the eggs and chrysalids, the former [illustrations] are from microphotographs by A. E. Tonge and drawings by Horace Knight.

1968 Punch 21 Aug. 271/3 There are blackboard diagrams, and micro-photographs of sperm and ova.

1974 Nature 22 Feb. 511/3 Species of pine and hardwood trees, grasses and cultivated plants, for example, are represented in the atlas of 136 microphotographs [of smoke particulates].

1992 Economist 14 Mar. (Suppl.) 21/1 British Petroleum..uses computer vision to help scan micro-photographs of earth taken from drilling samples to find the tiny fossil shells that can provide clues to help find oil.

1997 Brainwaves Catal. (Innovations PLC) Christmas 29/3 Yikes! features the human body in over 50 utterly astonishing ‘microphotographs’.