I never saw the Becke Line for years. It wasn't until I had to teach it myself that I really saw what all these lecturers were on about. Having two or more people looking down a microscope can be a problem and, combined with equipment that might not have been optimally adjusted, it is perhaps not suprising that I was never properly convinced in the early part of my petrographic career.
Optical mineralogy remains ubiquitous to geology courses and is resource intensive.
Microscopes are not cheap to buy or maintain and there is a high attrition rate for fragile thin sections. Although outstandingly successful as far as it goes, the OUVM does not attempt to stimulate more advanced techniques like Becke Lines or conoscopic observation. At present it also lacks any supporting instructional dialogue. Hardware requirements Optical Mineralogy is available in both Macintosh and Windows versions. All modules use 256 colours.