Man Walks All Day to Create Spectacular Snow Patterns.

[Scuba]

From my email ....



Artist Simon Beck must really love the cold weather! Along the frozen lakes of Savoie , France , he spends days plodding through the snow in raquettes (snowshoes), creating these sensational patterns of snow art. Working for 5-9 hours a day, each final piece is typically the size of three soccer fields! The geometric forms range in mathematical patterns and shapes that create stunning, sometimes 3D, designs when viewed from higher levels.How long these magnificent geometric forms survive is completely dependent on the weather. Beck designs and redesigns the patterns as new snow falls, sometimes unable to finish a piece due to significant overnight accumulations.

"The main reason for making them was because I can no longer run properly due to problems with my feet, so plodding about on level snow is the least painful way of getting exercise. Gradually, the reason has become photographing them, and I am considering buying a better camera". - Simon Beck

[eShirl]

1. neat!

thanks for posting

[Historic NY]

2. Amazing way to get excercise!!

[Lunabelle]

3. Crazy but beautiful

Really lovely patterns. I hope he doesn't get frostbite.

[daleanime]

4. Wow!

[vlyons]

5. Too much free time

[hunter]

26. Too much free time? There's no such thing.

A decent society would have twenty hour work weeks, two months paid vacation every year, and a retirement age of 58 or so.

We've got machines now to do much of our work.

Fuck the kind of "productivity" that turns most people into slaves and a small percentage of people into non-laboring multi-millionaires and billionaires.

[dhill926]

44. + a bunch........

[liberal N proud]

6. No coat?

He must love the cold.

[LuvNewcastle]

7. He looks like he's in pretty good shape.

I can certainly see why. I don't think I would be interested in doing such ephemeral art, but I think this is wonderful.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

8. So glad I caught this on the Trending Now DU list. Thanks for posting!

I know someone who would be very interested in this kind of art, but additionally I'm glad to have read about it myself.

[tclambert]

9. How does he measure? Does he have a helper? Someone to hold the other end of a rope?

Stake and line? He must plan these patterns meticulously in advance.

How did he do the one with all the little circles? They look so perfect, but there's no reference marks inside the circles.

I'm guessing the flat area he uses as a canvas is a frozen lake.

[JoeyT]

14. He probably plots it out

the way surveyors do. Some of the higher end GPS surveying equipment can do awfully impressive things.

[MrModerate]

29. I don't get it . . .

GPS is only accurate down to a few meters. That wouldn't be nearly precise enough.

[A Little Weird]

41. Can be more precise

I think some of the survey grade Trimble units are accurate to 20 cm now. Hard to imagine someone would spend that kind of money though.

[tclambert]

38. You kids with your new-fangled GPS and such!

Why, in my day, if we wanted to make a crop circle, we just needed a knotted piece of string and a stick . . . and a stompy board tied to our shoes . . . and a getaway car ('cause those farmers, they'll shoot at you for stomping down their crops).

[BobbyBoring]

27. Aliens help him

Just like they did with the pyramids and crop circles.

[BobTheSubgenius]

30. And Donald Trump's hair.

[tclambert]

39. The Mexicans who hang out by the Home Depot?

Yeah, seems like they build everything.

[Orrex]

10. Surely no human being could make such complex and precise shapes at that scale!

There must be supernatural forces at work, obviously.
Ley lines or aliens or something.

[tridim]

13. Or GPS.

[Orrex]

17. Spare me your hocus-pocus!

Obviously there are mighty and unfathomable powers at work here!

[csziggy]

32. Well, obviously he's getting help from space

So GPS could be the answer! Or aliens. One or the other.

If the crop circle creators videos I've seen are correct, they use rope to lay out their geometric shapes - no GPS for those. http://www.circlemakers.org/guide.html

[Berlum]

11. The Mayans are proved correct once again!

[tridim]

12. Amazing! I respect this guy much more than the crop circle hoaxters.

[starroute]

19. Except that he's swiping the designs from the crop circles

I recognize both the images as things I've seen many times before. So give some credit to the "hoaxers"

[tridim]

20. As long as you don't ask me to give credit to the aliens.

I appreciate the design of crop circles, I just don't care about the "mystery" aspect of them. Make your art, just don't bother trying to yank civilization's collective chain. It tends to turn people into idiots.

[earthbot1]

15. cool designs

i'd get totally lost if I tried that

[woo me with science]

16. Wow.

Those are beautiful.

If there have been any mysterious summer crop circles in the area, though, I think we may have a lead...

[Little Star]

18. Sometimes I wish I had a creative bone in my body, those are beautiful.

[Paper Roses]

21. Spectacular. An uplift to my spirits. n/t

[Aristus]

22. As Dan Rydell said in Sports Night: "Look what we can do!"

Beautiful. Just breathtaking...

[loudsue]

23. Some people are just geniuses.

This dude is an amazing artist.

[Javaman]

24. No way he could do that! it had to be aliens that made them. Like crop circles!!

[KT2000]

25. Well, that's amazing!

and beautiful.

[slutticus]

28. ...

[Tanelorn]

31. So if it can be done with snow could also do it......

[ashling]

33. Do you have a link?

[Scuba]

35. I do not, sorry.

[ashling]

36. I found these

https://www.facebook.com/snowart8848

[Scuba]

37. Very cool, thanks for adding.

[defacto7]

34. Kickin'

[PotatoChip]

40. That is so cool!

Literally!

Thanks for sharing Scuba.

[Baitball Blogger]

42. The chosen one.

So incredibly brilliant!

[Dont_Bogart_the_Pretzel]

43. Wow!

Nice