Shortlisted: Pooyan Shadpoor, Houcheraghi. While walking along the shore of Larak, Iran – an island in the Persian Gulf – Shadpoor came across this luminous scene. The “magical lights of (the) plankton ... enchanted me so that I snapped the shot”, he writes. (Photo by Pooyan Shadpoor/2016 EPOTY)

A curious grey seal investigates photographer Brian Matthews at Lundy Island off the north Devon coast, July 2024. *Photo by Brian Matthews/Solent News)

Big wave surfers on their jet skis in front of a surf of a huge wave on the rock of Sao Miguel Arcanjo fort and Nazare lighthouse during a surfing session at Praia do Norte on January 27, 2025 in Nazare, Portugal. (Photo by Stefan Matzke - sampics/Corbis via Getty Images)

Seen in a long camera exposure, the Caldor Fire burns on Sunday, August 29, 2021, in Eldorado National Forest, Calif. (Photo by Noah Berger/AP Photo)

Semi-feral, conservation ponies, graze on the salt marsh's of Gower, Swansea, Wales, United Kingdom on September 7, 2022. (Photo by Joann Randles/Cover Images)

A woman mourns over the coffin of a relative after a deadly eruption of Mount Sinabung in Sukandebi village, Karo, North Sumatra, Indonesia May 22, 2016, in this photo taken by Antara Foto. The volcano in western Indonesian unleashed hot clouds of ash on Saturday, killing several villagers, an official said. (Photo by Irsan Mulyadi/Reuters/Antara Foto)

“Freestyle skiing is an acrobatic form of technical and aerial skiing. It is organized into a number of different disciplines”. – Wikipedia

Photo: Freeskier Chris Booth of Australia launches off a drop during the World Heli Challenge freestyle day in backcountry at Minaret Station on July 31, 2011 in Wanaka, New Zealand. (Photo by Cameron Spencer/Getty Images)

Thousands of heavy-duty trucks loaded with coal are lined up for up to 130 kilometres from the Mongolia-China border on a sole road in the Gobi desert, Mongolia, October 29, 2017. The journey can take more than a week. (Photo by Bazarsukh Rentsendorj/Reuters)