“This is the heart-stopping moment a photographer came within inches of a young cheetah when it stuck its head through her sun roof. Australian Bobby-Jo Clow, 31, was on safari in Tanzania when the juvenile started heading towards her Landrover with his sibling. She snapped away as the young male dangled its paws in front of her face and smelt her hair before its mother called it away into the wilds of the Serengeti National Park. But not until Bobby-Jo, a full-time elephant keeper at a Tanzanian Zoo, had leaned forward enough to capture the perfect shot, causing the cheetah to hiss and bare its teeth”. – Caters News. (Photo by Bobby-Jo Clow/Caters News)

French artist Gilbert Legrand’s new series takes everyday objects like corkscrews, tape measures, and more and turns them into hilariously cute characters that almost make you forget their original purpose. Skillfully using each object’s natural shape, he crafts a character full of whimsy and personality. Each is painted to detail, with even the tiniest of characters bearing an expression which leaves no doubt as to their feelings about the situation. It truly takes a talented hand and imagination to turn paint brushes and zippers into humorous characters with surprisingly huge personalities.

“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)

A Puffin returns to it's nest with a beak full of sand eels on June 25, 2011 on Inner Farne, England. The Farne Islands, which are run by the National Trust, are situated two to three miles off the Northumberland coastline. The archipeligo of 16-28 separate islands (depending on the tide) make the summer home to approximately 100,000 pairs of breeding seabirds including around 36,000 Puffins, 32,000 Guillemots and 2,000 pairs of Arctic Terns. The species of birds which nest in internationally important numbers include Shag, Sandwich Tern and Arctic Tern. The coastline around The Farnes are also the breeding ground to one of Europe's largest Grey Seal colonies with around 4,000 adults giving birth to 1500 pups every year. (Photo by Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)

“Nachos are a popular corn based food of Mexican origin associated with Tex-Mex cuisine that can be either made quickly to serve as a snack or prepared with more ingredients to make a full meal. In their simplest form, nachos are tortilla chips or totopos covered in melted cheese and salsa. First created circa 1943 by Ignacio "Nacho" Anaya, the original nachos consisted of fried corn tortillas covered with melted cheddar cheese and pickled jalapeño peppers”. – Wikipedia

Photo: Workers put the finishing touches on the nachos as Ninety Nine Restaurants in Billerica, Massachusetts set a new world record by creating the Guinness World Records World's Largest Nachos, weighing in at 3,999 lbs on October 1, 2011 in Billerica, Massachusetts. (Photo by Gail Oskin/Getty Images for Ninety Nine Restaurants)

LAPD chopper flies in a foregraund of the Super Moon in Los Angeles, California on May 05, 2012. Tonight's moon is set to appear 14 percent larger and 30 percent brighter from our perspective on Earth. The Supermoon lines up much closely with perigee – the moon's closest point to Earth. The 2012 May full moon falls some six minutes after perigee, the moon's closest point to Earth for this month. At perigee, the moon lies only 221,802 miles (356,955 kilometers ) away. Later this month, on May 19, the moon will swing out to apogee – its farthest point for the month – at 252,555 miles (406,448 kilometers) distant. (Photo by AFP/File, Joe Klamar)

“Henri Marie Raymond de Toulouse-Lautrec-Monfa or simply Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (24 November 1864 – 9 September 1901) was a French painter, printmaker, draughtsman, and illustrator, whose immersion in the colourful and theatrical life of fin de siècle Paris yielded an œuvre of exciting, elegant and provocative images of the modern and sometimes decadent life of those times. Toulouse-Lautrec is known along with Cézanne, Van Gogh, and Gauguin as one of the greatest painters of the Post-Impressionist period. In a 2005 auction at Christie's auction house a new record was set when “La blanchisseuse”, an early painting of a young laundress, sold for $22.4 million U.S” – Wikipedia.

Photo: Full-length portrait of French artist Henri Toulouse-Lautrec wearing an overcoat, a bowler hat, and pince-nez eyeglasses while holding a cane. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images). Circa 1895

Kevin Russ, a photographer & image moderator for iStockphoto, grew up in Arroyo Grande, California. In 2003, he made the move to Portland, planning to study at Multnomah Bible College. Finding the workload to be minimal, Kevin invested in a camera, filling his free time and finding himself instantly smitten with the craft. A year and a half later, photography had evolved into his full-time job. However, after 4 years of consistent portrait work, Kevin became burnt out and took a step back from photography altogether. Two years later, he picked up the camera again and now spends the majority of his time on the road, exploring & photographing the rustic landscapes & wildlife he encounters.