Breath of an Arctic fox by Marco Gaiotti, Italy. Marco was watching this little Arctic fox as it incessantly called another nearby. Gradually he noticed the fox’s wet breath was quickly freezing in the air after each call. It was late winter in Spitsbergen, Svalbard, and the air was -35C (-31F). Photographing Arctic foxes is often frustrating, as they are normally running around fast in search of food, but this one was very relaxed and let Marco get close enough to focus on it, with the light glowing perfectly in the background. (Photo by Marco Gaiotti/Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2021)

Women wear the traditional costume of the Alto Tio Diego carnival during the Women's Afro-Mestizo Carnival of Alto Tio Diego on February 11, 2024 in Veracruz, Mexico. Alto Tio Diego is a small town near the State capital Xalapa where every year inhabitants celebrate their traditional carnival. Women of the town demanded a special day for them to parade and few years ago, they started to do it by walking through the streets wearing traditional costumes and masks (mostly of animals) but the attires have evolved to more modern characters. (Photo by Hector AD Quintanar/Getty Images)

A protester poses for photos next to a burning police vehicle in Los Angeles, Saturday, May 30, 2020, during a demonstration over the death of George Floyd. a black man who was killed in police custody in Minneapolis on May 25. (Photo by Ringo H.W. Chiu/AP Photo)

Rice seedling festival is a traditional folk festival in longji, guangxi, China on June 9, 2019, during grain in ear season. (Photo by Costfoto/Barcroft Media)

An amazing series by Art Wolfe that were taken as part of his “Vanishing Act” in which the Seattle-based photographer shows the talent of animals in disguising themselves from predators. “This collection has been a long time in the making. Finding and filming animals on location is an exhilarating and painstaking process. I’m still adding to the project even now”. Have fun spotting the hidden animals.

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 calico sits in its enclosure and suns itself in Hessen, Germany on May 28, 2021. The Opel Zoo presents a walk-in Madagascar aviary for caltas and varis. The primate species is native to Madagascar and is threatened with extinction. (Photo by Andreas Arnold/dpa)

A cygnet keeps snug under its mother’s wing at Heronry Pond in Wanstead Park in east London in the last decade of May 2024. (Photo by Jeff Moore/The Times)