Ice crystals!

[Joel Wright]

Some dense fog rolled in very early this morning and induced some pretty cool ice crystal growth on many outside surfaces early this morning. Gave everything a really frosty look. Temps had dipped down into the single digits. Anyway, these are pretty cool when you look at them really closely. You can see the individual ice crystals and kind of get the sense at how they grew.

What's very interesting is now that they're starting to literally blow off the trees, it makes it look as if it's snowing from time to time. Kind of gives you an inside look at how snow is formed way up in the clouds. Pretty damn cool I thought.

Well anyway, here's a few pics I snapped a little while ago. Please excuse the size, but I wanted to show how neat these things look close up...

http://img45.imageshack.us/img45/6524/1230070031mv6.jpg (http://imageshack.us)





These bottom three pictures are closeups of the ice crystals growing on the dead leaves of one of my rose bushes.

http://img441.imageshack.us/img441/1282/1230070131bz9.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

http://img441.imageshack.us/img441/206/1230070141hr8.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

http://img441.imageshack.us/img441/9100/1230070151wy5.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

[Brandon Sullivan]

cool pics Joel.. Didn't look to see, did you guys have any Dense Fog or Freezing Fog Adv's?

[Joel Wright]

cool pics Joel.. Didn't look to see, did you guys have any Dense Fog or Freezing Fog Adv's?


I don't think they had any advisories out for us. Just east of here they did. They probably should have though since it was fairly widespread for a time and cut visibilities to under a quarter mile.

[Maggie Kahman]

I got some pictures on the 27th of some fog. The night before we were under a dense freezing fog advisory. Here are some of the pictures

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2008/2148975521_73523ac77b.jpg
The Fairfield watertower is barely visible through the thick fog

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2077/2148969311_3ecc079b12_o.jpg
Ice crystals on the porch

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2159/2149762590_fccb9f51a2.jpg
I love the contrast on this one!

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2167/2149760020_6185331908_o.jpg
More ice crystals on the side mirror of my car

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2003/2149762740_dca532f063_o.jpg
Crystals growing on some string.

[Joel Wright]

Nice pictures Maggie! :)

[Robert Dewey]

We had some freezing fog a few days ago... not to that extent you guys had, but it was still cool. With the sun shining on it, it almost looked like an ice-storm had rolled through. I had to do a double take when I looked out the window in the morning.

[Anna Lindstrom]

Very cool ...Nice pictures both of you. What kind of lens did you use?

[Marko Korosec]

A big part of continental Europe was (and still is) under the big ridge...more than half of Slovenian lowlands is under low cloudiness and inversion for almost 10 days now...and frost with nice crystals is there. Here are some pics I made few days ago...

http://www.weather-photos.net/gallery/albums/userpics/10001/22_12_2007mk14.jpg

http://www.weather-photos.net/gallery/albums/userpics/10001/22_12_2007mk17.jpg

http://www.weather-photos.net/gallery/albums/userpics/10001/22_12_2007mk33.jpg

You can see more pics here: http://www.weather-photos.net/gallery/thumbnails.php?album=234

[Joel Wright]

Very cool ...Nice pictures both of you. What kind of lens did you use?


I used a Canon A620 P/S camera in macro for those close shots. I need to get a DSLR, but that's a whole other topic lol.

Beautiful shots Marko! It's pretty cool the way the crystals grow in different ways depending on the temp etc.

[Bill Schintler]

Hard rime ice:



http://img441.imageshack.us/img441/9100/1230070151wy5.jpg (http://imageshack.us/)

Soft rime ice:




http://www.weather-photos.net/gallery/albums/userpics/10001/22_12_2007mk33.jpg



Both types of ice accumulation involve the growth of ice crystals as supercooled water droplets freeze on objects. Hard rime is most often associated with windy conditions and air temperatures above -10C. The ice grows on the windward side of the object, and notice the asymmetry to the crystal growth in the first photo. Soft rime is normally associated with colder temperatures, smaller water droplets, and calmer wind conditions then with hard rime.

- bill

[Maggie Kahman]

Very cool ...Nice pictures both of you. What kind of lens did you use?

Im not sure what the lens is called, I used super macro for the close shots. And thank you:)

Nice pictures Maggie! :)

Thanks, Joel. Right back atcha:D