I'm a computer guy and am learning all of the technical aspects of my equipment that I can. I'm confident I can and will do that. I'm not a born artist, but I do think you can learn what to look for, keep some basics in mind and take things to the next level. All of the basics like the rule of thirds and using leading lines have probably been beat to death here already. I saw one article where the author looks for curvy leading lines, like a snaking dirt road to lead your eye to the subject. Lately, I've been taking the first pictures that my instincts tell me will be pretty good and then I spend another hour or more just looking around for other angles of the same subject, other subjects in the immediate area, maybe step a foot or two to the right or left of where I was to see if something more interesting happens. Recently, I got my brother a nice p&s for his first decent camera and had him follow me around within 50 yards of his house, I with my DSLR and him with the new camera. We spent 2 hours and got some great macro pictures of flowers, some HDR fall color shots with dramatic clouds, we laid on our backs looking up at trees, etc. It was amazing what we could do without leaving his property. This is a good exercise wherever you go to shoot, whether it's intentional or serendipity takes you and your camera to somewhere cool. Also, I've personally learned a lot from Tony Northrup's How to Create Stunning Digital Photography and recommend the Kindle ebook at Amazon.com, since it has lots of links to his private youtube tutorials. If you get this book, when he updates it, you get the updates for free. It's only about $10, half the price of the wooden book.

One does not create wow, if one is lucky enough you manage to capture wow,the right place, right time, right equipment.
A wow photo might be you are out shooting lighting and lo and behold the moment you press the shutter the lighting strikes a tree , barn or something metal and you have captured that moment forever , thats a wow photo example, something unexpected happening while you are shooting photo's not a staged photo, another example would be watching a drag or nascar race taking photos and bam all of a sudden theres a crash or explosion right before your eyes as you press the shutter.
Those are wow photo's in my opinion, something that happens unexpected not staged.
What's that old saying ? oh yea being in the right place at the right time.
Pete

"…knowing how to visualize." What does that mean?

I don't intend that question as a negative comment, I mean it as a real question. I sometimes, will walk about and just look for interesting shapes in negative space. Sometimes I walk focusing three blocks away (I live in the city) or on the horizon. Sometimes I will try to stay sensitive to colors that repeat in my field of view. I do all of this without my camera, so I can focus on the seeing. Later I will work on how to go back out and capture things that I liked with the camera.