Note: New snowflake photos  are now on line.  If you are following a link that brought you to this page, click here to start at the beginning...

I first became interested in snowflakes while driving.  To be precise - while waiting at stop lights. I'd look up and see these seemingly perfect crystals land on the windshield - usually to melt away within moments.  When I took up photography, photographing snow crystals seemed like a worthwhile challenge, and so after one or two false starts I finally managed to look at a few snowflakes under high magnification.

It was then that I learned that most snowflakes show the wear and tear of their travels through the atmosphere.  Brushes with other snow crystals, changes in humidity and temperature, the effects of sublimation and the trauma of landing on earth all take a random toll on their crystalline structure.  Like us mortals, snowflakes show the wear and tear - but also polish and glitter - of the cumulative effects of existence. They emerge from their experience unique, irregular, complex. They conform to some general plan, but are far from perfect crystals.

And so the name of this gallery - Imperfect Symmetry.