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)
Tsunami, an eleven year old female Sumatran Orangutan eats a fruit platter during her birthday celebration at the National Zoo Ape Center in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Thursday, December 31, 2015. (Photo by Manan Vatsyayana/AFP Photo)
The Rakotzbrücke bridge in the autumnal azalea and rhododendron park in Kromlau in the district of Görlitz, Saxony near the state border with Brandenburg on November 7, 2023. More than four million euros have been invested in the restoration and reconstruction of this Lusatian landmark in recent years. The complex includes the listed group of Rakotzbrücke bridges and the so-called organ made of basalt. Friedrich Hermann Rötschke had these built between 1842 and 1875. (Photo by Patrick Pleul/dpa)
Fishermen are surrounded by green water as they use large nets to catch fish. The workers were pictured trying to find fish below the algae in Rajshahi, Bangladesh in the last decade of February 2024. (Photo by Bipul Ahmed/Solent News & Photo Agency)
Catholic faithful attend a Palm Sunday mass at the start of Holy Week in San Lorenzo, Paraguay, Sunday, March 24, 2024. (Photo by Jorge Saenz/AP Photo)
Revellers take part during the annual Easter Parade and Bonnet Festival on 5th Avenue in Manhattan, New York City, U.S., April 9, 2023. (Photo by Eduardo Munoz/Reuters)
A white crab spider hides between the petals of a rain spotted rose blossom in the garden of a home near Oakland in southwestern Oregon on August 23, 2024. Crab spiders are ambush predators and wait patiently for their prey to approach. (Photo by Robin Loznak/ZUMA Press Wire/Rex Features/Shutterstock)