Blue skies
Smiling at me
Nothing but blue skies
Do I see...

"There's not a cloud in the sky; excellent!" said no landscape photographer ever. :)

Clear, blue skies are great for all sorts of outdoor pursuits. Photographing the landscape is not generally among them. Want to capture a colorful sunrise or sunset? You need clouds. Angry skies associated with heavy weather? Clouds. Fog - or mist? Low clouds. If you're shooting on a partly sunny day, you can manage contrast by waiting for a cloud to block the sun.

Even flat, white skies - though uninteresting in and of themselves - create excellent, soft light. Exclude the sky from the composition and it's possible to work all day long in that type of overcast.

Down there at the bottom of most everyone's list would probably be the Robin's-egg-blue-sky syndrome.

That said, it doesn't mean you can't work if that's what Mother Nature has served.

The other day in Grand Teton National Park was such a "blue sky" situation. It has been very cold in Eastern Idaho and Western Wyoming this mid-February thanks to high pressure, the jet stream, and the absence of cloud cover overnight. Following the pattern, that morning it was -15 degrees Fahrenheit when I entered the park in the darkness before dawn. After finishing up at my first two locations, I decided to head over to the historic Moulton barns and check things out. Though the sky was completely clear, because it was still early the light wasn't overly harsh.

Winter is a unique time of year to visit Mormon Row: the road is closed due to heavy snowfall so the only option is to enter on foot.

Not only were there no people around, the area around the T.A. Moulton barn was pristine with no snowshoe or ski tracks anywhere near the structure. Spectacular, long shadows created by the low angle of the sun shining through a stand of cottonwoods were completely uninterrupted. Perfect leading lines!

I got down low and directly in front of one of the trees to block my own shadow, and positioned both the mountain range and the barn high in the frame since the shadows are the main focal point. Shooting this as a panorama of four vertical images combined enabled me to include more of the shadows (both vertically and horizontally), the cottonwoods on either side of the barn, and much less of the sky. Thus, the geometry of the composition is more pronounced and the "problem" sky is minimized.

While I considered processing the image in black and white, it's far more interesting rendered in this way because of the contrasting colors. The trees "disappear" somewhat when color is removed, and the horizontal line created by the barn and trees is less apparent.

No clouds? Not necessarily a problem.

While "nothing but blue skies" may not be ideal conditions, don't be too quick to pull the plug.