Derry Moroney is an Australian photographer who recently captured photos of a unique “Tree of Life” phenomenon that appeared on the receding Lake Cakora in Brooms Head, New South Wales, and the photos will take your breath away. The photographer explained that the phenomenon appeared after a big amount of rain and stormy weather broke the lake out and drained most of its water. At the same time, a nearby lake rich in tea tree oil and coffee rock ran off into Lake Cakora, creating this beautiful image of a tree.
Is there anything more breathtaking and surreal than outer space? Often, I feel like there absolutely isn’t. Maybe it’s because of all the celestial masterpieces stars, galaxies, and planets paint, effortlessly sweeping us off our feet? Or maybe we feel this way about space because it’s something we can’t touch, tame, or change? Or perhaps, it’s because of that nostalgic feeling you get when it’s a warm summer night and you raise your head and look up at the sky and all the stars simultaneously remind you of how truly small you are (but in the best way possible)?
But now, let’s get to the point. Insight Investment Astronomy Photographer of the Year is the largest international competition of its kind which, every year, showcases the best space photography from a global community of astrophotographers. The winners of the 2020 competition have just been announced and they’re all absolutely stunning. Bored Panda invites you to look through some of the most spectacular photos from this year’s space photography competition and choose your favorites!#1
Aurorae Winner – ‘The Green Lady’ By Nicholas Roemmelt
The overall winner of the competition is the photo called “Andromeda Galaxy at Arm’s Length?” that was taken by a French astrophotographer Nicolas Lefaudeux. “To most of us, our closest neighbouring galaxy Andromeda can also feel so distanced and out of reach, yet to create a photograph that gives us the impression that it is just within our physical reach is truly magical, and somewhat appropriate as we adjust after such socially distanced times,” said the competition judge Ed Robinson.#4
Stars And Nebulae Runner Up – ‘The Dolphin Jumping Out Of An Ocean Of Gas’ By Connor Matherne
Isn’t this an edited picture? How can the ground be as sharp as the sky- and how is space so visible without zoom? Unless that’s really possible in the desert?4ReplyView More Replies…View more comments#6
Skyscapes Winner – ‘Painting The Sky’ By Thomas Kast
The winner of Skyscapes is the photo called “Painting the Sky” taken by Thomas Kast. The photo captures polar stratospheric clouds in Finnish Lapland, looking like a spectacular water color painting. “Clouds are said to be the bane of astronomers, but they can also be the inspiration for a breathtaking astrophoto. These rare, incredibly high nacreous clouds reflect colour like oil does on water and this photographer has captured them perfectly. With subtle processing they have brought out the vibrant hues that can sometimes be seen in our skies,” commented the Art Editor at the BBC Sky at Night Magazine Steve Marsh.#7
Aurorae Runner Up – ‘Lone Tree Under A Scandinavian Aurora’ By Tom Archer
Our Sun winner is the photo taken by a British photographer Alexandra Hart called “Liquid Sunshine.” “This is a stunning example of how the ‘quiet’ Sun is never truly quiet. While the Sun may be less active, the nuclear fusion ongoing below its surface sustains all life on our little world,” commented astrophysicist, astronomer and science communicator at Royal Observatory Greenwich Emily Drabek-Maunder.#10
Our Moon Runner Up – ‘Hdr Partial Lunar Eclipse With Clouds’ By Ethan Roberts
The pastel masterpiece capturing the moon was nominated as the winner of Our Moon category. “This vibrant image teases out the faint colours on the surface of the Moon. Not only is this composition visually striking, but it highlights the different materials the Moon is made up of, all from the safety of the Earth,” commented Emily Drabek-Maunder.#13
Our Moon Winner – ‘Tycho Crater Region With Colours’ By Alain Paillou
“This was such a dramatic image, with the ‘green lady’ appearing to take flight above the mountains and illuminated water’s edge. I liked the way the landscape was dwarfed by the dominant aurora and yet the forms and colours of the composition echoed above with below. This was one of my favourite images,” fine art photographer Susan Derges commented on the winner of Aurorae category.#16
I had to look up the word “Ineffable”. I had never heard it before, or even seen it written…it means “too great or extreme to be expressed or described in words.”1ReplyView More Replies…View more comments#26
Galaxies Runner Up – ‘Ngc 3628 With 300,000 Light Year Long Tail’ By Mark Hanson
Julija Svidraitė is a Bored Panda writer an photo editor who recently got her bachelor’s degree in Psychology. Before Bored Panda, Julija worked as a social media specialist and content creator at a marketing agency. She also tried herself in many different fields working as an intern: from practising graphic design at a social media marketing agency to being an assistant at a psychiatric hospital. Her favorite articles to write are the ones about extraordinary everyday people. She wholeheartedly believes that each and every one of us sees life in their own unique way and it’s always a pleasure to help people share their unique experiences with this beautiful community Bored Panda has managed to grow… Read more »
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It’s truly a shame that our eyes are limited to seeing the world in a very specific human way. Sure, we should be happy that we have opposable thumbs and are capable of an advanced and complex thought process as compared to most other species, but wouldn’t it also be nice to have something like super macro vision so that we could see things super up close?
Well, until our eyes evolve into something like that, we are stuck with relying on technology. Speaking of which, the International Garden Photographer Of The Year competition has announced this year’s winners for the Macro Art photography contest.
The Macro Art contest encapsulates tiny moments of beauty in gardens around the globe. The pictures are lush with color, showcasing the natural world that surrounds us from a magnified perspective. Bugs, flowers, leaves, you name it, it’s there, up close and personal.
This year’s first prize winner is Bruno Militelli from São Paulo, Brazil, who’s the man behind the “Botanic Loop”, a black and white photograph of swirly passion fruit tendril. Second and third place prizes went out to Anne Macintyre for her “Mountains of Tulip Petals” and Zhang Ye Fei for “Shepherd’s Purse Seed” respectively.
Bored Panda has gathered all of the winners, finalists, and those commended in the competition for your viewing pleasure. Check out the photos in the list below, and while you’re down there, why not vote and comment on the ones you liked the most!#1
1st Place, ‘Botanic Loop’ By Bruno Militelli
“The spiral-shaped filiform structure of the Passiflora (passion fruit) tendrils are an important specialised botanic feature. They are used by climbers like claws to affix themselves for support and provide a stable place to grow and flower.”
2nd Place, ‘Mountains Of Tulip Petals’ By Anne Macintyre
“When the tulip petals all fell off the flower they still looked beautiful; such lovely colours and texture abound – so i laid them out and took a photo of them, they resembled little coloured mountains.”
3rd Place, ‘Shepherd’s Purse Seed’ By Zhang Ye Fei
“Although classified as a common annual weed, I used a macro lens to reveal the delicate beauty of Capsella bursa-pastoris seed pods– known commonly as shepherd’s purse. Being part of the Brassica family its seeds are edible and are consumed across Asia.”
“I used spectral light coming from a prism to bathe this Lilium (lily) flower in the full colours of the rainbow. Like many photographers I initially struggled to be creative during the COVID-19 lockdown. I convinced myself that home confinement was incompatible with a creative life but as the weeks went by I proved myself wrong. I used a prism and the sunny days of spring to look at flowers under (literally) a different light.”
Eucalyptus trees are works of art by themselves. Very nice snapshot!10ReplyView more comments#6
Finalist, ‘Flying Wishes’ By Kristina Zvinakeviciute
“I created this original artwork by photographing a dandelion seed head in natural sunlight (handheld) using my macro lens, I then used Adobe Photoshop to achieve the desired artistic look.”
“For this macro photograph of an Abutilon flower, I used a frontal perspective to capture the beauty of the perfect, circular symmetry formed by the pattern of the coiled petals.”
Highly Commended, ‘Common Blues On Apple Mint’ By Tony North
“I photographed these two Polyommatus icarus (common blue) butterflies at rest on this Mentha (apple mint) flower head in Derbyshire’s first dedicated butterfly nature reserve.”
Highly Commended, ‘Peep Through The Window’ By Minghui Yuan
“I found this South China tree toad (Annam tree frog) at rest on the foliage of plants in the forest. I watched from underneath through the holes in the leaves, and I focused on the head of the amphibian, which was gazing into the surrounding environment. It’s like nature provided a window for me in this exact moment, so I could see into the frog’s world.”
Highly Commended, ‘Silver-Studded Blues On Heather’ By Qasim Syed
“I photographed female and male Plebejus argus (silver-studded blue) butterflies at rest on heather flowers. They are one of my favourite butterfly species due to the amazing and intricate wing patterns with the individual colours to complement each sex. I used focus stacking to blur out the heavy background and bring out the detail of the subjects.”
The color and the contrast is insane! it’s hard to believe that it’s real except that mother nature does this all the time10ReplyView more comments#13
Highly Commended, ‘The Hunter’ By Rob Blanken
“I used my long-barrelled macro lens to capture this spider on its web, waiting; as the patient hunter for any vibration – to inform it that its prey had arrived.”
I did not expect a spider web to be so reflective. Look at all those bands of colour. I think the spider is thinking: “Yeah, fascinating. Now, go away. You’re scaring all the flies.”16ReplyView more comments#14
Highly Commended, ‘Posing’ By Barbora Polivkova
“I spotted this tiny glass frog on a flower in the rainforest, which looked like it was posing; I liked the contrast of colours – making the frog more visible and showing its size in scale.”
Highly Commended, ‘Butterfly Wing V’ By Petar Sabol
“I found a sleeping butterfly in the early morning and took the chance to capture some extreme macro shots of its wings. Top achieve this, I used an ultra macro lens at around 5:1 magnification. The result is a very detailed and intriguing image, rich in colour, shapes and textures of tiny scales that are covering the wings. I am always amazed by nature, especially when such beautiful details can be explored through macro photography.”
Highly Commended, ‘Camassia After The Rain’ By Marie Phelan
“To create this artistic photograph, I first used a normal glass-fronted photo frame and placed it on a glass-topped table. Into this I splashed some water and oil, and touches of watercolour paint and under the table I put one of my hand painted backgrounds. I then positioned a glass bowl with a blue rim on top of the background; I did this to offer a shape to echo the curve of the flower, then I carefully placed the rain-drenched Camassia onto the photo frame ‘dish’.”
Highly Commended, ‘You Can Leave Your Hat On’ By Ingeborg Hartgerink-Grandia
“I received a bouquet with all sorts of Allium flowers in it, including two leek flower buds. One of these flower buds burst open leaving its ‘hat’ on and I just had to capture it like that. The bouquet was in front of our chimney, the slightly stained-looking background is the marble stone of the chimney. I lightened the background and gave the image a slightly brighter vignette to keep the attention on the flower bud; I wanted to achieve a botanical feel to the image.”
Highly Commended, ‘Wild Carrot Flowers In The Late Afternoon’ By Rachele Z. Cecchini
“During a sunny afternoon in Salzburg, I photographed these wild carrot flowers in my garden; they grew very high this year, more than 2 metres tall. I managed to get some in both the foreground and background and discovered that the sun had created a beautiful bokeh as it backlit the flower heads.”
Laima is a photo editor in Bored Panda. After photography studies she spent most of the years working as a freelance photographer and photo editor . During her free time she loves to listen to the music, read, watch movies and spend time in nature and with people (and her trio of cats) that she loves. Read more »
Studio Ghibli movies have touched a wide range of people of all ages over the years. The combination of beautiful visuals, compelling stories, spectacular animation, and breathtaking music make these my favorite animated movies to watch.
In these watercolor paintings, I combined my love for Ghibli movies and my love for nature to try to recreate those feelings of serenity, cheerfulness, and love for life that Studio Ghibli movies give.
Julius Kähkönen is a young photographer, visual artist, and entrepreneur from Finland. His unique style in editing and photography results in photographs that many would describe as dream-like or straight out of a fantasy film. It’s small wonder that such stunning visuals earned Julius quite an impressive following, his Instagram page has 357k followers alone.
Kähkönen started editing back in 2017 and through the years developed a unique and eye-catching style that pushed his shots to the next level. As he traveled across the world, shooting hundreds of breathtaking sceneries, the photographer gathered an impressive portfolio that he then turned into a career. “I create art and absolutely love helping others,” Kähkönen’s Instagram bio states.
The photographer now teaches other people how to achieve such stunning visuals by launching courses on different aspects of photography and editing. From basic editing tricks to sky replacement lessons, Kähkönen seems to have found a way to turn his passion into a successful career.
Bored Panda reached out to Julius for some additional information and he gladly replied. “I started photography when I used my dad’s camera one evening during sunset and I was immediately hooked,” the photographer explained. “I then got tired of photographing because I lived in a town of 3000 people and couldn’t take photos anywhere in cool locations,” he said that we quickly got bored of local surroundings and discovered his passion in photoshop.
“I believe my style developed a lot in the beginning through paintings,” Julius told us about his inspirations, “I am drawn to dreamy paintings with a lot of color in them and I have taken a lot of features from night painting into my work”. He also revealed that he developed his own unique style by practicing daily and switching between his own shots and stock images. “The more I’ve been in nature taking images myself, the better my understanding of lighting and color has gotten,” the man said, “I’ve been able to travel to 19 countries so far and have thousands of my own images to edit out from”.
When asked how long does it usually take him to create a single finished piece, Julius had this to say:
“When I started, it took me 6-9 hours to finish one piece but at the time my workflow was not that optimized and I didn’t really know what I was doing. Through daily practice I have been able to cut down in editing time and finish complicated pieces in less than an hour. Nowadays my editing style is also more realistic and I tend to go for realism with a hint of magic in them”.
The photographer mentioned that people perceive his art in a positive light and he tries to be as transparent in his process as possible: “There has been some conversation about it being bad that I modify places around the world a lot BUT I try to be as transparent with my work as possible and I’ve always been creating art. I am not one to lie about whether something is real or not”.
Julius told us that now, after mastering what he’s doing and expanding his horizons, he’s been teaching others his techniques. “I’ve spent the past 1.5 years focusing on teaching as many people as possible about editing,” he said. The photographer also mentioned that he does not wish to gain money for creating art as turning his passion into a job is not his goal, so teaching is a nice way to monetize his talent. “Online teaching is so rewarding and I love to see my student’s progress with editing,” he concluded.
If you think you know how a winter wonderland looks, we invite you to think again. Even though your image may be filled more with fairy-lights, Christmas-trees and cinnamony smells as most of us probably associate the season with Christmas celebrations, these pictures from the Harbin International Ice and Snow Sculpture Festival will offer quite a different but no less fascinating perspective on what a winter wonderland can be.
This festival is an annual event taking place in Harbin, Heilongjiang, China and is currently the largest snow and ice festival in the world. Its history started in 1999 when the first Ice and Snow World was opened to the public in December. At first, the participants were almost all Chinese, however, it kept growing and growing until it was decided to make it an international festival and competition. Take a look at the wonders that these ice-sculptors came up with!
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