M42 Subtle V1 cropped. One of the most well-known astronomical objects in our universe is the Orion Nebula and this image depicts the wider region of the Orion Molecular Cloud Complex that is its home. This complex also includes another popular target for astrophotographers, the Horsehead Nebula, as well as Barnard’s Loop and the Running Man Nebula, which can be seen to the left of this photograph. (Photo by Patrick Gilliland)

A pair of foxes seem happy to see each other in Zandvoort, the Netherlands in the last decade of September 2024. (Photo by Anna Stelloo/Solent News)

Drag king Riss Obolensky performs as drag king Norman Creebs during the Opening Cabaret at The London Clown Festival in London, Britain, on July 8, 2024. (Photo by Hollie Adams/Reuters)

Russian President Vladimir Putin speaks via video call during a news conference in Moscow, Russia, Thursday, December 17, 2020. This year, Putin attended his annual news conference online due to the coronavirus pandemic. (Photo by Alexander Zemlianichenko/AP Photo)

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)

Oil pools in a leaf on the beach following an oil slick at Tanjong Beach in Sentosa, Singapore on June 15, 2024. (Photo by Edgar Su/Reuters)