Landscape category winner and photographer of the year: Frederik Buyckx. This year’s winning photographers have focused on everything from p*rn stars to hyenas. Here, in northern Montenegro, a shepherd is pictured walking to his herd. (Photo by Frederik Buyckx/Sony World Photography Awards)





Portraiture category, third place: Ren Shi Chen. This image was taken in Gansu province, China. More than 61 million children in the country’s rural areas have been left behind by parents who have gone to the cities to work. (Photo by Ren Shi Chen/Sony World Photography Awards)





Contemporary issues category, third place: Lorenzo Maccotta. A cam model poses after his day shift in Bucharest, Romania. The adult webcam industry is worth $1bn annually, and is growing fast as technology becomes better and cheaper. Romania, a country with one of the highest rates of youth unemployment in the EU, is now the undisputed world capital of studio-based cam operations; the models are paid by platforms such as Luxembourg-based LiveJasmin, which has 25 million visitors monthly. (Photo by Lorenzo Maccotta/Sony World Photography Awards)





Architecture category, second place: Julien Chatelin. A new hot spring spa complex in Fuling, China, where Chatelin charted the incredible pace of industrial and urban development. (Photo by Julien Chatelin/Sony World Photography Awards)





Contemporary issues category, winner: Tasneem Alsultan. In her work, Alsultan confronts her experiences as a Saudi single mother. “I’ve made peace with the sacrifices I’ve had to make, but I managed to find happiness”, she says. “I was married at the age of 17, but living as a single parent for the final six years of an unhappy 10-year marriage. Many family members commented on how foolish I was to ask for a divorce. Only later did I realise that there were many Saudi women who had had similar experiences”. (Photo by Tasneem Alsultan/Sony World Photography Awards)





Contemporary issues category, second place: Li Song. Li Hang, who suffers from Prader-Willi syndrome, in Changchun, China. The syndrome’s classic symptom is insatiable hunger. Hang’s eyes revealed passion and helplessness – he was being treated daily with traditional Chinese medicine, including massage, acupuncture, fire treatment and cupping therapy. (Photo by Li Song/Sony World Photography Awards)





Natural world category, winner: Will Burrard-Lucas. “To show hyenas in their element, I wanted to photograph them at night”, Burrard-Lucas says. “The stars in Africa are so beautiful that I also wanted to include them in my image. I used a remote-control “BeetleCam” to position my camera on the ground so I could photograph the hyena with the beautiful starry sky behind. This is a single exposure. I lit the hyena with two wireless off-camera flashes and used a long shutter speed to expose the stars”. (Photo by Will Burrard-Lucas/Sony World Photography Awards)





Architecture category, winner: Dongni. Working from above, the Chinese photographer Dongni reframes the geometries of urban architecture. (Photo by Dongni/Sony World Photography Awards)





Sport category, winner: Yuan Peng. Liu Bingqing and Liu Yujie are twin sisters who have studied and trained in gymnastics since their early childhood in Jining, China. (Photo by Yuan Peng/Sony World Photography Awards)





Current affairs and news category, winner: Alessio Romenzi. Fighters of the Libyan forces affiliated with the Tripoli government walk around the giant chandelier of the conference room in the Ouagadougou conference centre. The offensive to liberate Sirte, self-proclaimed capital of Islamic State in Libya, took seven months of fighting and about 500 American airstrikes, killing hundreds of soldiers and injuring more than 3,000 in the Libyan army. (Photo by Alessio Romenzi/Sony World Photography Awards)