From stuffed elephants to picnics under power lines, Leipzig-born photographer Frank Herfort coaxes magical, colour-saturated tableaux from intriguing slices of everyday Russian life. Here: A lonely dog watches the mailboxes in a typical Moscow residential block. (Photo by by Frank Herfort/The Guardian)

Jo-Anne McArthur’s book of photographs puts the spotlight on ethics of zoos around the world. Accompanied by essays by Born Free Foundation’s Virginia McKenna and philosopher Lori Gruen, the images and stories are also shared online through “A Year of Captivity”. Here: Asian Elephant, Denmark, 2016. (Photo by Jo-Anne McArthur/Born Free Foundation/The Guardian)

These photographs of hundreds of ducks following their leader down a river are truly mesmerizing. Rafeur Rahman of Bangladesh climbed a high bridge and saw hundreds of ducks apparently playing a game of follow the leader. More than 500 ducks live on the river, where the mosses and snails provide the perfect habitat. Here: Ducks in the river Baral in Bangladesh. (Photo by Rafeur Rahman/Caters News Agency)

Shortlisted images in the running to be crowned Photobox Instagram photograph of the year range from furry friends to the Holi festival to the meaning of love. Judges, including the Guardian’s former picture editor Eamonn McCabe, have whittled down 180,000 submissions to unearth a shortlist that celebrates the best of social media. Winners will be announced October 3, 2018. Here: Najac, France. Travel shortlist. (Photo by Aaron Jenkin/@aaronjenkin)

The impressive gallery shows beautiful landscapes that might appear to be from more exotic climes, but they were all taken on British soil. Alessio Putzu, 31, a professional landscape photographer from London, snapped the amazing shots during his trips to Devon and Cornwall, England; Pembrokeshire, Wales; and the Isle of Skye, Scotland. Here: Bedruthan Steps, Cornwall. (Photo by Alessio Putzu/Caters News Agency)

Chris Hondros, a Getty Images photographer, was fatally wounded on April 20, 2011, in a mortar attack by government forces while covering the civil war in Libya. Hondros' work is woven in our history as he covered everything from politics to marathons. A new film will focus on his life as told through his images. Here's a look at some of his finest and final work. Some of these images are graphic in nature

You might think Ysabel LeMay’s works are hyper-realistic paintings but they’re created through an innovative technique called photo fusion. The Quebec-born, U.S.-based artist takes hundreds of photographs for each piece, attunes the light and visual properties, then assembles one detail at a time in a painterly fashion to form a single composition. Each work takes 4 to 8 weeks on average.

Underwater photographer Sarah Lee uses a technique known as “duck diving” to capture these stunning photos of surfers in Hawaii. Surfers “duck dive” under the water to avoid incoming waves so they can get further out to sea. Photo: A surfer comes free from her surfboard. (Photo by Sarah Lee/Caters News)