Mineral Photo Placemats - custom printed place mats featuring Mineral Thin Section Art

New Item! Placemats!

All of Sue's beautiful Series 1 mineral photos are now available as placemats. I've found a great local company who can custom print on to 3mm timber with exceptional colour quality. Each placemat has a 1mm cork backing with the sides polished black.

Placemats are heat (standard 110 degrees) & water resistant with a cello-glazed print.

Dimensions are 29.3cm (12in) diameter.

Minimum order of 2. Price is per placemat.

These products are made especially for you as soon as you place an order, which is why it takes us a bit longer to deliver it to you. Making products on demand instead of in bulk helps reduce overproduction, so thank you for making thoughtful purchasing decisions!


HOW TO ORDER:
Once you've decided which of Sue's images you would like printed on your placemats, you'll just need to select the corresponding number in the Variations section. You can have the whole set printed with the same image or a selection of different images, it's completely up to you! The details of each mineral image are included below.

HOW THE PHOTOS WERE CAPTURED:
These photographs were taken by Sue Hanson during her career as a geologist. This is the process in Sue's words:
After cutting and roughly trimming with a diamond tipped saw the rock is slowly cut, ground and then polished to a thickness of 0.03mm (30µm). Using resin to hold this incredibly thin slice of rock onto a glass slide the constituent minerals are now ready to be viewed under a polarising microscope. The diagnostic colors produced by projecting various wavelengths of light through the rock sliver, in conjunction with mineral shape and its association with other minerals are used to determine the mineral type. The diagnostic colors and shape of the mineral can also tell the experienced petrologist the approximate chemical composition of the mineral.

AUSTRALIAN MINERAL SERIES DETAILS:
Photograph No 1 of 12 PYROXENE - depicts a magnified view (under crossed polars) of pyroxene crystals being altered by feldspar laths.

Photograph 2 of 12 EPIDOTE - depicts a magnified view (under crossed polars) of radiating epidote blades set in a fine-grained quartz groundmass.

Photograph 3 of 12 EPIDOTE - depicts a magnified view (under crossed polars) of radiating epidote blades, set within quartz.

Photograph 5 of 12 PYROXENE & FELDSPAR – depicts a magnified view (under crossed polars) of twinned pyroxene and feldspar.

Photograph 6 of 12 FELDSPAR - depicts a magnified view (under crossed polars) of twinned feldspar (plagioclase) and blocky biotite showing birds-eye extinction.

Photograph 7 of 12 PYROXENE - depicts a magnified view (under crossed polars) of an agglomeration of pyroxene crystals.

Photograph 8 of 12 GARNET - depicts a magnified view (under plain polarising light) of garnet crystals set in pyroxene and quartz.

Photograph 10 of 12 PYROXENE & FELDSPAR - depicts a magnified view (under crossed polars) of
pyroxene and feldspar.

Photograph 11of 12 EPIDOTE - depicts a magnified view (under crossed polars) of radiating blades of epidote set in a coarse groundmass of quartz.

Photo 12 of 12 EPIDOTE - depicts a magnified view (under crossed polars) of radiating blades of epidote set in a coarse groundmass of quartz.