One of the compositional concepts I deal with most often on these pages, is “clean and simple”  Less is more would be another appropriate cliché.  I do believe that any photographer who shares a large portfolio of work, needs variety.  Clean and simple is powerful, but with every image it is boring.

A few years ago I was headed through a rural Wisconsin county on the morning after a winter’s storm.  The sun had broken through and the purity of snowy white trees and a blue winter sky was more than I could stand.  I simply found some trees, parked my car and began looking for pictures.  The problem I had was not an unusual one.  There was no sense of order to be found.  I quickly thought back to a common technique with snow scenes that are too busy, and composed side to side, top to top snowy branches.  Nothing else. That seems counter intuitive, but the uniformity of those snowy branches brings a sense of calm and order to the scene.  I let the sun poke through one spot to create an off-center sunstar. I succeeded in my task but I wanted a true landscape photo with that blue sky showing.  The secret was to find the best comp I could, but make sure I included enough of that blue sky.  The sky is continuous blue.  Clean and simple.  Job done.

Speaking of clean and simple I rarely turn down the opportunity for those type of shots with birds.  A fair share of those images present themselves with hawks, eagles and wading birds, but any time a small songbird like this Yellow-rumped Warbler gives me a chance, I take it.

I found a flower picture I haven’t shared before so here we are.  So many compositions are possible with flowers that I am sure that ten of us would find ten very different pictures with this flower.  This is mine.  Simple as that.

I have shared a lot of Milkweed Beetle images over the years.  I would say round a bout 50% of them have been mating pictures. There are a lot of Milkweed plants in this part of the world and apparently these insects have no shame.  They are  a good species to practice insect photography with the way I do with gulls when I want to improve my bird/action photography.

Like I said, wading birds frequently give you clean and simple compositions.  I like the leaves on the tree as well as the preening pose of this Great Egret.  Wading birds are living art.

Female ducks often get lost in the shuffle when photographers search for subjects.  They may not be colorful, but the patterns (camouflage) are beautiful.  Caught this female Mallard in a reflective moment with nice light.

As long as I have just shown an image of the common Mallard, how about the much more common Canada Goose.  There is not a day of my life that I could not find a Canada Goose or a Ring-billed Gull to photograph if I so choose. They are in huge flocks in this area. Sometimes animals just strike great poses or make funny expressions.  This is an example of a picture that is not clean and simple, but certainly still worth sharing.

I appreciate the opportunity to chat with you.  I hope you have a fine day and please stop back again.