Some of the best entries so far in the 2016 Insight Astronomy Photographer of the Year competition. There are two weeks left to enter, and the winners will be announced in September. Here: Aurora over Laksvatn Fjord, Laksvatn, Norway. The aurora borealis dances in the skies over the town of Laksvatn, with the Milky Way to the left. The image is a single shot with no compositing, only post-processing to bring out the aurora, and some colour corrections. The photographer Matt Walford said: “I love the way the northern lights look like they are just wistfully dancing over the fjord, framed by the mountains on either side”. (Photo by Matt Walford/National Maritime Museum)

A colourful sky before sunrise on Whitley Bay beach on December 21, 2015, as December could be the mildest across a large part of England since records began more than 350 years ago, forecasters have said. (Photo by Owen Humphreys/PA Wire)

Sheep are waiting in Via Manzoni before the final filming of the Last Shepherd on October 1, 2011 in Milan, Italy. Directed by Marco Bonfanti, L'Ultimo Pastore (The Last Shepherd) tells the story of the life of Renato Zucchelli, the last nomadic shepherd in Milan. (Photo by Pier Marco Tacca/Getty Images)

An installation consisting of a series of bird boxes is displayed in a tree in Duncan Terrace Gardens in Islington on March 24, 2011 in London, England. The boxes by artists Bruce Gilchrist and Jo Joelson of “London Fieldworks”, were designed to reflect the architecture of the Georgian terraces and flats that surround the park in the community gardens. (Photo by Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)

A picture taken with a drone shows a painting made of flowers, titled “Summer Flower Bed”, by the artist Elita Patmalniece at Kronvalda park in Riga, Latvia, 19 July 2023. (Photo by Toms Kalnins/EPA)

Pedestrians fight wind and rain as they cross Hollywood Boulevard during Tropical Storm Hilary, Sunday, August 20, 2023, in Los Angeles. (Photo by Chris Pizzello/AP Photo)

A giraffe appears almost to be doing the splits as it bends to drink at a watering hole on a reserve in Mkuze, South Africa in September 2023. (Photo by Peter Batty/Solent News)

A vendor sells beef at a market in Hanoi, Vietnam 01 October 2024. Vietnam's official manufacturing Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI) declined to 47.3 points in September, down from 52.4 points in the previous month, according to the latest survey from S&P Global. (Photo by Luong Thai Linh/EPA)