Shortlisted: Pooyan Shadpoor, Houcheraghi. While walking along the shore of Larak, Iran – an island in the Persian Gulf – Shadpoor came across this luminous scene. The “magical lights of (the) plankton ... enchanted me so that I snapped the shot”, he writes. (Photo by Pooyan Shadpoor/2016 EPOTY)

HRP-4C, a five-foot humanoid robot developed at Japan's National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology, sings and dances with performers at the Digital Contents Expo in Tokyo on October 17, 2010. The robot runs entertainment software called Choreonoid, a name formed from the words “choreograph” and “humanoid”. (Yoshikazu Tsuno/AFP)

Children wearing bear fur costumes dance during a parade in Comanesti, Romania, Friday, December 30, 2022. In pre-Christian rural traditions, dancers wearing colored costumes or animal furs, toured from house to house in villages singing and dancing to ward off evil. (Photo by Vadim Ghirda/AP Photo)

North Korean youngsters sing and play accordions to entertain foreign visitors including United Nations Secretary General Kurt Waldheim, who visited Pyongyang, May 4, 1979. Visitors report music education in North Korea begins at an early age and is taken seriously by children and adults. (Photo by Peter Arnett/AP Photo)

Ukrainians wearing traditional costumes sing Kolyadky or Ukrainian Christmas Carols, as a part of Orthodox Christmas in Kiev, Ukraine, Thursday, January 7 2016. Orthodox Christians mark their traditional Christmas Day Jan. 7, with many ancient symbolic events. (Photo by Sergei Chuzavkov/AP Photo)

Followers of the Stowdart Sect of the Zion Church of God, sing and dance during a service in the historic neighborhood of Mbare in Harare on August 20, 2023. Zimbabweans will head to the polls on August 23, 2023 to vote in general and presidential elections. (Photo by John Wessels/AFP Photo)

A Muslim dervish sings a traditional Sufi song near a rally for the Mawlid al-Nabi holiday, marking the birthday of Islam's prophet, Muhammad, in Lahore, Pakistan, Sunday, November 10, 2019. To mark the holiday, thousands take part in religious processions, ceremonies and distribute free meals to the poor. (Photo by K.M. Chaudary/AP Photo)

Belarusian villagers celebrate the Christmas carol rite (Kalyady) in the village of Danilevichy, some 320 km south of Minsk on January 7, 2020. Kalyady is an ancient pagan holiday originally celebrated on winter solstice. Dressed-up people walk from house to house singing, dancing, eating and drinking with their neighbours. (Photo by Sergei Gapon/AFP Photo)