Sunday, January 28, 2018

Frost from Fire

As different as a moonbeam from lightning, or frost from fire.
~ Emily Bronte

It has been a cold, frosty winter for the most part. One downside is that it's been too cold to wander about comfortably with camera in hand. Another is that my apartment windows are so heavily covered in frost, that I have a hard time seeing outside of them. The upside however, is that it makes for some interesting macro photography. Frosty windows with minimal tweaking are below.

frost with morning sun
Winter is a glorious spectacle of glittering fractals complete with a soundscape and atmosphere entirely its own. ~ Anders Swanson
The sun sent its first light over the horizon and sprinkled her golden glitter on my window pane.





frost with morning sun2
It is the life of the crystal, the architect of the flake, the fire of the frost, the soul of the sunbeam. This crisp winter air is full of it. 
~ John Burroughs
Just when I thought it couldn't sparkle any brighter.. it did.





frost at sunrise4
What miracle of weird transforming
Is this wild work of frost and light,
This glimpse of glory infinite?
~ John Greenleaf Whittier
The day began to take on peachy hues.





frost at sunrise
How beautiful thy frosty morn,
When brilliants gem each feathery thorn!
~ Bernard Barton
Peach blended with pink and mauve light turned icy panes into a bejeweled mountainous landscape.





frost at sunrise2
What a severe yet master artist old Winter is. No longer the canvas and the pigments, but the marble and the chisel.
~ John Burroughs
As the day grew lighter, so did the colours reflected in the glass.





frost at sunrise3
The frost performs its secret ministry,
Unhelped by any wind.
~ Samuel Taylor Coleridge
I just kept seeing little worlds within this tiny frozen space.





frosty1
In winter we behold the charms of solemn majesty and naked grandeur.
~ James Ellis
I love how depending on the time of day and the colour of the sky, various shades appear to soften the icy etchings.





frosty2
Nothing burns like the cold.
~ George R.R. Martin
Silvery blue crystals with aqua hues in the sky beyond.





frost4
A lot of people like snow. I find it to be an unnecessary freezing of water.
~ Carl Reiner
Some of these photos are from last spring like this one taken in March of 2017.





frost2
I watch the springs, the summers, the autumns;
And when comes the winter snow monotonous,
I shut all the doors and shutters
To build in the night my fairy palace.
~ Charles Baudelaire
As was this frosty feather.





frost
Winter is nature's way of saying, "Up yours.
~ Robert Byrne
Also from last year, I turned up the contrast and vibrance on this and the next image, and found that these sparse bits of frost looked like unusual bugs crawling around on the glass.





frost5
Melancholy were the sounds on a winter's night.
~ Virginia Woolf
This pattern should come with its own sound effects.





frosty3
Winter came down to our home one night
Quietly pirouetting in on silvery-toed slippers of snow,
And we, we were children once again.
~ Bill Morgan, Jr.
A nighttime shot with enough light from behind to silver-paint the window.





frosty4
It is said that in a certain faraway land the cold is so intense that words freeze as soon as they are uttered, and after some time thaw and become audible, so that words spoken in winter go unheard until the next summer. ~ Author Unknown
Layer upon layer of sparkling frost, and what appears to be a silver leaf a little left of center. I might not be able to see out my windows but they do entertain me.





frost at night
The gaunt limbs, and stark, rigid, death-like whiteness of winter.
~ Bret Harte
And later in the night, city street lights help illuminate the window's canvas so that Jack Frost can do his work.





NYE near-full moon3
There is a grandeur in winter, stern and wild it may be, but a grandeur which speaks to the soul.
~ C. J. Peterson
On New Year's Eve, the moon was nearly full - and it rose early. You might have to pull back a bit to see the curve of that lovely orb in the background.





NYE near-full moon2
The winter frowned its icy eyebrows
~ Florenin Smarandache
Or I could just give you a more distant perspective instead.





NYE near-full moon1
I hide myself in the quiet white of Winter and
nestle in her comforting folds of cold oblivion.
~ Terri Guillemets
And here we are further still - the near-full moon smiling contentedly at Jack Frost's work.





Wolf Moon New Years Day
Moonlight drowns out all but the brightest stars.
~ J.R.R. Tolkien
And on New Years Day, the full Wolf Moon appeared bright and beautiful in the eastern sky.





New Years Day wolf moon
Don't tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass.
~ Anton Chekhov
A bit late in the wishing but Happy New Year, everyone.