Olympic mullein (verbascum olympicum)

Another close-up from that same day of shooting at Van Dusen Botanical Garden as yesterday's photo. This one demonstrates a compositional technique I like to use to make a photo more interesting. Most aspiring photographers already know that you don't just show the full subject dead-center in the frame. That's boring. The Rule of Thirds helps. But if it's a simple subject like one leaf, even that wouldn't quite give it the punch it needs. Framing it such that part of the object is cut out of the frame can be the difference between ho-hum and mmmm!!!

You might have noticed by now that I vary where I place the photo in relation to the surrounding text. My choice of layout is not random. I base it on the subject of the photo. For example yesterday's flowers were sort of "looking" towards the right, so I put them on the left of the text. Today's leaf is inviting you to think of what is outside the frame on the left, so I put it on the right of the text.