Photography

The best photography of 2019

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Grand Prize winner / 1st Place - Cities in the 2019 National Geographic Travel Photo Contest. "Upernavik is a fishing village on a tiny island in west Greenland."
Photograph and caption by Weimin Chu / 2019 National Geographic Travel Photo Contest
Commended in the 2019 Drone Awards Urban category. Skyscrapers and Fall Foliage in Central Park
JoSon
A Commended entry in the Urban category. Thunderstorm in St Petersburg
Anton Galakhov
6th Place winner in the Nikon Microscopic Photography Awards. Small white hair spider
Javier Rupérez
Politician took out an Honorable Mention in the Streets category of the 2019 Urban Photo Awards
Jaume Escofet
Photo of the Year in the 2019 Siena Photo Awards. A Boy in the Crowd, Monrovia, Liberia
Jonathan Banks
Highlight from the top 50 in Amateur Landscape / Nature category of the 2019 Pano Awards
Zhayynn James
Highlight from the top 50 in Open Built Environment / Architecture in the 2019 Pano Awards
Lourdes Gomez Fernandez
Highlight from the top 50 in Open Nature / Landscape in the 2019 Pano Awards
Daniel Bonte
Finalist in ‘The Great Outdoors’ category in the 2019 EyeEm Awards. Known as The Chocolate Hills in the Philippines.
Noel Dong / EyeEm
Finalist in ‘The Great Outdoors’ category in the 2019 EyeEm Awards. An incredible perspective on the classic three pillars image at Arizona's Monument Valley. This shot was literally taken looking out of a window from a gift shop at the location.
Benjamin Lee / EyeEm
Awarded 'Remarkable Artwork' in the 2019 Siena Photo Awards
Jian Wang
Awarded 'Remarkable Artwork' in the 2019 Siena Photo Awards
Shouzhi Wang
Highlight from the top 50 in Open Built Environment / Architecture in the 2019 Pano Awards
Tran Minh Dung
Highlight from the top 50 in Amateur Built Environment / Architecture in the 2019 Pano Awards
Amri Arfianto
From the 2019 iPhone Photo Awards. “One of my favorite moments, perched on the tummy of my master. I have to confess, the view is awesome!! This cushion makes me feel secure. I can also warn other dogs and protect my master. Yeeaah! Who’s the boss?! I belong to him and he belongs to me.”
Photo and caption Magali Chesnel / IPPAWARDS 
Awarded 'Honorable Mention" in the 2019 Siena Photo Awards. A water park in winter, Rybnik, Poland
Marcin Giba
Highlight from the top 50 in 2019 Pano Awards
Sebastian Tontsch
Winner Highest scoring smartphone panorama in the 2019 Pano Awards
Roberto Soares
From the 2019 iPhone Photo Awards. “Janta Manta Observatory is very sci-fi looking. I captured the flying pigeon with the building to give the photo a dynamic feeling.”
Photo and caption Kuanglong Zhang / IPPAWARDS 
From the 2019 iPhone Photo Awards. “View from Artist’s Point in Monument Valley, where the ground falls away steeply and the flat land stretches ahead for many miles, punctuated by the peaks of buttes, mesas and pinnacles in distance.
Photo and caption Garrine Tsang / IPPAWARDS 
From the 2019 Pano Awards
Sergey Semenov
Winner Curator's Award - Pano Awards. The Drowning, New Zealand
Simon Roppel
Volcán De Fuego.
José David Altamirano González/TNC Photo Contest 2019
Wildlife. Botswana, July 2019.
Jose David Altamirano González/TNC Photo Contest 2019
The view of the world famous Victoria Harbour (Hong Kong) under the clouds in the early morning.
Tsz Ho Tse/TNC Photo Contest 2019
A big male Polar Bear in Svalbard. Awarded in the 2019 Siena International Photo Awards
Roie Galitz
Overall Winner 2019, plus Winner in Behaviour: Mammals. Early spring on the alpine meadowland of the Qinghai–Tibet Plateau, in China’s Qilian Mountains National Nature Reserve
Yongqing Bao / Wildlife Photographer of the Year
Winner in ‘The Architect’ category, this series of images examines dilapidated architecture in Eastern Europe, in particular focusing on Spomenik (Serbo-Croatian) buildings. The photographer added light pastel coloring to amplify a sense of nostalgia on these otherworldly monuments.
Gabriella Achadinha / EyeEm
Winner in ‘The Traveler’ category. Located in a remote valley at the altitude of 4,000 meters, hidden deep in the remote areas of China, close to Tibet, Larung Gar hosts more than 40,000 Buddhist monks, nuns and students.
Sandra Morente / EyeEm
Third Place, Wildlife. A Grevy's zebra staring at the camera in Lewa, Kenya.
YARON SCHMID/TNC Photo Contest 2019
Honorable Mention, People in Nature. A storm comes over Varadero, Cuba, 2019.
Giovani Cordioli/TNC Photo Contest 2019
"Motherly love" captured at the Tenerife zoo
Santiago López/AGORA images
Ayah, 37 and Aisha, 18 drink from Burger King cups in a mall ahead of the face veil ban in Hundige, Denmark, July 19, 2018
Andrew Kelly , Australia, Shortlist, Professional, Documentary, 2019 Sony World Photography Awards
Like a checkerboard representing the oyster tables of the Thau pond, near Sète
Gérard Bret, France, Shortlist, Open, Landscape, 2019 Sony World Photography Awards
Thousands of women Buddhists line up the hillside to go to the mountains to practice the dharma, which is called Da Yuan Sheng Hui, in Sichuan, China
Lifeng Chen, National Awards 2nd Place, China Mainland, Shortlist, Open competition, Culture , 2019 Sony World Photography Awards
A new housing estate in Tangshan juxtaposed with an older decrepit one
Jennifer Bin, Canada, Shortlist, Open, Architecture (Open competition), 2019 Sony World Photography Awards
A crash at the first corner of the Belgian Grand Prix in August 2018
Francois Lenoir, Belgium, Shortlist, Open, Motion (Open competition), 2019 Sony World Photography Awards
Cīrulīši nature trail, Gauja National Park, Latvia
Arvids Baranovs, Latvia, Shortlist, Open, Creative, 2019 Sony World Photography Awards
Man overlooks the Nowruz festival in Iran
Alimohammad Karami, Iran, Shortlist, Open, Culture (Open competition), 2019 Sony World Photography Awards
Nominee, Professional, Wildlife/Animals. From a series called Fracile
Ernoult Alain / Fine Art Photography Awards
Nominee, Professional, Landscape. Lightning triggered by a volcanic eruption in Colima, Mexico
Hernando Rivera Cervantes / Fine Art Photography Awards
The Human Touch by James Gifford, Human/Nature Winner, Virunga National Park, Democratic Republic of the Congo
James Gifford / BigPicture
Vincent Wu from Hong Kong, China, took this photograph of Hill of the Buddha in Japan's Makomanai Takino Cemetery by Tadao Ando. It was entered into the Interior category
incent Wu/APA19/Sto
'Two opposed worlds' by @hadangkhoa (Vietnam)
@hadangkhoa/Agora
Awarded 'Remarkable Artwork'. Window Of Autumn, taken in Chatos, Cyprus
Hasan Baglar
Honorable Mention, Landscape. Torres Del Paine National Park in Chile. January, 2019.
Carlos Eduardo Coulart/TNC Photo Contest 2019
View gallery - 50 images

To celebrate the coming new year, we have hand-picked a selection of the most spectacular photographs of 2019. This "best of the best" gallery gathers our favorite images from the greatest photo contests of the last twelve months, from head-spinning drone shots to psychedelic microscopic photography.

From a standpoint of pure spectacle one of the most impressive competitions from the last year has been the Pano Awards, a photo contest with only one major criteria – that entries must be presented in at least a 2:1 or 1:2 aspect ratio.

Highlight from the top 50 in 2019 Pano Awards
Sebastian Tontsch

For those with a penchant for the marvels of the microscopic world, the Nikon Small World Photo Contest always delivers an incredible assortment of tiny treats. Running for nearly 50 years this is one of the oldest photo competitions in the world.

6th Place winner in the Nikon Microscopic Photography Awards. Small white hair spider
Javier Rupérez

Two of the world's larger photo contests also delivered the goods in 2019. The Sony World Photography Awards served up some incredible winners, whittled down from an astounding 320,000 entries. While the Siena International Photo Awards, only in its 5th year, cemented its place as a premiere photo contest with a truly remarkable array of winning selections.

Take a look through the gallery at our picks for the top 50 photos of the year.

View gallery - 50 images
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2 comments
RJB
Amazing images with (in many cases) inadequate detail in the captions.
guzmanchinky
Incredible photography. My favorite is the tiger.