"Against this background, snowflakes look very impressive," he wrote. "Like precious gems in a jewelry store." But he also uses a glass background to capture the snowflakes in a different light.

Kljatov describes his process on his website. He photographs the snowflakes on either a dark wool or glass background on his balcony. He uses a Canon Powershot A650 IS with the attached lens at 6X ...

He features many of his snowflake photos on Flickr and his snowflake ... Sometimes he uses dark woolen fabrics as a background, which explains the fibers that are visible in some of the shots.