A Ballet dancer prepares backstage during the final dress rehearsal for the famous Nutcracker ballet by Pyotr Tchaikovsky at the Joburg Ballet, Johannesburg, South Africa, 04 October 2018. The premiere of Nutcracker is scheduled for 05 October and the show will run for two weeks. (Photo by Kim Ludbrook/EPA/EFE)

School children celebrate after being rewarded for their dance performance during India's Independence Day celebrations in Chandigarh, India, August 15, 2015. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's independence day speech focused on measures his “Team India” had rolled out to include millions of poor Indians in the banking and insurance systems, policies for workers and farmers and successes in the fights against inflation and corruption. (Photo by Ajay Verma/Reuters)

“Don't Leave Any Food On Your Plate”. The giraffes at Nairobi's Giraffe Manor are totally at home with humans. They will eat out of your hand, or even off your plate. Photo location: Giraffe Manor, Nairobi, Kenya. (Photo and caption by Gavin Werbeloff/National Geographic Photo Contest)

Lush green rice terraces sprawl over 2,200 hectares of mountainside ready to be harvested. These stunning images, captured by photographer Saravut Whanset, show the incredible terraces throughout the course of the day, including at sunrise and sunset. Workers tend to the fields, with each terrace between 1 and 1.5 metres wide, while wooden huts stand on stilts on the mountainside. The beautiful panoramic pictures were taken in Mu Cang Chai, Vietnam, with the fields located at the foot of the Hoang Lien Son mountain range, 1,000 metres above sea level. (Photo by Saravut Whanset/Solent News and Photo Agency)

Honorable Mention: “The Storm”. During I was taking photo with my nephew, the storm came and I caught this beautiful moment. Photo location: Kocaeli, Turkey. (Photo and caption by Aytül Akbaş/National Geographic Photo Contest)

Katie Handler, veterinary technician with the New England Wildlife Center, reaches to try to capture an oil-covered goose along the Muddy River, Monday, December 9, 2024, in Brookline, Mass., as wildlife rescuers tended to dozens of birds that were soaked in oil after an apparent spill. (Photo by Charles Krupa/AP Photo)

A mural on an apartment block created as part of the Urban Morphogenesis street art festival in the Novaya Tryokhgorka residential neighbourhood in the town of Odintsovo in Moscow Region, Russia on August 31, 2019. (Photo by Valery Sharifulin/TASS)

Buddhist believers wearing faces masks to help protect against the spread of the new coronavirus wait to attend a service to pray for overcoming the COVID-19 outbreak and to celebrate Buddha's birthday at the Chogyesa temple in Seoul, South Korea, Thursday, April 30, 2020. (Photo by Ahn Young-joon/AP Photo)