I don't understand why they went so minimal with the UI to let us really feel immersed, but left out any option to toggle off the large bar at the top of my screen which most of the time is showing information I don't need and/or can get another way. I'd really like to take screenshots without it being there, staining the beautiful scenery.

To toggle it off for screenshots open the console and type "tm" (this will hide the console as well, just press up then enter to turn them back on).

Hopefully there will soon be a more customizable UI, whether through mods or patches.

You can turn hud opacity all the way down which removes the compass.

Those are both pretty inconvenient methods, since it disables the important parts of the HUD - which conveniently hide themselves when not relevant anyway. They do work for taking screenshots I guess.

Here is a topic with some tweaks you can do. disable compass is one of them. http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2227329

Deactivate compass

Go to C:\Users\USERNAME\Documents\My Games\SkyrimOpen Skyrim.ini, and search for [Interface] sectionChange bShowCompass=1 to bShowCompass=0

Thanks