I would classify myself as an amateur rockhound. By profession I am a physicist; in the past I studied heavy fermion at low temperatues (millikelvin) and now do research in polarization optics.

I volunteered to be curator of the rock and mineral collection here at Georgian Court (a predominantly women's university in Lakewood, NJ)when I first came here about 13 years ago.

The universities web master recently contaced me to put up a web page about the collection, so I started to photograph the collection about a month ago. I guess I got really hooked when I started to see the incredibly beautiful crystals on the thumnails under the microscope.

I do teach a geology course here, so I know basic information, but that's about it. I really like this site because I can start to learn about more specific information and ask fellow enthusiasts questions.

I used to take pictures of the micromounts with a MiSCOPE, a very affordable hand-held microscope. The macro specimens are photographed with a Nikon digital camera. I have "upgraded" to a Leica EZ4D, it takes much better photos and can more easily be used with "stacked" photo software like helicon.