Wedges of an orange generate enough current and electrical juice – 3.5 volts – to power an LED. The fruit’s citric acid helps electrons flow from galvanized nails to copper wire in this 14-hour exposure. This image was published in September’s Visions of Earth, a trio of photos that appear in each issue of National Geographic. (Photo by Caleb Charland/National Geographic)

Photographer Howard Schatz had an idea: place actors in a series of roles and dramatic situations to reveal the essence of their characters. Such was the premise behind his book, In Character: Actors Acting, which captures some of Hollywood’s most emotive stars in the act of, well, making faces. Luckily for us, he continued the tradition for Vanity Fair. Here are some of the best.

My transport of choice in NYC is definitely a road bike. When you cycle on the streets you see city and it’s habitants in a very different point of view. Let me share with you some photos I took last year – NYC through the eyes of a road bike.

Tim Sklyarov

“Head in the Clouds” – a series of a photographer from Brooklyn, Kaitlin Rebesco. She creates unique portraits of Paris, focusing on the tops of the iconic buildings.

I would like to tell you why many artists, who like me, have painted portraits and landscapes in oils on canvas, worked with acrylics, watercolors, and pen and ink drawings, have turned to the art of gourd carving.

Paramilitary policemen carry seized crystal meth at Boshe village, Lufeng, Guangdong province, December 29, 2013. Police in the southern Chinese province of Guangdong have seized nearly three tonnes of the drug crystal methamphetamine and arrested 182 people in raids on a village notorious for producing narcotics. (Photo by Reuters/Stringer)

In this November 28, 1966 file photo, one of the 10 beagles involved in the first test of the Veterans Administration Hospital in East Orange, N.J. smokes a cigarette through a machine linked to its windpipe by a plastic tube to test any link between smoking and emphysema. (Photo by AP Photo)

This picture taken on January 1, 2014 shows giant panda “Li Li” sleeping on a tree in Hangzhou Wild Animal World in Hangzhou, east China's Zhejiang province. Giant pandas, notorious for their low s*x drive, are among the world's most endangered animals. Fewer than 1,600 pandas remain in the wild, mainly in China's Sichuan province, with a further 300 in captivity around the world. (Photo by AFP Photo)