IN PICS: Nature photographer of the year

The winners of the annual Nature TTL Photographer of the Year competition have been announced, with a fierce flamingo-hunting caracal taking the top prize in an image that shows the raw reality of nature. We bring you some of the highlights from the competition.

Tomasz Szpila captured this image in Moremi, Okavango Delta, Botswana. The picture was awarded first place in the Wild Portraits category.

“When a huge lion looks you right in the eyes, you immediately forget that you are sitting safely in the car,” explains the Polish Szpila.

“Instinctively, you cower and slowly retreat deeper inside the car so as not to provoke a predator. Fortunately, he and his brothers were busy consuming the young buffalo that had been hunted several minutes earlier.”

The Underwater category first prize was claimed by Andy Schmid, from Switzerland, for his image captured in the Maldives. The photograph shows a Pink Whipray splitting a school of Bannerfishes, shot against the setting sun on a late afternoon at the famous dive site “Tuna Factory” that is located close to Male.

Geoffrey Reynaud used a camera trap to capture this “Ice Bear” in Klukshu, Yukon, Canada. It was awarded as winner in the Camera Trap category.

“In the Yukon, Canada, a unique phenomena happens every year. The bears will freeze their fur and stay out until the month of December, despite the temperature reaching as low as -30 degrees Celsius. This picture was taken by a camera trap set up along the river about 2 days before a snow storm. The temperature was starting to drop to -15C, and the bear was only starting to become an ‘ice bear’.”

South African photographer Bertus Hanekom claimed the top prize in the Landscapes category with this image captured in Loxton, in the Northern Cape. A thunderstorm can be seen passing over a sunflower which, against the odds, has managed to survive on a rubbish dump in the semi-arid Karoo.

This image of a Micro-moth (Micropterix calthella) covered in golden balls of pollen from a creeping buttercup flower found in Mutter’s Moor near Sidmouth, Devon, UK, was awarded the runner up prize in the Small World category. Photographer Tim Crabb used a techique of compiling focus-stacked pictures to present this photograph.

Mauro Tronto, from Italy, captured this image, which was awarded as runner up in The Night Sky category. The photograph was captured in Godafoss, Iceland.

Tronto explains: “This shot is mixture of magical elements: the light of the moon whose incidence at the right angle generated a magnificent rainbow; the beautiful northern lights shot just above the lunar rainbow; finally Godafoss, a spectacular waterfalls in Iceland. All elements are real and occurring at the same time.”

Thirteen-year-old Achintya Murthy, from India, was crowned the Young Nature TTL Photographer of the Year for this image of Malabar Parakeets in Karnataka, India. These parakeets usually flock together and are seen in huge numbers. These two are fighting over a stump that had paddy grains.

Runner up in the Animal Behaviour category was awarded to Michael Snedic, from Australia, for his image taken in Tanzania at the Ngorongoro Crater.

Snedic states, “After wallowing in the mud, this majestic African Elephant was walking towards our safari vehicle in the Ngorongoro Crater. It sucked up some dust in its trunk and before long, it turned its trunk upwards and released a huge puff of dust. My camera was set to continuous shutter and I was clicking away like crazy – an exhilarating moment!”

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