Australian Michael Aw won the ‘under water’ category in the 2015 Wildlife Photographer of the year competition with A whale of a mouthful. Captured during the annual sardine run on South Africa’s Wild Coast, the photo shows a Bryde’s whale swallowing up hundreds of the tiny fish in one gulp. Michael is a multi-award winning conservation photographer, named one of the world’s most influential nature photographers in 2010 by Outdoor Photography.

The company of three, by Israeli photographer Amir Ben-Dov, was the winner of the ‘birds’ category in the 2015 Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition. The image depicts three red-footed falcons, a grey male and two young females, photographed in Israel where they would have been resting on their way from Eastern Europe to their wintering ground in Africa.

Norwegian photographer Audun Rikardsen took this image of a diving humpback whale in the fjords of Norway. Dark dive, as it’s titled, is part of a portfolio of Audun’s images that won the 2015 Wildlife Photographer of the Year portfolio award.

Sea eagle snatch is another of the images in Audun Rikardsen’s winning portfolio. Wanting to know how the aerial strikes of white-tailed eagles appear to their prey, Audun spent three years perfecting a set up to capture the moment. In the end, he attached a camera to the sea floor and tethered a floating fish nearby as bait.

Broken cats by German/UK photographer Britta Jaschinski won the 2015 Wildlife Photojournalist Award: single image. Britta captured these big cats performing at the Seven Star Park in Guilin, China, in 2012. Drugged, and with their teeth and claws pulled out, the cats are controlled using metal spikes for entertainment.

The critically endangered hawksbill turtle is still illegally hunted for its shell, eggs, meat and babies, which are stuffed and sold as gifts. David Doubilet from the USA took Turtle flight in Kimbe Bay, Papua New Guinea. It was a finalist in the ‘amphibians and reptiles’ category of the 2015 Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition.

Canadian photographer Don Gutoski’s image A tale of two foxes was the 2015 Wildlife Photographer of the Year grand title winner. Climate change has extended the range of red foxes further north into the Canadian tundra, where their smaller relatives Arctic foxes live. Red foxes are now Artic foxes’ main predators, as well as their main competitors for food.

France’s Jonathan Jagot won the 15-17 years old division of the Young Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition with this photo, Flight of the scarlet ibis, taken on Ilha do Lençóis in Brazil. The wading birds were feeding on small crustaceans around mangroves when Jonathan first saw them, but he managed to later capture them flying over the island’s fine silica sand dunes.

White storks incorporate themselves into a sculpture by German artist Wolf Vostell, at the Vostell-Malpartida Museum in Spain. Francisco Mingorance’s photo, titled Stork art, was a finalist in the ‘urban’ category of the Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition.

An entrant in the 11-14 years old category, Ondřej Pelánek from the Czech Republic ended up being named the grand title winner in the Young Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition. The winning image, Ruffs on display, captures courting male ruffs in the midnight sun of a Norwegian summer.

Gemsbok are large antelopes that are well adapted to hot environments, but in northern Namibia many didn’t survive the worst drought the region had seen for a generation. Thus, when Russian photographer Sergey Gorshkov took this photo of a lone animal while flying over the dunes, he decided to title the image Desert survivor. The antelope can survive for weeks without water, and are able to raise their body temperature up to 45°C.

The shark surfer by Thomas P Peschak was a finalist in the 2015 Wildlife Photojournalist Award: single image category. Thomas says he wanted to convey to possibility of a peaceful co-existence between sharks and humans through this image of an inquisitive blacktip shark and a paddling surfer. The prototype board is fitted with an electromagnetic shark deterrent