2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year Winners
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National Geographic has revealed the winners of their annual Nature Photographer of the Year contest, and as usual, every photo from the Grand Prize winner all the way to the Honorable Mentions and People’s Choice awards are fantastic.
The Grand Prize this year—and title of Nature Photographer of the Year—went to Jayaprakash Joghee Bojan of Singapore, who captured an intense wildlife portrait of an orangutan crossing a river in Indonesia’s Tanjung Puting National Park. The photo, titled “Face to Face in a River in Borneo,” was selected from over 11,000 entries and earns Bojan $ 10,000 in prize money, in addition to his image showing up in an upcoming issue of National Geographic.
Speaking of the moment he captured the shot, Bojan told Nat Geo:
Honestly, sometimes you just go blind when things like this happen. You’re so caught up. You really don’t know what’s happening. You don’t feel the pain, you don’t feel the mosquito bites, you don’t feel the cold, because your mind is completely lost in what’s happening in front of you.
You can see Bojan’s grand prize winning image, as well as every 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and People’s Choice winner in the slideshow above, or by visiting the National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year website.
Press Release
National Geographic Announces Winners of the 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year Contest
WASHINGTON (Dec. 12, 2017) – Selected from over 11,000 entries, a wildlife photo of an orangutan crossing a river in Indonesia’s Tanjung Puting National Park has been selected as the grand-prize winner of the 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year contest. The photo, titled “Face to face in a river in Borneo,” was captured by Jayaprakash Joghee Bojan of Singapore. He has won $ 10,000 and will have his winning image published in an upcoming issue of National Geographic magazine and featured on the @NatGeo Instagram account.
Bojan took the winning photo after waiting patiently in the Sekoyner River in Tanjung Puting National Park in Borneo, Indonesia. After spending several days on a houseboat photographing orangutans in the park, Bojan learned of a location where a male orangutan had crossed the river – unusual behavior that he knew he had to capture. After waiting a day and night near the suspected location, a ranger spotted the orangutan the next morning at a spot a few minutes up the river. As they drew near, Bojan decided to get into the water so the boat did not scare the primate. About five feet deep in a river supposedly home to freshwater crocodiles, Bojan captured the photo when the orangutan peeked out from behind a tree to see if the photographer was still there.
On capturing the photo, Bojan said, “Honestly, sometimes you just go blind when things like this happen. You’re so caught up. You really don’t know what’s happening. You don’t feel the pain, you don’t feel the mosquito bites, you don’t feel the cold, because your mind is completely lost in what’s happening in front of you.”
Karim Iliya of Haiku, Hawaii, won first place in the Landscapes category for a photo from Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park; Jim Obester of Vancouver, Wash., won first place in the Underwater category for a photo of an anemone; and Todd Kennedy of New South Wales, Australia, won first place in the Aerials category for a photo of a rock pool in Sydney at high tide.
The judges for the contest were National Geographic magazine’s senior photo editor of natural history assignments, Kathy Moran, National Geographic photographer Anand Varma, and photographer Michaela Skovranova.
Contestants submitted photographs in four categories – Wildlife, Landscape, Aerials and Underwater – through National Geographic’s photography community, Your Shot. All of the winning photos, along with the honorable mentions, may be viewed at natgeo.com/photocontest.
2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year Winners
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1st Place | Wildlife and Grand Prize Winner
Photo © Jayprakash Joghee Bojan, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year.
Photograph by Jayaprakash Joghee Bojan, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year
A male orangutan peers from behind a tree while crossing a river in Borneo, Indonesia.
2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year Winners
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1st Place | Underwater
Photo © Jim Obester, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year.
Photograph by Jim Obester, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year
Blue-filtered strobe lights stimulate fluorescent pigments in the clear tentacles of a tube-dwelling anemone in Hood Canal, Washington.
2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year Winners
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1st Place | Landscapes
Photo © Karim Iliya, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year.
Photograph by Karim Iliya, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year
Shortly before twilight in Kalapana, Hawai’i, a fragment of the cooled lava tube broke away, leaving the molten rock to fan in a fiery spray for less than half an hour before returning to a steady flow.
2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year Winners
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1st Place | Aerials
Photo © Todd Kennedy, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year.
Photograph by Todd Kennedy, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year
In Sydney, Australia, the Pacific Ocean at high tide breaks over a natural rock pool enlarged in the 1930s. Avoiding the crowds at the city’s many beaches, a local swims laps.
2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year Winners
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2nd Place | Wildlife
Photo © Alejandro Prieto, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year.
Photograph by Alejandro Prieto, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year
An adult Caribbean pink flamingo feeds a chick in Yucatán, Mexico. Both parents alternate feeding chicks, at first with a liquid baby food called crop milk, and then with regurgitated food.
2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year Winners
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2nd Place | Underwater
Photo © Shane Gross, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year.
Photograph by Shane Gross, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year
Typically a shy species, a Caribbean reef shark investigates a remote-triggered camera in Cuba’s Gardens of the Queen marine protected area.
2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year Winners
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2nd Place | Landscapes
Photo © Yuhan Liao, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year.
Photograph by Yuhan Liao, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year
Sunlight glances off mineral strata of different colors in Dushanzi Grand Canyon, China.
2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year Winners
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2nd Place | Aerials
Photo © Takahiro Bessho, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year.
Photograph by Takahiro Bessho, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year
Snow-covered metasequoia trees, also called dawn redwoods, interlace over a road in Takashima, Japan.
2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year Winners
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3rd Place | Wildlife
Photo © Bence Mate, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year.
Photograph by Bence Mate, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year
Two grey herons spar as a white-tailed eagle looks on in Hungary.
2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year Winners
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3rd Place | Underwater
Photo © Michael Patrick O’Neill, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year.
Photograph by Michael Patrick O’Neill, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year
Buoyed by the Gulf Stream, a flying fish arcs through the night-dark water five miles off Palm Beach, Florida.
2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year Winners
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3rd Place | Landscapes
Photo © Mike Olbinski, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year.
Photograph by Mike Olbinski Photography, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year
A summer thunderstorm unleashes lightning on the South Rim of the Grand Canyon.
2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year Winners
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3rd Place | Aerials
Photo © Greg C., 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year.
Photograph by Greg C., 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year
On the flanks of Kilauea Volcano, Hawai’i, the world’s only lava ocean entry spills molten rock into the Pacific Ocean. After erupting in early 2016, the lava flow took about two months to reach the sea, six miles away.
2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year Winners
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People’s Choice | Wildlife
Photo © Harry Collins, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year.
Photograph by Harry Collins, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year
A great gray owl swoops to kill in a New Hampshire field.
2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year Winners
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People’s Choice | Underwater
Photo © Matthew Smith, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year.
Photograph by Matthew Smith, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year
A Portuguese man-of-war nears the beach on a summer morning; thousands of these jellyfish wash up on Australia’s eastern coast every year.
2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year Winners
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People’s Choice | Landscapes
Photo © Wojciech Kruczynski, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year.
Photograph by Wojciech Kruczy?ski, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year
Sunset illuminates a lighthouse and rainbow in the Faroe Islands.
2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year Winners
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People’s Choice | Aerials
Photo © David Swindler, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year.
Photograph by David Swindler, 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year
Green vegetation blooms at the river’s edge, or riparian, zone of a meandering canyon in Utah.
Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)
