Diffraction contrast electron microscopy of microcrystalline long chain lipids at low beam currents reveals flexible bending of these crystals due to forces imposed by the underlying support film. Such bend contours as are illustrated here for microcrystals of cholesteryl nervonate (Fig 1) and glycerol 1,3-dipalmitate (Fig 2) can be indexed by dark field images formed from strongly diffracting beams (1) and can be measured to estimate the crystal radius of curvature (2). In comparison with earlier studies on polyethylene single crystals (3), such measurements indicate lipid crystals to be much more prone to elastic bends than are polymer crystals, although similar details, including edge dislocations, are sometimes evidenced in moire1 fringe patterns (4).