GUIDED BY THE LIGHT
The lights from the boats attract the Shirasu eel at night in Tokushima, Japan. Your Shot photo editor Matt Adams published this photo in the Daily Dozen saying, “This image felt very out of this world and sci-fi and I just love this scene. What a cool thing to witness and then to capture with your camera.”
PHOTOGRAPH BY MITSUNORI YUASA, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT
THREE GOOD FRIENDS
While driving on Ireland’s scenic Ring of Kerry, Your Shot photographer Max Malloy could resist stopping at a roadside market for this smiling threesome. “It looks like the man is making a cross with reeds while the dog barks instructions and the donkey checks his work,” he says.
PHOTOGRAPH BY MAX MALLOY, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT
KISSING KITS
Red fox kits play in a field on Prince Edward Island, Canada. There are on average four to six kits in a litter, and they stay with their parents for about seven months.
PHOTOGRAPH BY BRITTANY CROSSMAN, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT
GRADUATION CELEBRATION
Graduates of the United States Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colorado, celebrate the end of their commencement ceremony—and the end of four years of hard work and perseverance. As Thunderbird jets fly over the stadium, the cadets toss their caps into the air. Traditionally, cadets put money on the inside of their caps. Once the toss happens, kids under 12 are allowed to run onto the field, find a cap, keep the money, and return the cap to the cadet.
PHOTOGRAPH BY AJ LEE, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT
LILY HARVEST
In Vietnam’s Mekong Delta, a woman harvests water lilies. The fertile region is home to a wealth of plants and animals, and its agricultural yield has earned the Delta the nickname of Vietnam’s “rice bowl.”
PHOTOGRAPH BY THÁI DƯƠNG LÊ, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT
BACKYARD BEAUTY
The long winter nights of Lapland, Sweden showcase the stunning northern lights in Your Shot photographer Johannes Kormann’s backyard.
PHOTOGRAPH BY JOHANNES KORMANN, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT
DUST BATH
In Botswana’s Chobe National Park, an elephant gives itself a dust bath. Using its trunk to spray dirt over its body helps keep the skin healthy and parasites at bay.
PHOTOGRAPH BY NICK DALE, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT
LIKE A BOSS
Your Shot photographer Lauren Breedlove noticed this woman and perfect backdrop while on a trip to Havana. “I borrowed some change from a friend and approached the woman with it, asking to take her photograph. She nodded and posed like a boss, stogie and all.”
PHOTOGRAPH BY LAUREN BREEDLOVE, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT
SUDDENLY SOAKED
Life goes on despite the steady monsoon rain in Kolkata, India. “[The] weather is extremely hard to predict,” says Julie Mayfeng of the Indian rainy season, which typically lasts from July to September. “At the time [this photo was taken], I was eating lunch at a street café. Suddenly it started to shower. I borrowed an umbrella from a stranger and ran out into the street. Although I was wet through and through, I was able to capture this fantastic scene.”
PHOTOGRAPH BY JULIE MAYFENG, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT
BROTHER BEARS
Two bear cubs play in a forest of the Carpathian Mountains in Ukraine. Your Shot photographer Volodymyr Burdiak says he wasn’t expecting to see them emerge from the bushes, and he had only a few seconds to get this photograph before they ran back into the woods with their mother.
PHOTOGRAPH BY VOLODYMYR BURDIAK, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT
THE ‘STARS’ ABOVE
A free diver emerges from the depth of Swallows Cave in Tonga’s Vava’u Group islands, finding a living cloud of fish circling above. “They offer a spectacular ballet when you dive inside,” writes Your Shot photographer Marc Henauer. The composition of his photo was striking to Henauer: “The contrast between the dark of the bottom and the light of the top make … the fishes [look] like stars.”
PHOTOGRAPH BY MARC HENAUER, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT
LOOK UP
While driving through Northern California, Your Shot photographer Josh Heidebrecht experienced a moment of photographic serendipity after he and his friend pulled over to see what they could find in the grove. “While searching, a squirrel briefly chattered above me, causing me to look straight up,” he remembers. “Luckily I had my wide-angle lens with me so I could capture this perspective of the partially burnt redwoods towering above us in an eerie silence.”
PHOTOGRAPH BY JOSH HEIDEBRECHT, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT
SEEING EYE-TO-EYE
A male orangutan makes eye contact with the camera. The cheek pads, called flanges, make male orangutans more desirable to females. Recent studies show that the flanges can sometimes take 20 years to appear, but their growth is directly related to testosterone levels.
PHOTOGRAPH BY PEDRO JARQUE KREBS, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT
FLOCKING TOGETHER
A flock of pied falconets gathers on a tree branch in Wuyuan, Jiangxi, China. The small birds are only about 6-8 inches in size, and they feed on everything from insects to small rodents in their forest homes.
PHOTOGRAPH BY KANT LIANG, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT
LUCKY STRIKE
Storm chaser and Your Shot photographer Vanessa Neufeld captured this scene in Keyes, Oklahoma. The day before she was to fly home, she and her fellow chasers “thought we’d go for one last chase and hope for something more than just a squall line,” she remembers. “As the evening descended, so did a barrage of lightning in northwest Oklahoma.”
PHOTOGRAPH BY VANESSA NEUFELD, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT
OFFERING PRAYERS
A Nepalese Hindu boy reacts before submerging himself in the Hanumante River to offer prayers during the Madhav Narayan festival in Bhaktapur, Nepal. Devotees recite Holy Scripture and women pray for wellbeing of their spouses throughout the month-long fast devoted to Goddess Shree Swasthani and God Madhav Narayan says Your Shot photographer Skanda Gautam.
PHOTOGRAPH BY SKANDA GAUTAM, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT
FRIENDS AND ANEMONES
A clownfish hides within a sea anemone in the waters off Indonesia. Clownfish always make their homes in anemones, and the species share a mutually beneficial, or symbiotic, relationship. The anemone’s stinging tentacles ward off fish that predate on clownfish. In return, the clownfish clean the anemone, and its waste provides nutrients for the anemone.
PHOTOGRAPH BY GREGORY PIPER, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT
THE CIRCLE OF LIGHT
Off the coast of Lagoa, Portugal, is a unique cave called Algar de Benagil. Your Shot photographer Simão Viegas snapped this as a beam of light streamed through “the eye” of the cave, illuminating the people inside.
PHOTOGRAPH BY SIMÃO VIEGAS, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT
COLD YET?
Frequent Your Shot contributor Christian Aslund captured this cold-inducing portrait of Renny Bijoux, a youth ambassador from the Seychelles on a Greenpeace North Pole expedition. Aslund said, “The team, most of them without any previous polar experience, skied to the North Pole and lowered a capsule 4.3km onto the sea bed, containing signatories to their campaign to protect the Arctic from industrial development.”
PHOTOGRAPH BY CHRISTIAN ASLUND, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT
EYE OF THE LYNX
In Neuschonau, Germany “a lynx approaches cautiously” says Your Shot photographer Angiolo Manetti. Fellow photographers from the community praised the photo for the wild cat’s intense eye contact.
PHOTOGRAPH BY ANGIOLO MANETTI, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT
ABOVE MECCA
The city of Mecca, in Saudi Arabia, is the holiest site in the religion of Islam. Non-Muslims are prohibited from entering the city, and each year, 15 million pilgrims make the trip to worship. The tower is the Makkah Royal Clock Tower, part of Abraj Al-Bait, a complex of skycraper hotels for worshippers to stay in. The clock tower is one of the tallest buildings in the world, and it sports the largest clock face—measuring 141 feet across.
PHOTOGRAPH BY AMMAR ALAMIR, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT
RACING STRIPES
A herd of zebras stampede toward the Mara River in Kenya’s Rift Valley. “The Great Migration is considered one of the Wonders of The World,” says Your Shot photographer Jonas Stenqvist. “I got to see it in all its chaotic glory last year.”
PHOTOGRAPH BY JONAS STENQVIST, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT
IN GOOD HANDS
Your Shot photographer Phuc Hau Huynh immerses the viewer in the extraordinary perspective of an operating room patient in this submission to the Strong Women assignment.
PHOTOGRAPH BY PHUC HAU HUYNH, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT
SNAKE ISLAND
More than 7,000 islands make up the Philippines. This one, called Snake Island, is named after a sandbar that is only visible at low tide.
PHOTOGRAPH BY ANDREJ AFRIKANTOV, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT
DAILY CATCH
Your Shot photographer Cynthia H. had perfect timing while observing the mating ritual of black skimmers in the Gulf of Mexico. She remembers, “I watched as this female accepted her suitor’s trophy, ensuring his bloodline will continue to be passed on. This poor minnow is only thinking he might still have a chance to get away.”
PHOTOGRAPH BY CYNTHIA H., NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC YOUR SHOT