A bald eagle skims a still lake with its wingtips just touching the surface, so the bird and its reflection form one shape. Photographer Fred Johns waited for the moment when the wings mirrored perfectly.
Can a camera really capture scenes this strange without digital editing? Very often, yes. Light, weather, patience and an unusual viewpoint can produce images that look manipulated but are not. This gallery collects 97 photographs, originally gathered by Bright Side and later shared by The Mind Unleashed, that were presented as taken without Photoshop: boiling water exploding into ice crystals, flamingos standing in the shape of a flamingo, a comet photographed from a spacecraft and a red lake in Tanzania.
For each photo we explain what you are looking at, where it was taken and why it looks the way it does. Some scenes rely on rare natural events, others on clever timing or perspective. We cannot independently confirm that every single file is untouched; most professional photographers adjust colour and contrast, which is normal, and a few images here may have been processed more heavily. The credit line under each picture names the photographer or the page where it first appeared, and we have grouped the photos by theme so you can browse ice, water, landscapes, animals, cities and the night sky.
Ice, snow and frost
Boiling water thrown into freezing air
When boiling water is flung into air colder than about -30 °C, it shatters into tiny droplets that partly evaporate and partly freeze almost instantly, creating a cloud of ice crystals and vapour. The photo was taken at sunset, which turns the cloud gold. The trick is popular in polar regions, but people have been scalded doing it, so throw the water downwind and away from your body.
Frosted trees in a misty forest
Czech photographer Jan Bainar caught trees coated in rime, the feathery ice that grows when supercooled fog droplets freeze on contact with branches. Rime builds up on the side facing the wind, which is why it can look like fur. It forms on cold, still, foggy days.
A husky walking on a frozen lake
Thin, wet ice can be as reflective as calm water, so this husky seems to walk on the surface of a lake. The dog was photographed on a clear, overcast day with no wind, which kept the reflection sharp. It is a reminder that early-winter ice can be dangerously thin even when it looks solid.
A dacha village near Arkhangelsk, Russia
Fedor Savintsev photographed a settlement of brightly painted summer houses, or dachas, under snow near Arkhangelsk in Russia's far north. Many Russian city families keep a dacha for gardening and weekends. In winter most stand empty, and the colours become the only bright spots in the landscape.
Winter arrives overnight in Mari El, Russia
This split-level shot by Eduard Nikolaev shows a snowy forest above the waterline and green water plants below. Half-underwater photos need a wide lens and a special dome housing so both halves stay in focus. Here it captures the moment when the land has frozen but the river has not yet caught up.
© Eduard Nikolaev / National Geographic
Autumn meets winter at the Maroon Bells, Colorado
The Maroon Bells, two peaks near Aspen, are often called among the most photographed mountains in North America. Jeff Howe captured fresh snow on the summits while golden aspens still glowed in the valley, all mirrored in Maroon Lake. The overlap of seasons usually lasts only a few days each year.
Fence shadows in melting snow, Rostov region
This backyard in Miklukhin, Russia, shows stripes of snow surviving only where the shadow of a slatted fence fell. Sunlight melted the exposed snow while the shaded strips stayed frozen. It is a simple and perfect demonstration of how much energy direct sunlight carries.
Unknown author
A flashlight under clear ice
Henry Liu set a torch on transparent lake ice at night, lighting up the cracks and the stones far below. Very clear, black ice forms when water freezes slowly without snow or wind, and lakes such as Siberia's Baikal are famous for it. The long exposure also picked up the stars and the last glow of dusk.
Dog sledding in Greenland
Joe Capra photographed a musher behind a fan-shaped team crossing blue sea ice. In Greenland, sled dogs are still used for hunting and travel, and the fan hitch, with each dog on its own line, suits open ice without trees. Warmer winters and thinner ice have made this traditional way of travel harder.
The ghost of a Jeep
Freezing rain encased the front of a parked car in ice; when the car pulled away, the shell of ice kept the shape of the grille and bumper. Freezing rain falls as liquid and freezes on contact with cold surfaces. Similar "ice cars" have been photographed during several North American ice storms.
A road across the ice, Chukotka
In Chukotka, in Russia's far north-east, many settlements have no permanent roads, so seasonal winter roads are built over frozen rivers and tundra. Elena Chernyshova's aerial view shows two vehicles as tiny dots on an immense white plain. These routes close when the thaw begins.
© Elena Chernyshova / National Geographic
A train across the snowy Kazakh steppe
Seen from a plane window, a train becomes a thin line drawn across white land. Kazakhstan is the world's largest landlocked country, and its railways cross huge, empty steppe. Slava Stepanov captured the scale with a single, simple composition.
Ice sculptures on a Slovenian mountain
Wind-driven freezing fog and rain can coat everything on a summit in thick layers of ice. In early 2014 a severe ice storm hit Slovenia, damaging forests and power lines, and photographers recorded extraordinary ice shapes on mountain tops. Here an observation structure has almost disappeared under the crust.
The freezing Athabasca River, Jasper
Harry Lichtman photographed river stones seen through a thin, patterned layer of new ice on the Athabasca River in Canada's Jasper National Park. The feathery lines are ice crystals growing across the surface. Moving water freezes in stages, which creates these complex patterns.
A boat breaking new ice
Peter Pereira's aerial photo shows a small boat cutting a dark path through a thin sheet of fresh ice in Marion Bay. From above, the wake looks like a crack running across paper. New ice like this is often only millimetres thick.
The snow express
A flock of sheep walks in single file along a narrow track in deep snow. Following the leader saves energy, because each animal steps in prints already made. The scene looks staged, but this is how flocks naturally move in heavy snow.
Water, coasts and colourful lakes
Dykes, wind turbines and roads in the Netherlands
About a quarter of the Netherlands lies below sea level, protected by dykes like the one in this aerial photo. Wind turbines stand in the water beside a dyke, while a road and farmland run alongside. The image shows how the Dutch shape land, water and energy together.
An Italian beach from above
German photographer Bernhard Lang shot rows of beach umbrellas on Italy's Adriatic coast from a helicopter for his series "Aerial Views Adria". Private beach clubs there rent umbrellas in strict grids, colour-coded by club. From above, the beach becomes an abstract pattern.
Firefly squid, Japan
Each spring, firefly squid gather in Toyama Bay on Japan's west coast to spawn, and their blue bioluminescence lights up the shoreline at night. Photographer Takehito Miyatake specialises in capturing this display. The squid produce light with special organs, partly to hide their silhouette from predators below.
Flamingos in the shape of a flamingo
This aerial photo from Mexico's Yucatán Peninsula was a National Geographic photo of the day in 2010. A flock wading in shallow water happened to form the outline of a single flamingo, complete with neck and head. Flamingos move in tight groups, which makes such chance shapes possible.
Lake Natron, Tanzania
Lake Natron is extremely alkaline and salty, and microorganisms living in it can turn the water and salt crusts red or orange. Few animals can survive there, but it is the main breeding ground for lesser flamingos, which nest on its salt islands safe from predators. From the air, the crusts look like cracked paint.
A waterspout on Lake Victoria
Julia Cumes photographed a waterspout, a tornado-like column of spinning air over water, on Lake Victoria in Uganda. Africa's largest lake generates powerful storms because warm water feeds rising air. Most waterspouts are weaker than land tornadoes, but they are still dangerous to boats.
A toothy shoreline
The zigzag edge of the sea in Patrice Carré's photo is caused by beach cusps, regular scalloped shapes that waves carve into sand or shingle. Scientists still debate exactly how the even spacing forms. A couple walking on the beach gives the scale.
Yoga by the sea
A woman in a swimsuit sits cross-legged in a meditation pose as a wave bursts behind her, framing her like a halo. The shot depends on exact timing: a fraction of a second earlier or later and the spray would look like a mess. It was widely shared in 2014.
Christ of the Abyss, Key Largo, Florida
This bronze statue stands underwater in John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park in the Atlantic off Key Largo. It is a copy of the original "Christ of the Abyss" placed off San Fruttuoso, Italy, in 1954, and was installed in Florida in 1965. Corals and algae have colonised it, and divers visit it regularly.
Trees standing in floodwater, Ljubljana
Ales Komovec photographed trees reflected in still floodwater after the Ljubljana marshes flooded, with a few paddlers drifting past. Slovenia's capital sits beside a wetland that floods after heavy autumn rain. The calm surface turned the trees into perfect mirror images.
Kaindy Lake, Kazakhstan
Kaindy Lake in the Tian Shan mountains formed when an earthquake in 1911 triggered a landslide that dammed a gorge. The flooded spruce trees still stand, their bare trunks rising from cold turquoise water. Below the surface, their branches are preserved by the low temperature.
Fifty shades of grey: a school of rays
Eduardo Lopez Negrete photographed a huge school of mobula rays in Mexico's Gulf of California, an entry in a 2014 National Geographic travel photo contest. Mobulas gather in vast numbers at certain times of year and sometimes leap clear of the water. The title is a pun on the bestselling novel.
Lake Retba, Senegal
Lake Retba, or Lac Rose, near Dakar, owes its pink colour to the salt-loving alga Dunaliella salina, which produces red pigment. The water is so salty that people float easily, and local workers harvest salt by hand from boats. The colour is strongest in the dry season.
Giant waves and a crowd of spectators
Crowds gather on a clifftop to watch huge waves break below a lighthouse, a scene typical of Nazaré in Portugal, where an undersea canyon focuses ocean swells into some of the biggest surfable waves on Earth. Big-wave surfers ride them with the help of jet skis. The spray and scale make the people look tiny.
A glacier lake in Banff National Park
This turquoise lake, photographed by Ben Leshchinsky for National Geographic, gets its colour from rock flour: fine particles ground by glaciers that stay suspended in the water and scatter light. A single canoe shows the scale. Lake Louise and Moraine Lake in Banff are the best known examples.
© Ben Leshchinsky / National Geographic
Deserts, mountains and farmland
A shrine covered in ash after the Ontake eruption, Japan
On 27 September 2014, Mount Ontake in central Japan erupted without warning while hundreds of hikers were near the summit. Sixty-three people died or were never found, making it Japan's deadliest eruption in decades. This photo shows rescuers on the ash-covered summit shrine during the search.
A blue universe at Hitachi Seaside Park, Japan
In spring, millions of nemophila flowers, also called baby blue eyes, cover the hills of Hitachi Seaside Park in Ibaraki Prefecture. The photo by Hiroki Kondo appeared in National Geographic. The flowers bloom from late April to mid-May and draw huge crowds.
Hiroki Kondu / National Geographic
Spider webs in Abernethy Forest, Scotland
Wildlife photographer Mark Hamblin photographed heather covered in spider webs in the Cairngorms. On a misty autumn morning, dew makes thousands of normally invisible webs stand out. Most belong to tiny sheet-web spiders.
Lightning inside a volcanic plume, Iceland
Sigurdur Hrafn Stefnisson captured lightning in the ash cloud of Eyjafjallajökull in 2010, the eruption that grounded flights across Europe. Ash particles colliding in the plume build up electric charge, producing volcanic lightning. It is one of the most famous photos of that eruption.
© © Sigurdur Hrafn Stefnisson / www.stefnisson.com
Performers below the Jade Dragon Snow Mountain, Yunnan
Hundreds of performers carrying baskets file along a red-walled open-air stage with snowy peaks behind them. The scene matches Impression Lijiang, an outdoor show near Lijiang in Yunnan created by film director Zhang Yimou's team, with a large cast drawn from local ethnic minority communities. The mountain backdrop is real, not a painted set.
Deadvlei under the Milky Way, Namibia
In Deadvlei, a white clay pan in Namibia's Namib-Naukluft park, dead camel thorn trees have stood for centuries, preserved by the dry air. Beth McCarley photographed them at night under the Milky Way. Orange dunes, among the highest in the world, surround the pan.
Endless forest, Russia
Ivan Letokhin photographed a woman in red standing on a log in a channel through a birch forest. Russia has the largest forest area of any country, about a fifth of the world's total. The bright green surface of the channel is duckweed.
Rapeseed fields in Luoping, China
Every February and March, the karst hills around Luoping in Yunnan rise from fields of yellow rapeseed blossoms. The crop is grown for cooking oil, and the bloom has become a major tourist attraction. The cone-shaped hills are limestone shaped by rain over millions of years.
Sea-like dunes of the Namib Desert
Nick Lefebvre's photo makes a dune look like a breaking wave with acacia trees at its foot. The Namib is considered one of the oldest deserts in the world, and its sand is coloured red by iron oxide. Side light at sunrise or sunset brings out the ridges.
A mountain that looks like a wave, Georgia
Gergeti Trinity Church, a 14th-century church near Stepantsminda in Georgia, stands at about 2,170 metres beneath Mount Kazbek. Alexandra Mednaya's long lens compressed the streaked, snowy mountainside behind it so it looks like a towering wave. Nothing is edited; it is perspective.
A hillside that seems to explode
Corey Arnold photographed the last sunlight hitting the top of a rocky hill while the road below was already in shadow. The bright rock against the dark foreground looks like an explosion or a fire. Such effects last only minutes before sunset.
Rolling fields in South Moravia, Czech Republic
Polish photographer Pawel Kucharski is known for his images of the wavy fields of South Moravia, sometimes called the Moravian Tuscany. Low evening light and long lenses turn crops and furrows into patterns of light and shadow. Look closely to spot two deer near the top.
Crescent Lake pagoda and the dunes of Dunhuang, Gansu
In Gansu Province, near the Silk Road oasis of Dunhuang, a pagoda-style pavilion stands below the Mingsha Shan, or Echoing Sand Dunes. Tourists climb the dunes in a long line. The oasis and its crescent-shaped lake have attracted travellers for centuries.
A tractor among almond trees, California
California grows the large majority of the world's almonds, and in February the orchards of the Central Valley burst into white blossom. Robert Holmes photographed a tractor driving between the rows. Growers bring in huge numbers of rented honeybee hives each year to pollinate the crop.
The gifts of the Earth, Norway
Jørn Allan Pedersen photographed a red farmhouse above a field of yellow rapeseed in Norway; his title echoes Knut Hamsun's novel Growth of the Soil. Norway has little farmland, so fields like this are tucked between forests and fjords. The colours are natural.
Zhangjiajie, China, an inspiration for Avatar
The sandstone pillars of Wulingyuan, in Zhangjiajie, Hunan, rise hundreds of metres from the forest. One pillar was renamed "Avatar Hallelujah Mountain" in 2010 after the film's floating mountains were linked to the area. Wulingyuan has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1992.
An autumn forest, 50 percent downloaded
Dan Tivadar's photo shows a road with green trees on one side and orange ones on the other, like an image still loading. Different species, or the same species on slopes facing different directions, change colour at different times. The humorous title made it a favourite online.
Kallur lighthouse, Kalsoy, Faroe Islands
Kallur lighthouse sits on a grassy ridge above sheer cliffs at the northern tip of Kalsoy island. Grégoire Sieuw's photo appeared as a National Geographic photo of the day. The site became even more famous after it featured in the 2021 James Bond film No Time to Die.
© Grégoire Sieuw / National Geographic
A secluded house between ploughed fields
An aerial photo shows a single brick house with a long, narrow garden surrounded on all sides by ploughed farmland. The garden includes flower beds and a vegetable patch. It looks like the owners refused to sell their plot while the fields around them were merged.
Animals up close
An eagle soaring over a lake, Canada
The same eagle as in the opening photo appears again here, credited to Fred Johns. Bald eagles hunt fish by gliding low and snatching them from the surface with their talons. The mirror image shows how close to the water they fly.
The scarlet eye of a tree frog, Costa Rica
Ingo Arndt's macro shot fills the frame with a frog's red eye and patterned lower eyelid. Many tree frogs have a translucent lower lid that protects the eye while still letting light through. Their striking eyes may also startle predators.
© Ingo Arndt / National Geographic
Butterflies drinking turtle tears
A butterfly perches on a turtle's head, and another flutters nearby. Butterflies need sodium, which is scarce in rainforests far from the sea, and they get it from turtle tears, a habit called lachryphagy. The turtles appear to tolerate it calmly.
A spider's web in a hole in a leaf
Bertrand Kulik photographed a small spider that had spun its web inside a round hole in a leaf, so the leaf frames it like a window. Spiders often use existing gaps to save silk. Backlight makes the threads visible.
A starling murmuration shaped like a tornado
Huge flocks of starlings swirl at dusk before roosting, forming shapes called murmurations. Research suggests each bird tracks only its nearest few neighbours, about seven, yet the whole flock moves as one. Here the flock funnelled down like a tornado over a tree.
An eagle looking straight at the camera
Tim Boyer captured a bald eagle with ruffled head feathers staring directly into his lens. Eagles' eyesight is several times sharper than ours. The plain sky background makes the white head and yellow beak stand out.
A lizard "playing" a leaf guitar
Indonesian photographer Aditya Permana photographed a lizard holding a leaf as if strumming a guitar, and the image went viral as "Rango". Some wildlife photographers have questioned whether such poses are encouraged or staged, so treat it as a lucky or arranged moment rather than lizard music.
A cardinal mid-jump
A Reddit user caught a northern cardinal at the exact moment it hopped off a railing, so it seems to hover in mid-air. Fast shutter speeds freeze movements that are too quick for our eyes. The male's bright red feathers come from pigments in its diet.
Angels in the fog
Polish photographer Robert Radomski photographed great egrets landing in thick fog, their white wings almost dissolving into the background. Fog softens contrast and hides the horizon, making the birds look weightless. The effect is achieved simply by shooting in difficult weather.
A crayfish that seems to hold the world
A crayfish sits on the rim of a metal bucket whose wet, curved bottom reflects the sky like a globe. The illusion relies entirely on reflection and angle. It is a good example of how ordinary objects can surprise the eye.
Ants surrounding a drop of honey, Malaysia
Malaysian macro photographer Husni Che Ngah captured ants arranged in a ring around a drop of honey on a leaf, each one drinking from the edge. Ants share food through a process called trophallaxis, passing liquid mouth to mouth back at the nest. The ring shape forms naturally as each ant finds a spot at the edge.
Red deer at sunrise, Bushy Park, London
Max Ellis photographed stags in the misty sunrise of Bushy Park, a royal park near Hampton Court. Deer have roamed there since Henry VIII's time. A small bird perched on one deer completes the picture.
An owl sheltering under a mushroom
German photographer Tanja Brandt captured a little owl sitting under a mushroom in the rain, and the caption references the umbrella scene in the 1988 Studio Ghibli film My Neighbor Totoro. Brandt often photographs tame or rescued birds, so the scene may have been set up. It remains one of the most shared owl photos online.
Squirrels and a pine cone
Russian photographer Vadim Trunov photographed two red squirrels jumping around a pine cone, which seems to float between them. The title borrows the levitation spell from the Harry Potter books. Trunov is known for patient, playful squirrel photography.
Cities, people and human-made wonders
Two worlds divided: Central Park, New York
This aerial photo shows Central Park's autumn trees running straight into a wall of Manhattan apartment blocks. The 843-acre park was designed by Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux in the 1850s. Few cities place so much green space against such dense buildings.
A loader catching a cloud
The bucket of a wheel loader seems to scoop a small cloud from the sky. The effect depends on perspective and timing, and the title the photographer used on 500px suggests some adjustment, so this one may not be entirely untouched. Either way, it is a playful image.
The centenary of Kim Il-sung's birth, North Korea
Russian photographer Ilya Pitalev photographed rows of soldiers and civilians in formal clothes at events marking 100 years since the birth of Kim Il-sung, North Korea's founder, in April 2012. His birthday, 15 April, is the country's main public holiday. Mass gatherings like this are carefully choreographed by the state.
Westerdok district, Amsterdam
The aerial photography team AirPano shot this view straight down onto a canal lined with houseboats in Amsterdam's Westerdok area. Amsterdam has thousands of houseboats, many of them permanent homes. From above, the boats look like a row of colourful pills.
The Hive, by Wolfgang Buttress
Stefano Landenna photographed a plane through the open top of The Hive, an aluminium lattice sculpture created for the UK Pavilion at Expo Milano 2015 and later moved to Kew Gardens in London. Its lights respond to vibrations recorded in a real beehive. The plane passing through the opening is perfect timing.
Light pillars over Charlotte, Michigan
Vincent Brady photographed vertical beams of light rising above a small town on a frozen night. These light pillars appear when flat ice crystals float in very cold air and reflect street lights upward. They are not lasers or UFOs, though they are sometimes reported as such.
A freight train at Morant's Curve, Alberta
Morant's Curve is a bend in the Canadian Pacific railway along the Bow River in Banff National Park. It is named after Nicholas Morant, a railway photographer who made it famous. Photographers wait there for hours to catch a train against snowy peaks.
Fish as wedding gifts
A smiling bride holds up two decorated fish, a custom associated with Bengali weddings, where fish symbolise prosperity and fertility and are exchanged as gifts. Brian Callaway's photo was a National Geographic photo of the day. The old caption placed it in Mahabalipuram, but the source page describes a Bengali bride, so the exact location is uncertain.
© Brian Callaway / National Geographic
San Francisco floating in fog
Peter Majkut photographed San Francisco's skyline, Sutro Tower and the Bay Bridge rising above a sea of fog. In summer, cool ocean air flows inland under warmer air and condenses into thick advection fog. Locals have even nicknamed the fog "Karl".
Ocean-themed eye make-up
German make-up artist Svenja Jödicke created this eye design with painted scales, gems and a small starfish. Detailed make-up like this can take hours and is photographed in macro. It is wearable art rather than a photographic trick.
The Mir diamond mine, Mirny, Yakutia
Behind the town of Mirny lies the Mir mine, an open pit about 525 metres deep and over 1 kilometre wide, one of the largest excavated holes in the world. It produced diamonds from 1957, with open-pit mining ending in 2001 and underground mining later. The scale of the pit next to the town is real.
A plane taking off, in a long exposure
With the shutter open for many seconds, a plane's navigation lights draw a curving line through the night sky as it climbs from the runway. Long exposures turn movement into light trails. The airport fence in the foreground anchors the composition.
Dancers forming an eye
This image of dozens of dancers lying on crumpled paper to form a giant eye is credited to the French artist JR, known for huge photographic installations. He collaborated with New York City Ballet in 2014. Seen from above, the bodies become lines in a drawing.
The Royal Navy puts on a show
A helicopter fires decoy flares above a Royal Navy warship at sunset, creating a shape like angel wings. Flares are used to divert heat-seeking missiles away from aircraft. The display was photographed during an exercise or demonstration.
Sky lanterns at Yi Peng, Chiang Mai, Thailand
During the Yi Peng festival in northern Thailand, usually in November, thousands of paper lanterns are released into the night sky as a symbol of letting go of misfortune. Sherry Zhao's photo for National Geographic shows two people launching one. Authorities now regulate releases because of fire and air-traffic risks.
Amitabha Buddha Day, Vietnam
Rows of Buddhist monks and lay followers sit in meditation among candles and lotus-shaped lights during a celebration of Amitabha Buddha in Vietnam. Amitabha is one of the most venerated Buddhas in East Asian Pure Land Buddhism. Events like this can involve thousands of participants.
The Eiffel Tower from directly below
Sylke Scholz pointed her camera straight up through the centre of the Eiffel Tower, turning the iron frame into a symmetrical pattern. The tower was completed in 1889 for the Paris World's Fair and is about 330 metres tall today. Its lighting makes the lattice glow at night.
A residential block in Hong Kong
Lingfei Tan photographed a courtyard surrounded by towering apartment blocks, a view that resembles Quarry Bay's famous "Monster Building". Hong Kong is one of the most densely populated places on Earth. Looking up, the sky becomes a narrow slot.
Times Square from below
Andrew Thomas used a very wide lens pointing upward to bend Times Square's skyscrapers and screens into a circle around the sky, with a plane passing overhead. Wide-angle distortion, not editing, creates the curved effect.
Wingsuit jumpers in Norway
Two BASE jumpers in wingsuits leap from a platform above a fjord. Norway's cliffs attract jumpers from around the world. The sport is extremely dangerous, and fatal accidents occur every year.
A fighter jet in a vapour cone
An F/A-18 is surrounded by a white cone of condensed water vapour as it flies close to the speed of sound. The cone forms when air pressure drops sharply around the aircraft in humid air. Despite the popular caption, a vapour cone does not prove the jet is breaking the sound barrier at that instant.
Sky, space and light
A galactic tennis ball
Abhijeet Kumar photographed a spinning, wet tennis ball flinging droplets outward in a spiral, which looks like a galaxy against a dark background. A fast flash froze the water. It is a simple tabletop experiment with a cosmic look.
A supermoon behind a radio telescope
A huge orange full moon appears to rest in the dish of a radio telescope. Photographers achieve this by standing far away and using a long lens, which makes the moon look large compared with nearby objects. A "supermoon" is a full moon near its closest point to Earth, when it looks slightly bigger and brighter than usual.
Now I can finally get a tan
A tiny rainbow umbrella sits alone on a white snowy slope. The joke title plays on beach umbrellas, and the minimal composition, almost all white, makes the colour pop. The photo is credited to Gray Malin, known for aerial beach photography.
Rosetta's selfie with a comet
On 7 September 2014 the CIVA camera on the Philae lander, still attached to the Rosetta spacecraft, photographed one of Rosetta's solar panels with comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko in the background. The European Space Agency's spacecraft was then hundreds of millions of kilometres from Earth. Philae landed on the comet that November.
© ESA / Rosetta / Philae / CIVA
Sleeping clouds and the moon
Dmitry Iskhakov photographed a soft bank of cloud glowing at sunset below a rising moon, an entry in a 2014 photo contest for unedited images. The gradient from deep blue to warm orange is natural twilight. It feels like a painting because of its simplicity.
The One: a dandelion and the sun
Michael Shmelev lined up a dandelion seed head with the setting sun, so the sun looks like a glowing halo behind it. Using a long lens and getting low makes the sun appear large. A few seconds of alignment are enough.
Cherries under water
Dutch photographer Laurens Kaldeway shot cherries in sparkling water, where tiny bubbles cling to the skin and catch the light. A dark background and careful lighting make each bubble shine. The bubbles are carbon dioxide coming out of solution.
The moon rising over Madrid
Yil Dori photographed the full moon rising between the skyscrapers of Madrid's Cuatro Torres business district. Shooting from several kilometres away with a long lens makes the moon look huge next to the towers. Photographers plan these shots with apps that predict where the moon will rise.
Fickle moods: a rainbow and lightning
A double rainbow and a lightning bolt appear together over a wet car park. A rainbow needs sun behind you and rain in front, so a storm moving away while the sun breaks through can produce both at once. The second, fainter rainbow has its colours reversed.
An outsider in a red hat
Vyacheslav Mishchenko photographed a fly agaric mushroom glowing in a shaft of light in a dark forest. Fly agaric, with its red cap and white spots, is the classic fairy-tale toadstool, but it is poisonous. Low, back light makes the cap shine like a lamp.
A dragon in the shadow of a leaf
A curled, dry leaf on the pavement casts a shadow that looks like a dragon with a long neck. Seeing shapes in random patterns is called pareidolia. The low sun stretched the shadow into its dramatic form.
Sunrise over Bagan, Myanmar
Andy Ferrington photographed a hot-air balloon drifting above the temples of Bagan at sunrise, for National Geographic. Bagan was the capital of a powerful kingdom between the 11th and 13th centuries, and more than 2,000 temples and pagodas still stand on its plain. It was added to UNESCO's World Heritage list in 2019.
© Andy Ferrington / National Geographic
What "without Photoshop" really means
Many of these images look edited because they show things we rarely see: light pillars, volcanic lightning, rime ice, beach cusps or a frozen moment of a bird in flight. They are possible thanks to timing, location, patience and equipment such as long lenses, fast shutters, underwater housings and drones. Perspective explains several "impossible" scenes, from the moon in a telescope dish to the mountain wave behind Gergeti church.
It is also worth knowing what "no Photoshop" normally means for professional photographers. Adjusting exposure, colour and contrast is part of developing any digital file, just as darkroom printing was in the film era. What contests usually forbid is adding or removing objects or combining several photos into one. If you want to judge a viral photo yourself, look for the original photographer, check the location and date, and search for other pictures of the same place. The more you learn about how scenes like these happen, the more you start noticing them around you.
Sources: Bright Side: original selection; The Mind Unleashed; ESA Rosetta mission; National Geographic: Kallur lighthouse; National Geographic: Bengali bride.
Picture number 19, Namib Desert. The tree is in broad daylight and stars are still visible. No photoshop?
ReplyDeletemoon that size always indication of photoshop composing :)
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