Kieron Connolly’s new book of photographs of more than 100 once-busy and often elegant buildings gives an idea of how the world might look if humankind disappeared. Here: Bodie, Mono County, California. Gold was discovered at Bodie in 1859 (just after the initial California gold rush) and it went from mining camp to boomtown. Its decline began in 1880, when word spread of new boomtowns elsewhere. The Standard Consolidated Mine closed in 1913, and four years later the Bodie Railway was abandoned. By 1940 the population was down to 40. Today, Bodie is maintained in a state of arrested decay as a visitor attraction. (Photo by Alamy Stock Photo)

This undated image provided by World View shows World View capsule and balloon spacecraft that will rise to 100,000 feet above Earth for passengers to see the curvature of the planet and the blackness of space. Space tourism companies are employing designs including winged vehicles, vertical rockets with capsules and high-altitude balloons. While developers envision ultimately taking people to orbiting habitats, the moon or beyond, the immediate future involves short flights into or near the lowest reaches of space without going into orbit. (Photo by World View via AP Photo)

These are the stomach-churning pictures of the swing at the end of the world – a rickety wooden swing hanging over a precipice 2,660 metres above sea level – and not a seatbelt in sight. (Photo by Caters News)

Recycling artist Nicolas Gomez checks the strings of a cello he has made out of an oil barrel for the Orchestra of Recycled Instruments of Cateura, in Cateura, Paraguay February 13, 2015. Saudi Arabia's oil exports have risen in February in response to stronger demand from customers. As OPEC's top producer battles for market share Reuters photographers around the globe have been photographing oil barrels to document how they are utilised once the fuel has been used. (Photo by Jorge Adorno/Reuters)

A Siberian tiger at a photographer for getting too much in its face during the presentation of two new Siberian tigers at Cabarceno Natural Reserve in Cabarceno, northern Spain, 21 July 2014. (Photo by Pedro Puente Hoyos/EPA)

People look at French artist Clement Briend's photographic light installation “Divine Trees”, which features images of divine figures highly revered in Asian cultures projected on trees towering over bystanders, during a media preview of the Singapore Night Festival in Singapore August 21, 2014. The Singapore Night Festival begins on Friday. (Photo by Edgar Su/Reuters)

Survivors pass by two large boats after they were washed ashore by strong waves caused by Typhoon Haiyan in Tacloban city, Leyte province central Philippines on Sunday, November 10, 2013. Typhoon Haiyan, one of the strongest storms on record, slammed into six central Philippine islands on Friday leaving a wide swath of destruction and hundreds of people dead. (Photo by Aaron Favila/AP Photo)

Julian, left, is photographed by his mother with friend Gianluca, right, under water at a public pool in Gelsenkirchen, Germany, on a hot Friday, July 3, 2015. Germany faces a heat wave with temperatures up to 38 degrees Celsius (100 degrees Fahrenheit) at the weekend. (Photo by Martin Meissner/AP Photo)