Keyence VHX-1000

The VHX Series Digital Microscope was designed to alleviate the shortcomings of traditional, optical light microscopes - shallow depth-of-field, short working distance, lack of portability and versatility, sample limitations, etc. As a result, Keyence developed a HDR CCD camera which in combination with specially designed optics produces an image with around 20 times the depth-of-field of conventional microscopes. If this increase in depth-of-field is not enough, this type of microscope combines stepper motor precision with fast image processing to capture a series of images, focussing through the sample height range, and then processes the images to identify the maximally focussed pixels and integrates them into a fully focused image. This not only leads to an in-focus image of a 3D surface but also allowing 3D profile measurements such as volume, distance or angles to be measured up an accuracy of 1µm at a magnification of 1000x (the pico-motors step size).

The lens of the VHX1000 is mounted on the arm of a multi-angle viewing stand that rotates from -60° to +90°. This in combination with the 'Depth Up' mode allows the capturing of images that could, historically, only be captured in an SEM.

_{Image Courtesy of Keyence}