Brian Skerry can be called many things – explorer, journalist, conservation advocate – but he is first and foremost a photographer. His journeys to capture amazing underwater photographs have taken him across the world’s oceans. Photo: This Bahamian oceanic whitetip shark, known for the distinctive coloring on its white-tipped, rounded extremities, is part of a globally threatened species due to overfishing demands, primarily for its fins. (Photo by Brian Skerry)

The Smilovichi Felting Factory in Belarus was founded in 1928, when Smilovichi was a small Jewish settlement of craftsmen. Five of those craftsmen organized a small artel (a cooperative association of craftsmen who all live and work together), which produced warm boots called “valenki” for cold weather. Photo: Belarusian workers works at a felt boot factory in Smilovichi, some 35km from Minsk, Belarus, 16 January 2012. (Photo by Tatyana Zenkovich/EPA)

In the desert near Joshua Tree, California, there stands a 70-year-old homestead cabin that isn’t all there. The ethereal cabin is part of an outdoor art installation by artist Phillip K. Smith III called Lucid Homestead. To give the cabin its striking appearance, the artist replaced strips of the wall with mirrors and the windows with mirrored panels that light up at night. The building reflects the desert sun and environment around it, making it seem like an airy and transparent space

A Geminid meteor streaks diagonally across the sky against a field of star trails behind one of the peaks of the Seven Sisters rock formation in this long exposure early December 14, 2007 in the Valley of Fire State Park in Nevada. The meteor display, known as the Geminid meteor shower because it appears to radiate from near the star Castor in the constellation Gemini, is thought to be the result of debris cast off from an asteroid-like object called 3200 Phaethon. The shower is visible every December. (Photo by Ethan Miller/Getty Images)

“The Antonov An-124 Ruslan (NATO reporting name: Condor) is a strategic airlift jet aircraft. It was designed by the Soviet Union's Antonov design bureau. It is the world's largest ever serially-manufactured cargo airplane and world's second largest operating cargo aircraft. During development it was known as Izdeliye 400 in house, and An-40 in the West. First flown in 1982, civil certification was issued on 30 December 1992”. – Wikipedia

Photo: The new metro called “Bombardier MOVIA” with 22,50 meters long and 3,2 meters wide is load on a Antonow An-124 plane for transport to India on February 25, 2009 in Parchim, Germany. (Photo Handout Bombardier Transportation via Getty Images)

Women, who are members of Saaed group, prepare food to be given out as Iftar meals for the poor and internally displaced Syrians during the month of Ramadan in Damascus, Syria June 18, 2016. Iftar (or Fatoor) is the evening meal when Muslims end their daily Ramadan fast at sunset. Muslims break their fast at the time of the call to prayer for the evening prayer. (Photo by Omar Sanadiki/Reuters)

Chocolate is the greatest gift the Earth has given us. The dessert table would be a sad sight without it. It’s so beloved, so appreciated, that the Swedish scientist who named the cocoa plant that gives us chocolate called it Theobroma cacao, which means “food of the gods”. Here: Farmer holding a freshly cut cocoa bean pod, revealing the pulp and seed inside on a rainforest farm. (Photo by Doug McKinlay/Getty Images)

Sandrine Kerfante has had a fascination with “doubles” ever since meeting her mother’s twin as a child. In 2012, this lifelong captivation inspired her to create a blog called twin-niwt, which celebrates photographs of doubles in all their forms. “I’m fascinated by the idea of the duo, repetition, symmetry, reflection, mirror games and all the symbolism associated with it”, she says. “I think it’s a topic often present in photography, more or less consciously”. (Photo by Sandrine Kerfante/The Guardian)