Snowflake photography

November 26th, 2008 - 23:29 | 4 comments

While thinking about Christmassy photos this evening, I wondered how easy it would be to photograph snowflakes. I quickly came across snowcrystals.com, which has dozens of utterly beautiful images:

How easy is it to photograph them? Not very. The above shots were taken in the field, at -15 degrees celcius, with a purpose-built photomicroscope and coloured backlights. Aren’t they gorgeous, though? The site is full of the science behind snowflakes, and it’s worth exploring - they managed to grow a 2.5cm snowflake. I really want the book.

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4 Responses to “Snowflake photography”

1 Lynsey Nov 27th, 2008 at 6:02 pm

I like the spiky ones best.
2 Ed Nov 27th, 2008 at 11:56 pm

Are those flat?
Whenever you see one in the wild, so to speak, they are always 3D. The photos don’t seem to show them as really three dimensional entities. Is that due to the technique, or just how the shots are done?
3 Julie Nov 29th, 2008 at 8:59 am

I wish you’d found out about this and mentioned it earlier! We had the book at Borders but no one bought it so it went in the sale for £1 in August. I looked through it a couple of times - it’s absolutely brilliant - but I couldn’t justify the shelf space in my tiny room so I didn’t get it!
4 Andrew Nov 29th, 2008 at 12:03 pm

Ed - the snowflakes are on a slide under a microscope. I don’t know how you’d go about photographing them in 3D - that’d be tough.

Julie - damn! Maybe it’s the kind of thing I can find in second-hand shops.

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