Talk:Akhavan - Neuroglia

This started out as a design experiment, to see if I could recreate the effect of an opposed bar square, but in a hexagon. If the effect had worked, there would have been lots of rhombi and some triangles. However, I forgot that with a hexagon, you'd necessarily have a series of barion facets for either the crown, the pavilion, or both. There would have been two different ways to generate the bar effect (in theory) - one involved two sets of that "cube illusion" (which is what I used), and the other would have involved a hexagonal step cut on one end, and something I can't brain for the other end. Clearly, I chose the one I understood.

Somehow, I didn't get the intended effect at all. Instead, I got something with better-than-expected brightness, and an interesting reflection pattern. The first thing that came to mind, since I had just finished my histology final exam, was, "This looks like astrocytes! Or maybe oligodendrocytes." So, that's how the design got its name. It looks the coolest in that Windex apatite from Mexico, and looks the most like neuroglia with an H&E stain preparation if you cut it in a greyish amethyst. However, it can be cut in any material from feldspar to CZ (RI = 1.52 - 2.16) with no changes, but depending on the RI you'll get different effects for the axons or dendrites.

Cutting is very straightforward, but you have to make sure that you cut the steps evenly and to the correct proportions. If you have the steps off, you get really large areas of extinction. Not sure why...

Difficulty level = high beginner