A magnified observation apparatus includes an illuminator, a feature quantity calculator, and an illumination controller. The illumination controller selectively performs first and second sequences. In the first sequence, the illuminator is operated in the first lighting pattern, and a display is operated to display a live image of the observation object that is irradiated with the first lighting pattern by a display controller. In the second sequence, the illuminator is operated in the second lighting pattern as at least one of the different illumination directions that is selected based on the feature quantities of the image data, which are calculated correspondingly to the different illumination directions by the feature quantity calculator, and the display is operated to display by the display controller an image of the observation object that is captured when the observation object is irradiated with the second lighting pattern.