“Eye of a toad”. Animal Portraits, Łukasz Bożycki, Poland. Early spring sees a pond near Łukasz’s home city of Warsaw, Poland, full of mating frogs and a few toads. On this March day, Łukasz shared the pond with them for an evening, sitting in the icy water in his chest-high waders, keeping as still as possible, despite the numbing cold, so that the amphibians could get used to him. “I wanted to find a fresh way of portraying the amphibians”, he says, “at water level”. Using a telephoto lens, he focused on one lone toad and waited for the sun to dip almost below the horizon before pressing the shutter, using flash to bring out the details in the shadow. His prize was “the glorious pool of sunset colour” and fiery glow of the toad’s eye. Nikon D80 + 70-300mm f4.5-5.6 lens + extension tube; 1/125 sec at f9 (-2.3 e/v); ISO 100; built-in flash. (Photo by Łukasz Bożycki)

Artist Victor Nunes combines every-day objects with simple illustrations to turn them into pictures of faces, animals and other playful scenes. His images invite us to look at the world differently and find creative images in our surroundings. Nunes’ art is a great example of pareidolia, which is our propensity to give meaning to random objects (like in this post about seeing faces in random objects). It’s the reason why we associate a smiley face with a human face and why some of Nunes’ pieces of popcorn or bread resemble faces to us.

A Thai veterinarian sterilizes a monkey in a bid to control the birth rate of the monkey population in Hua Hin city, Prachuap Khiri Khan Province, Thailand, 15 July 2017. (Photo by Narong Sangnak/EPA/EFE)

Greek actress Katerina Lehou, playing the role of High Priestess, lights a torch during the dress rehearsal for the Olympic flame lighting ceremony for the Rio 2016 Olympic Games at the site of ancient Olympia in Greece, April 20, 2016. Fire spurted from the concave mirror as a priestess, kneeling in her long, pleated dress before a ruined Greek temple, focused the blazing sun's rays on her metal torch. Come rain or shine on Thursday's official lighting ceremony, Rio de Janeiro has now secured its Olympic flame, which will burn in the main Olympic stadium throughout the Aug. 5-21 games. (Photo by Yannis Behrakis/Reuters)

A boy poses for a picture amid clashes between supporters of Shiite Muslim cleric Moqtada and Iraqi security forces in Tahrir Square in the centre of Iraq's capital Baghdad on September 28, 2022, during a parliament session in the nearby high-security Green Zone across the Tigris river. Three rockets were fired at Baghdad's Green Zone, wounding seven security force personnel as parliament was holding its first session in two months, Iraq's security forces said. The parliament, at the centre of a months-long political paralysis, met for the first since deadly unrest in August to vote on the resignation of its speaker. (Photo by Ahmad Al-Rubaye/AFP Photo)

These ink-redible, explosive masterpieces are like say-what-you see inkblots tests only in water. The vibrant colors burst from Brian Tomlinsons works, appearing as though they may be coloured ash clouds from an erupting volcano, rather than simply everyday substances. By doing so, Brian challenges viewers to identify what images can be imagined when mixing one fluid with another. In order to shoot the series, entitled Liquid Ink Art, Brain, 40, drops different coloured inks into a fish tank full of water before capturing high-speed shots with a flash. Here: Brian Tomlinsons ink artwork. (Photo by Brian Tomlinsons/Caters News Agency)

A stuffed rabbit doll sits among children's beds standing in the abandoned kindergarten of Kopachi village located inside the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone on September 29, 2015 near Chornobyl, Ukraine. Kopachi, a village that before 1986 had a population of 1,114, lies only a few kilometers south of the former Chernobyl nuclear power plant, where in 1986 workers inadvertantly caused reactor number four to explode, creating the worst nuclear accident in history. (Photo by Sean Gallup/Getty Images)

In this May 31, 2016 photo, pieces of watermelon litter the trash area of the Coche public market in Caracas, Venezuela. Staples such as corn flour and cooking oil are subsidized, costing pennies at the strongest of two official exchange rates. But fruit and vegetables have become an unaffordable luxury for many Venezuelan families. (Photo by Fernando Llano/AP Photo)