Danielle Smith won second prize in the same category with this image, taken off the coast of Lennox Head, in northern New South Wales—a place they call “the Humpback Highway.” Smith said: “Every day you see whales breaching. What was rare was being able to photograph two at the same time.”

New Zealander Tony Stoddard won second place in the People & Nature category. His words describe his image with justice: “I had the immense privilege of attending the pōwhiri at the Mākara Village Hall. After the formal welcome, members of the Capital Kiwi team gently lifted two large kiwis from their boxes, offering us a rare and intimate look at these taonga—treasures—before releasing them into a 23,000-hectare sanctuary. This photograph, in which a precious manu is held in someone’s arms, says it all. It captures the deep care, reverence, and hope that sustain every step of this extraordinary return to the wild, in the heart of our capital city.”

Tiana Reimann, from Papua New Guinea, won third prize in People & Nature with this image of her cousin, surrounded by a school of yellowtail on a local reef. They are likely yellowtail trumpeters, a species native to northern Australia and the southern coast of Papua New Guinea.

Christine King won third place in Wildlife with this perfectly timed image. And, again, in her own words: “On a warm summer’s night along a local lake, perched on reeds, adult dragonfly nymphs were emerging from their exoskeletons. I watched this dragonfly during the moult. Slowly, gently, it removed itself from its previous skin with astonishing care and precision. The process can take hours, but in this one single moment I was able to capture the beauty of its transformation. A spectacular display of nature at its most beautiful, in the darkness of night.”