Wednesday, January 26, 2022

Beautiful Winter Blues

 


Cerulean pool

Deep depressions bloom in snow

Colors of the light



While out snowshoeing last weekend, I noticed one of my favorite winter phenomena- BLUE snow! In the holes made by ski poles, blue light glowed out across the endless white field before me. It looked like blue flowers blooming in winter. (This photo is truly what I saw last weekend! There are no filters applied. I don’t think the photo does it justice. It was much more beautiful and awesome.)

So I came home to investigate how this happens. It doesn’t happen all the time so I was curious. To paraphrase from an article on Webexhibits.org- Sunlight is white light. As sunlight penetrates deep snow, red and yellow light is absorbed  and filtered leaving the blue light. Deeper snow filters out more of the other wavelengths. That is why we see blue when we look into the depressions. 

The beautiful blues of winter!

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Location: Rochester, NY, USA

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