When Ed Templeton was a young skateboarder in California, he took Polaroids of his friends smoking at their local park. Those pictures in 1994 were the start of a lifelong habit – Templeton has been capturing youngsters all over the world experimenting with cigarettes ever since. Here: Santiago, Chile, 2002. (Photo by Ed Templeton/Robert & Tilton Gallery, Culver City)

“Centuries ago, Inuit hunted the bowhead whale. At that time, whale hunting undoubtedly was part of a complex and very important ritual, if only because of the size of the catch. The position that the ancestors of today's Inuit occupied in the living world involved a relationship with the spirit that inhabited each animal but also their species”. (Photo by Robert Frechette/2014 Sony World Photography Awards)

Now celebrating its 40th year, Nikon Small World is widely regarded as the leading forum to recognize proficiency and photographic excellence of photography taken under the microscope. To select the winners, competition judges analyzed entries from all over the world covering subjects ranging from chemical compounds to up-close-and-personal looks at biological specimens. The 2014 winners will be revealed on October 30th. In 2014, the competition received over 1,200 entries from more than 79 countries around the world. (Photo by Dr. Igor Robert Siwanowicz/Nikon Small World 2014)

In this June 20, 2014, file photo, lobsters are processed at the Sea Hag Seafood plant in St. George, Maine. More and more American and Canadian-caught lobsters have been turning up at fancy restaurants in China, marketed as “Boston lobster”, say Maine-based processors. One processing firm owner says it's now the biggest live lobster important day of the year after Christmas in Europe. (Photo by Robert F. Bukaty/AP Photo)

Scott Bisson of Quantum Creative Glass was first fascinated by the medium in high school chemistry class, at age seventeen. Since then, he has studied with five different masters, as well as at the world renowned Pilchuck School with Robert A. Mickelson, and has met and observed Dante Marioni, William Morris, and Peter Novotney.

Henry Frayne of Australia shows his ability to triple jump the lenghth of more than two Formula 1 cars during a press conference at Albert Park on February 29, 2012 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Robert Prezioso/Getty Images)

Artist Robert Mickelson is an expert sculptor whose medium of choice happens to be glass. There's something so pure and serene about glass. Perhaps it's the material's transparency coupled with its fragility. Whatever it may be, Mickelson knows how to accentuate the element's most appealing qualities. Each of his life-like sculptural pieces exude realism with a refined quality.

“Grit and Glamour”, a retrospective of the late British photographer Elsbeth Juda, who fled Nazi occupation and came to England in 1933, is at the Jewish Museum, in London, until July 1, 2018. Here: Shelagh Wilson, Copacabana beach, Rio de Janeiro, 1951. (Photo by Elsbeth Juda Archive/Victoria and Albert Museum)