These kaleidoscopic images showcase the sheer beauty of the mammoth firework displays held across Japan every summer. The Japanese word for fireworks, hanabi, means fire flower, and each year, local governments in Japan throw around 7,000 festivals, or hanabi taikai. Here: Tsuchiura National Fireworks Competition, Tsuchiura City, Ibaraki Prefecture. (Photo by Makoto Igari/Caters News Agency)

The photography of Art Wolfe covers the globe, capturing landscapes, wildlife, and cultures from every continent; here he talks through a selection of his favourite images. Art Wolfe is an American photographer and conservationist. His photographs have been noted by environmental advocacy groups for their “stunning” visual impact. Here: Snowy owlets (Bubo scandiacus), Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Alaska, USA. (Photo by Art Wolfe/Art Wolfe Stock)

Tokyo Rainbow Pride 2015, at Yoyogi park-Shibuya, on April 26, 2015. Some 3,000 lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people paraded through Tokyo’s Shibuya district Sunday afternoon to demonstrate their hope that Japanese society will continue to forge ahead with recent moves to embrace equality and diversity. In a nation where prejudice against sexual minorities persists, the annual Tokyo Rainbow Pride parade has sought to counter the trend by openly spotlighting LGBT residents and spreading their voices. But this year, LGBT participants and proponents seemed particularly joyous, emboldened by what they see as a blossoming of LGBT-friendly moves by municipalities and companies. (Photo by Yoshiaki Miura)

A child parades on a float during the Bun Festival on May 25, 2015 in Hong Kong, Hong Kong. One of Hong Kong's most colourful cultural celebration event, Cheung Chau Bun Festival, will be staged on 25 May 2015 (Monday) till 26 May 2015 midnight (Tuesday). This festival has over 100 years of history. Every year, thousands of people descend upon the tiny island for The Piu Sik (Floating Colours) Parade, Lucky Bun (Ping On Bun) and The Bun Scrambling Competition, the ancient custom during the festival. (Photo by Lam Yik Fei/Getty Images)

A reveler wearing sheepfur costume is seen in front of a bonfire on which they burn a coffin symbolizing winter during the closing ceremony of the traditional carnival parade in Mohacs, 189 kms south of Budapest, Hungary, 07 February 2016. The carnival parade of people, the so-called busos, dressed in such costumes and frightening wooden masks, using various noisy wooden rattlers is traditionally held on the seventh weekend before Easter to drive away winter, and is a revival of a legend, which says that ethnic Croats ambushed the Osmanli Turkish troops, who escaped in panic seeing the terrifying figures during the Turkish occupation of Hungary. (Photo by Tamas Soki/EPA)

Vietnamese military personnel in traditional dress take part in a parade celebrating the 40th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War which is also remembered as the fall of Saigon, in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, Thursday, April 30, 2015. (Photo by Dita Alangkara/AP Photo)

Carrying a portable shrine on their shoulders, participants all clad in traditional happi coats, parade through precincts of the Kanda Myojin shrine during the annual summer festival in Tokyo, Saturday, May 9, 2015. (Photo by Eugene Hoshiko/AP Photo)

A resident looks at a parade marking the 496th anniversary of Panama City, Panama August 15, 2015. Modern-day Panama City includes the historical ruins of the original Panama Viejo settlement founded on August 15, 1519 by Spaniard Pedro Arias Davila, according to local media. (Photo by Carlos Jasso/Reuters)