Children sit under a crocodile based table, as they pose for photographers during a press preview of a themed auction that features the animal as artistic inspiration, entitled “Creatures Great and Small”, in London, Monday, December 15, 2014. The sale scheduled for December 17, 2014, explores animals across a diverse range of mediums and styles, from intricate carving details in 19th century furniture through to contemporary sculpture, according to Christie’s auction house. (Photo by Lefteris Pitarakis/AP Photo)

Indigenous woven backpacks called guayare are seen in front of a house in Paraitepui village, before a walking excursion to Mount Roraima, near Venezuela's border with Brazil January 13, 2015. A mysterious table-topped mountain on the Venezuela-Brazil border that perplexed 19th century explorers and inspired “The Lost World” novel is attracting ever more modern-day adventurers. (Photo by Carlos Garcia Rawlins/Reuters)

Activists protest the Shell Oil Company's drilling rig Polar Pioneer which is parked at Terminal 5 at the Port of Seattle, Washington May 16, 2015. Hundreds of activists in kayaks and small boats fanned out on a Seattle bay on Saturday to protest plans by Royal Dutch Shell to resume oil exploration in the Arctic and keep two of its drilling rigs stored in the city's port. (Photo by Jason Redmond/Reuters)

“A team of expert cavers and photographers had been exploring caves in the Chongquing province of China – when they were amazed to discover the entrance to a hidden cave that was previously undiscovered. And they were stunned when they managed to enter the ginormous cave – and found that it was so large there was even a cloud inside it – a cave so large it has its own weather system. Photographer and caver Robbie Shone, from Manchester, was part of a team of 15 explorers on a month-long expedition who stumbled across the natural wonder”. – Caters News

These pictures reveal the crumbling ruins of the famed Grand Orient Express, now hollowed-out and almost reduced to rubble. There are only a couple of the trains, launched in 1883, left in the world. This example stands dormant in Belgium, untouched from its last voyage in the winter of 2009. Rusty ceilings, moth-eaten seats and tattered floors capture its level of decay. A Rotterdam-based urban photographer Brian Romeijn managed to snap these pictures while exploring the area. (Photo by Brian Romeijn/IMP Features)

People explore the ice covered pier in Port Stanley, Ontario, Canada, on December 27, 2022. The ice formations were created by a large winter storm which hit the region on over the Christmas weekend. Temperatures were expected to moderate across the eastern and midwest US on December 27, after days of freezing weather from "the blizzard of the century" left at least 49 dead and caused Christmas travel chaos. (Photo by Geoff Robins/AFP Photo)

Professional adventurer Alison Teal has become the first woman to paddle out into lava during a volcanic eruption into the sea. Amazing shots of the extreme surf session shows the daredevil riding her pink surfboard up to the base of Kilauea Volcano. Photographer Perrin James snapped the brave explorer within feet of the lava as it flows into the ocean. Its the first the volcano in the Big Island of Hawaii has erupted since 2011. Here: Alison Teal paddles out to Kilauea volcano in Hawaii as it eruopts into the ocean. (Photo by Perrin James/Caters News)

Professional conceptual category winner. Greetings from Mars, by Julien Mauve, France. Mauve says: “I have always wondered what it would be like to discover a totally different world ... and to photograph it for the first time as if I was Ansel Adams. So I came up with this project, which is about space exploration and discovery. But it’s also about our behavior in front of landscapes and how we create pictures that will share our personal story with the world”. (Photo by Julien Mauve)