At last the snow settled on central Sweden also - and it couldn’t be otherwise - although still not in a "Scandinavian" amount. Enough to justify going out in the woods; not enough to get views of them in line with the "winter wonderland" effect of stylization and simplification that snowy landscapes usually provide (and I usually expect). With such a low level of the blanket, brush and branches of the undergrowth remain in sight to mess with the purity of the whole. Therefore I thought to go with the good old motion blur, in order to dilute the "impurities" while maintaining clearly visible the side of the trees crusted with snow (I've been waiting for it a long time), which in any case would not show any detail. Blades of sunset enriched an already fascinating scenario. When you have to do with photos so alike, it’s dificult to tell which one is better, which deserves the title of "nice picture"; here, more likely, none of the three, but that is what I could get in this December so far.

And talking about similarities, the most careful of you will find some between the second picture here and the motion blur one in this post: when the elements in a picture are few, similar and simple (the trunks, in our case), the rules of a balanced composition can lead to photographs which look actually pretty the same. The other parameters involved (light, colours) make the difference, in these cases.
Photography is like music (and I’ll like to return on this topic): the involved parameters are finite in number, but their combinations are endless.

By the way: Happy Holidays to everybody. Or better: God Jul och Gott Nytt År!

_ The lack of snow persists. The landscape keeps an atypical appearance for the beginning of December: looking at the forest of conifers, it would be virtually impossible to tell whether we are in May or late autumn, without take a look at the calendar.
There is still room, then, for the games of the cold: a few degrees below zero are enough to transfom the shores of Lake Särna - and any other expanse of water in the region - into canvas over which the ice seems to enjoy drawing the most amazing shapes. Here it is a couple of images that ideally complements the last year's collection "The Icy Ten", taken in the same circumstances, which you can see here in the 2010 Chronicles.

Here next, the water surface was solidified with a crystallization phenomenon that created regular geometric shapes: it happens when the temperatures drop suddenly within a single night, from just above zero to minus ten degrees.

_ In Särna, the lake sports small but delightful beaches made by fine sand, methodically arranged by the wind, and by the even slightest backwash, in the shape of those classical, minute waves that you expect from the sand at any latitude. The water entering and flooding them is the first to freeze, and creates a double scheme of mirrored sinuousities beneath a thin layer of ice so transparent to be invisible, if wasn't for some still free sand blown by the wind, which rests on it, taking the shape of long strips of gold.
This gold moves rolling on the ice with waving motion - in all respects similar to a snake - and run all over the lake: one of those rare moments when I regret not having a videocamera in my hands.

The snow is expected in very short term, and once it will be here there will be no way to play with the ice again, until October of next year.

_ Yesterday I met a female Capercaillie especially friendly and cooperative. Instead of just stealing some of those furtive shots which are usually connected with such accidental encounters (and which always leave a bad taste in the mouth, under the point of view of personal fulfilment and empathetic relationship with the subject), I took advantage of its kindness watching her for quite a long time.

And admiring her: the massive body, perfect to keep the heat, is also a masterpiece of mimetism, wonderful in its warm and marbled tones culminating in the tawny breast; the thick plumage on the powerful claws; the bill, an ideal tool to cut handfuls of pine's needles, taken away with a strong torsion of the neck: a move clearly visible in one shot of the sequence you can see after the break (click on Read More). I spent 45 minutes together with this remarkable bird, keeping myself discreetly in distance; during this time she just occasionally looked at that unknown shape which was producing strange swishes at six frame per second.
Until she decided, for once in total quietness and freedom, it was time to move to another tree.