“This grey adult male seal enjoys a good grin while lying on the beach”. (Photo by Michael Hutch/SplashdownDirect via Rex USA)

Special Merit Award. Mallory Franklin (2019). The British slalom canoeist has competed internationally since 2009 and won nine medals in total at the ICF Canoe Slalom World Championships with four golds, four silvers and a bronze. She has also won eleven medals at the European Championships. (Photo by Richard Pelham/World Sports Photography Awards 2021)

Two Afghan children stand amid piles of garbage next to their home, in Kabul, Afghanistan, Monday, April 18, 2022. (Photo by Ebrahim Noroozi/AP Photo)

UK's Love Island favourite Maura Higgins, 29, was seen wearing a short satin dress as she left Amazonico Restaurant in Mayfair, central London on October 28, 2020. (Photo by Splash News and Pictures)

A former living goddess Kumari, middle, watches the Indra Jatra festival, an eight-day festival that honors Indra, the Hindu god of rain, in Kathmandu, Nepal, Friday, September 13, 2019. (Photo by Niranjan Shrestha/AP Photo)

Inquisitive elephant seal pups venture towards a photographer on South Georgia, an uninhabited island near Antarctica early July 2022. The seals are not used to seeing humans and shuffled closer to Charlotte Rhodes rather than shying away. (Photo by Charlotte Rhodes/Media Drum Images)

A gibbon drinks from a soft drink bottle, given by a tourist, at a zoo in Kunming, Yunnan province, June 18, 2015. (Photo by Wong Campion/Reuters)