David Guttenfelder was born in Iowa and graduated from the University of Iowa with a Bachelor of Arts in cultural anthropology. He has worked for the AP since 1994 based in Kenya, the Ivory Coast, India and Japan. He is currently AP’s chief Asia photographer and his feature work has been used prominently in editorial publications throughout the world including Time and National Geographic. Photo: U.S. soldiers from the 2nd Battalion, 12th Infantry Regiment, 4th Brigade Combat Team, fire mortars at known enemy firing positions from a base in the Pech River Valley in Afghanistan's Kunar province, Saturday, October 24, 2009. (Photo by David Guttenfelder/AP Photo)

A woman waits at a polio immunisation health centre, in Maiduguri, Borno State, Nigeria, August 29, 2016. Nigeria's military has liberated large swathes of land from Boko Haram but a ride with an army convoy, all guns firing for fear of ambush, shows how far the northeast is from normality after a brutal Islamist insurgency that has displaced millions. (Photo by Afolabi Sotunde/Reuters)

Many of the 12 million people who entered the US through New York’s Ellis Island wore traditional dress from their homelands. Here: A Ruthenian woman circa 1906 from the region historically inhabiting the kingdom of the Rus, incorporating parts of modern-day Slavic speaking countries. Her outfit consists of a shirt and underskirt made from linen embroidered with traditional floral-based patterns. (Photo by Augustus Francis Sherman/New York Public Library/The Guardian)

Colombian police help carry people's household belongings across the Tachira River from Venezuela, top, to Colombia, on the border that separates San Antonio del Tachira, Venezuela from Villa del Rosario, Colombia, Tuesday, August 25, 2015, during a mass exodus of Colombians. Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro vowed to extend a crackdown on illegal migrants from neighboring Colombia he blames for rampant crime and widespread shortages, while authorities across the border struggled to attend to droves of returning deportees. (Photo by Eliecer Mantilla/AP Photo)

People will spout about impermanence of digital records, but books are really fragile, too. Alexis Arnold from San Francisco wanted to illustrate that with her project The Crystallized Book: collecting books and growing Borax crystals on them. Books range from literature classics to magazines, and there’s even a mysterious and arcane tome called “Linux: The Complete Manual”.

Artist Joe Hill poses on his 3D artwork, from the “Joe and Max” project as part of an advertising campaign, during its presentation at a park in Moscow, Russia, July 4, 2015. (Photo by Sergei Karpukhin/Reuters)

Students from Vida Nueva School present their dinosaur robot built with recycled materials during the annual robotics fair supported by the Bolivian Education Ministry in La Paz, August 10, 2015. (Photo by David Mercado/Reuters)

Newlyweds take wedding photos hanging from bridge, Yueyang, Hunan province, China on August 9, 2016. They held such a special wedding ceremony on China's Qixi Festival. (Photo by Top Photo Corporation/Rex Features/Shutterstock)