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Summer and Winter are my favourite seasons of the year. The Summer for its warm weather, long hours of daylight, thunderstorms and Noctilucent Clouds and Winter for its majestic snow scenes, both seasons can offer some of the most dramatic weather subjects of the year for the dedicated photographer or storm chaser. To date 2022 has been the most difficult year I've ever experienced for weather and night sky photography, the fault was mainly due to the weather pattern itself, the NLC season was virtually a non-event and Summer was a dull time of relentless grey skies and very few convective episodes.
As December approached I expected the year to end in a similar fashion when suddenly a severe cold spell appeared on the models which affected all of UK and Ireland to some degree for a two week period. With Christmas fast approaching I couldn't have wished for a better atmosphere, in fact, the visual scenes were quite frankly a dream come true. We experienced a fairly rare high ground snowfall, periodic wintry showers of snow, sleet and hail, relentless sub zero temps day and night with crisp clear days and frigid starry nights with not a breath of wind the entire time. During this cold spell, from my own experience anyway, I was seeing white on the ground the entire time, it was a tremendously beautiful period which I'm truly grateful for and which produced some of the best Winter scenes I've witnessed since 2010.
This was a high pressure freezer set-up, I was paying close attention to the model output and had been anticipating the possibility, if it came true, of potentially epic scenes. I was on alert from the night of December 12th, the atmosphere had already been freezing for days and on this night the high humidity would bring freezing fog across the country, if this happened and conditions were just rite, there could be a possibility of witnessing rare 'Hoar Frost'. This type of frost only forms in sub zero conditions in areas where freezing fog have been pooling for hours overnight, if this can happen with no wind then water vapor literally transforms into ice crystals which form on any exposed surface such as tree branches, power lines or grass. The moisture in the air changes state into solid ice without going through the liquid phase, a process called sublimation, similar to what occurs on the nucleus of a comet.
In exceptional cases hoar frost can completely blanket all exposed trees in a quilt of white, in such scenarios with good sunshine and blue skies one can capture scenes of true Christmas card caliber. However, proper hoar frost is rare in Ireland, it happens on occasion however it tends to be localized and vanishes fast with the heat of the sun and the coating tends to be thin and sporadic. The most dramatic hoar frost scenes sport trees covered in frost accumulations so thick that it literally looks like thick snow covering branches and to get this standard lasting for any length of time and over a wide area requires exceptional cold conditions, and this was what I had been hoping to catch.
I had spent a couple of days on messenger chatting with mates about the potential for hoar frost, we were excited by the potential but never really thought it would produce. I noticed the local weather forecast had warnings for freezing fog overnight in the Sperrins with the coldest plunge in temps taking place over W. Tyrone, Fermanagh and parts of Donegal. It would all come down to if and where freezing fog would form. I hadn't been out on a shoot in a long time, especially weather related, so I was getting psyched up about getting on the road for a chase. I decided I was going to commit myself and go for it the following day and hope for the best. That night was absolutely freezing outside, the sky was filled with stars and two mighty planets, however no fog in Cookstown, so I spent the night with little sleep scanning reports from social media to see where any fog was forming. I set the alarm for 06.30 with the intention of spending a day on the road.
I woke up before the alarm and was checking through social media for intel on freezing fog locations, however there were hardly any reports and it was still dark, all I seen was a Met Office yellow warning for fog and ice. I was committed to chasing W at first light however some ground truth would be helpful so I could fine tune my target area. I got up, had breakfast, filled a flask and snacks, de-iced the windscreen and got the van warmed up. The waning gibbous Moon was lowering into the SW and in the NE Corona Borealis was well placed, lurking unseen to the eye was a comet called ZTF which might be naked eye in another month or so, this would be my next obsession. Cookstown was clear and starry with no fog however the place was solid ice and frost so the first part of the recipe was in place.
After 07.00 I got a message from a very excited Paul Martin (also a Winter lover) saying ''man, epic hoar frost!!!'', ''best I've seen since 2010'', that was a bold statement which got me really pumped up for the chase, it really is hard to beat ground truth like this from someone who knows the caliber of Winter scenes which we hunt for. Paul not only confirmed the presence of hoar frost but that it was the best since 2010, that Winter was legendary and I've never seen hoar frost since that insane period. This went from an unknown chase in very cold conditions with the chance of seeing nothing to 100% certainty of spectacular photo opportunities. Paul confirmed the frost was thick and covering all the trees between Omagh and Fermanagh and said ''get there man for the images''. I would like to say a big thanks to Paul for letting me know what was going on in that area because I saw nothing like that at home.
I was out the door like a rocket, adrenaline going, I felt the same emotional sensations I would experience on a good Summer storm chase, I didn't even feel the cold any more as I was so focused on what I might be seeing soon. I took my Dog Rhua along with me, got the heat blasting, Downtown Radio was on blasting out Christmas songs and we where on the road chasing. It was pitch black as we drove through Cookstown but as soon as I entered the Cookstown-Omagh road the pre-dawn light was sufficient enough to reveal the countryside, when it did I was in awe. Every tree, bush, fence, roof top and field was covered in white, at a first glance it looked like a thick dusting of snow but of course I knew it wasn't, this was a widespread thick accumulation of hoar frost, I had waited 12 years to witness a spectacle like this again.
Everywhere I looked was epic, and I don't say that lightly, it was extraordinary, a true Winter wonderland of magic and hundreds of photo opportunities as far as the eye could see. I started to feel a slight panic because I was eager to get shooting but the light wasn't bright enough yet and I didn't know where or what to shoot. I felt a strong compulsion to get something in the bag incase this all vanished. I tried to remain calm, I kept driving, as I did my eyes scanned every tree and bush for frost thickness and composition. The van was reading -7 degrees C however I later learned it peaked at -8C just a little further W. I was going to head to the Fermanagh area however I decided I might as well just target this region, the scenes were already here so I pulled into the car park at An Creagan and got out to admire the landscape. The sun had just rose into a purple-blue twilight sky with a pink glow on the horizon, the air was baltic, crisp, clear and simply beautiful.
I love this kind of Polar air, I always feel truly alive, the Arctic air felt so pure and cleansing. I took images of trees with frost but couldn't seem to get a good results. I got the drone in the air and did a flight over the frost-covered trees, the drone briefly passed through a bank of freezing fog and I began to experience issues. The props were showing in the camera field and I was getting sudden IMU warnings, I suspected what was happening and brought it back for examination. The props were encased in ice!, that's what had thrown the IMU off, it was a good job I noticed this and warmed the drone up inside or it literally could have crashed, I've never had an issue with my drone in any freezing or snow weather before so this was the first time. The minimum operating temperature for the Mavic 2 Pro is approximately -10C, so I suspected that with increased height and entering the freezing fog the true temp could have been much colder so the aircraft could have been operating outside its tolerance levels.
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I kept the van engine running to keep the gear warm, I had tea and a snack then went for a walk with Rhua, the morning sunshine was now excellent for photography. Being surrounded by a Winter wonderland can make photography difficult, you would think with so much beauty around you that getting good images would be easy, this isn't the case. My main interest was shooting nice trees covered in thick hoar frost, I saw plenty of them, however finding the rite kind of tree and getting one in isolation without foreground clutter is not as easy as it would seem, I would end up spending hours on the quest for that perfect tree. I was using the 100-400mm on the 600D crop sensor here, zooming into trees, this was across the fields from An Creagan, I really can't do this experience justice for beauty, it was white everywhere, beautiful trees and bushes with isolated farm houses and barns, all in white, proper Christmas card material. I settled for this tree in the meantime with a bank of freezing fog behind, at least I was getting images now, I hoped to get better later.
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When I got back to the van I was absolutely freezing!, I honestly can't recall feeling this cold on a frosty morning for a very long time. I had another warm brew then Rhua and I hit the road. I chose the back country roads, my intention was to check out Gortin Glenn forest however I never got there as I got distracted by so many cool scenes so I ended up checking out nearly every road between An Creagan and Greencastle. By this stage it felt like a Summer storm chase, I was on roads I don't remember seeing before so this was turning into quite the adventure and I was loving it. I had no plan, I just drove, saw a cool scene, pulled over anywhere and got out to take images, I had two cameras ready in the back, one with the 100-400mm and the full frame with the 15mm lens for wide angle options.
I was completely in the zone, I recall this location, I stopped on top of a very steep hill and used the telephoto to get the curving road at the bottom, the hoar frost covered all the trees. I covered quite a few miles, ended up on roads so narrow I had to reverse back out to avoid getting trapped, navigated sections of black ice, I spun out a few times, but for the most part I made it across many of the back routes without any drama. I must have shot about 40 trees at different locations yet I couldn't get a decent image I was pleased with. I learned something from this chase, trees are very difficult to shoot!, I don't consider myself to be a landscape photographer at all, I didn't even take any tripod mounted images and I never use filters and I don't have the experience working with trees as my subjects tend to be sky phenomena over foreground, so when I got really involved with the frosted trees I found myself a little out of my comfort zone.
A tree with thick frost, of proper shape, in good light, isolated against a blue sky were the main requirements, but do I shoot the whole tree with sky around it?, go for wide angles of the countryside or get in close and personal? I was limited to just two of my best lenses so this really dictated what I could do. The 100-400mm for zoom shots of distant trees or to hone in on details on overhead branches or the super wide angle for getting dramatic scenes of entire trees in the frame or close to branches for that dramatic look, so this was my mind-set.
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By 10.00 I had ventured onto high ground and stumbled across a cross-roads in the middle of nowhere, the scenes were dramatic so I spent a little time there. That's a normal wire fence, not barbed wire, those spikes are frost structures.
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All the fences, fence posts and hedges were covered with this beautiful structure. From a distance hoar frost looks like snow but when you get up close to it you can see it's made from accumulations of delicate ice crystals, you can appreciate how cold and still the air must be for these crystals to form.
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The ice crystals can look like blades, spikes, or needles, which can vary in length from tiny to several cm's or more in length, billions of frosted needles clinging to everywhere, what a stunning sight to see.
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I couldn't resist taking a 400mm image of this country house surrounded in white, check out the tree in the front garden, at first I thought maybe that was Christmas lights but when I drove past I could see it was hoar frost.
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By 11.00 I found myself on this narrow mountain road near Greencastle and ascending into a world of beauty, a world of pure white and blue skies, a world of perfection. The hoar frost on the tall hedges either side of me were amazing so these became the main focus of the day.
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This was a tall hedge, camera pointing up and using wide angle, it really doesn't get much better than this, absolutely perfect conditions.
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There was even hoar frost on the phone lines
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I loved this frost structure on the wire fence, for some reason the most dramatic frost on the fence was on this side so I had to shoot into the sun. I was buzzing and having such a great time here. The above image is 15mm wide angle on full frame so you can appreciate that those needles are much larger in reality.
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There was a magical atmosphere on this mountain road, I never saw a single car during the entire one and half hours I spent here, it felt like it was just me living inside this frozen world. The place was dead silent, I mean absolutely nothing, the frost seemed to absorb the natural acoustics, it was surreal, the only sound was the crunch of frost when I walked and the click of the camera's shutter.
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Nature is amazing
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I felt like I was living a dream shooting these scenes, if you had told me a week earlier I would be witnessing this caliber of Winter scenes I would never have believed you. I took a few more images until I could hardly feel my fingers anymore, I did two drone flights around a frosted tree then decided to call it a day, the time was 12.30 UT. The drive home was just as stunning as the pre-dawn drive earlier, in fact, some of the best trees I saw where located close to Cookstown with huge draping branches covered in frost. When I got home I downloaded all the images and footage and got all the DSLR and drone batteries fully charged because I was already planning on returning to the area the following day. I came home in such a natural high and feeling so good from this chase that I could hardly settle all evening and all my thoughts turned towards tomorrow's chase.
I had such a good feeling about the 14th, daytime temperatures from the day before stayed below freezing and severe low temperatures were expected again overnight with yet more freezing fog, I figured that most of the hoar frost would still be there and the fog would only add more crystals to the formations on the branches so the frost could be never thicker. The photogenic conditions looked to repeat themselves with the forecast giving the fog to clear with sunshine and blue skies, I had a feeling this was going to be an epic day of high rewards, but only if I could get to the rite place and find the dramatic scenes I had my mind. While yesterday was a total success I felt I could have done better with my photography, December 13th was my introduction to this amazing phenomena and a race to get images, but on December 14th I would be calmer and get better images, I hoped.
I was up at 07.00 UT to another pre-dawn twilight sky full of stars and baltic conditions outside. I was pondering my chase location, should I try further W this time or return to yesterday's location? the Universe yet again provided me with the answer when I got a message from Paul Martin. He was heading to work between Omagh and Fermanagh and said the scenes ''were epic!!!'' with ''frost an inch thick in the trees''. Thanks again Paul for the intel, I packed the gear, defrosted the windscreen and headed out Winter chasing for the second day in a row.
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Paul was rite, this was epic and even more photogenic, the Cookstown-Omagh road was amazing yet again and I felt impulses to stop and shoot everything I could see but for some reason I stayed cool and just kept on driving passing wonderful photo opportunities every few minutes, I just felt a compulsion to get further W so I kept on driving. The van was already reading -9C which matched the official low temperature recordings in W Tyrone this morning. When I arrived in Omagh I was blown away by the scenes, I can't find words to describe the Winter beauty, it was awesome and everything I wanted as a photographer.
I drove through the town centre and emerged into the countryside on the west side of town and pulled over a few miles town the road, I practically jumped out from the van with the camera like a child on Christmas morning. Both sides of the main road where lined with trees covered in thick hoar frost, and between these the frost could be seen as far as the eye could see, I was still in shock seeing such amazing vistas, it was still quite a surprise. Moon visible above the trees.
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I concentrated on this tree on the left side of the road and got up close with the wide angle lens. The sky was perfectly clear, crisp and Arctic blue and the low sun not long after sunrise was casting golden hour light onto the frost.
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Hoar frost spikes at sunrise, shooting into the morning sun
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I buried myself inside this tree for a wide angle view of the branches and frost-covered landscape. I knew at this moment I was going to have an epic day and I was getting much better images because I was feeling calmer, I had also learned alot from the first day and was in the zone. Please click on page two to view the rest of this chase.
Martin McKenna
