Gorgeous galaxies and stunning stars make up this selection of pictures from the shortlisted entries for this year’s Insight Astronomy Photographer of the Year award. The winners will be announced on 15 September, and an exhibition of the winning images will be will be displayed in a free exhibition at the Royal Observatory Greenwich’s Astronomy Centre from 17 September. Here: “Seven Magic Points”. The rusty red swirls of the circular, iron sculpture Seven Magic Points in Brattebergan, Norway mirror the rippling aurora above. (Photo by Rune Engebø/Royal Observatory Greenwich’s Astronomy Photographer of the Year 2016/National Maritime Museum)

Birds behaviour winner: Land of the Eagle by Audun Rikardsen, Norway. High on a ledge, on the coast near his home in northern Norway, Rikardsen carefully positioned an old tree branch that he hoped would make a perfect golden eagle lookout. To this, he bolted a tripod head with a camera, flashes and motion sensor attached, and built himself a hide a short distance away. From time to time, he left road‑kill carrion nearby. Very gradually – over the next three years – a golden eagle got used to the camera and started to use the branch regularly to survey the coast below. (Photo by Audun Rikardsen/2019 Wildlife Photographer of the Year)

A festival goer uses a hula hoop, as revelers gather ahead of this weekends Glastonbury Festival of Music and Performing Arts on Worthy Farm in Somerset, southwest England, on June 25, 2014. US metal giants Metallica will play this year's coveted Saturday night headline spot at Britain's Glastonbury festival, organisers announced Thursday. It will be the “Master of Puppets” four-piece's first appearance at the legendary festival, held in south west England, following on from The Rolling Stones' Worthy Farm debut last year. (Photo by Leon Neal/AFP Photo)

A brightly burning magnesium-rich meteor known as a bolide was captured near Bude, Cornwall on January 24, 2020. (Photo by Chris Small/Apex News)

The tempestuous stellar nursery called the Carina Nebula, located 7,500 light-years away from Earth in the southern constellation Carina. (Photo by Reuters/NASA)

High-flying photographer Jeffrey Milstein, renowned for his aerial photos of US cities, snaps landmarks through the open door of a helicopter. This month he hired a chopper in London and amazingly he had just an hour to cover all the buildings he wanted to capture including Buckingham Palace, the London Eye, the glass roof of the British Museum and the Gherkin and Walkie Talkie towers in the City. Here: Jeffrey Milstein captured these stunning images through the door of a helicopter hovering over central London. (Photo by Jeffrey Milstein/Rex Features/Shutterstock)

Lava erupts from a crater of Mt. Etna, Europe's largest active volcano, behind Santa Maria della Guardia church in Belpasso, near Catania, in southern Italian island of Sicily, early Friday, June 18, 2021. Since Feb. 16, 2021, Mt. Etna has begun a series of spectacular eruptive episodes. (Photo by Salvatore Allegra/AP Photo)

The Spirit of Ecstasy, also called “Emily”, “Silver Lady” or “Flying Lady,” was designed by English sculptor Charles Robinson Sykes and carries with her a story about a secret passion between John Walter Edward Douglas-Scott-Montagu (second Lord Montagu of Beaulieu after 1905, a pioneer of the automobile movement, and editor of The Car Illustrated magazine) and his love and the model for the emblem, his secretary Eleanor Velasco Thornton. Photo: Worker Ronald Little displays a finished “Spirit of Ecstasy”. (Photo by Stefan Wermuth/Reuters)