Source: Faisal Alamgir, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA The imaging of microscopic structures of solid materials, and the analysis of the structural components imaged, is known as materialography. Qualitative information such as, for example, whether or not there is porosity in the material, what the size and shape distribution of the grains look like, or whether there is anisotropy to the microstructure can be directly observed. We will see in Part 2 of the Materialography series, however, that statistical methods allow us to quantitatively measure these microstructural features and translate the analysis from a two-dimensional cross section to the three dimensional structure of a material sample. This presentation will provide an overview of the techniques and procedures involved in preparing solid material samples for optical microscopy. While materialography can be conducted with optical as well as electron-based microscopy, this presentation will focus on the sample preparation specifically for optical microscopy. It should be noted, however, that a sample prepared for optical materialography can be used for scanning electron microscopy as well with minimum, if any, additional steps.