The Face of the Earth: A remote mountain lit at night by aerial lighting reveals an astonishing face. Looking more closely reveals a secondary line of faces. Taking this shot was surreal. The wind made audible languagelike sounds. It was as if the mountain's spirit was talking to me. The hairs stood up on my skin and I left the site immediately. It was only after reviewing the images that I saw the face that had been staring at me. #

Through the Eyes of Sapa: Blue eyes are very rare in Asia and heterochromia (two different-colored eyes) is even rarer. In traditional societies it is worse, as girl children are discriminated against to begin with. But Sapa, a tribal girl in Vietnam, has overcome the stares, teasing, and worse. The pride of her family, she is studying to become a doctor and to one day bring medical care to her village. Still, she says thoughtfully, "it is sometimes too hard." To get this close and capture her story, I had to earn her trust. #

Breathtaking Inversion in Senja: On my last night in Senja, Norway, I was gifted with an incredible cloud inversion. After two days of rain and zero visibility, Segla finally revealed itself. I arrived at midnight and waited until 3 a.m. for the sun to rise. With my tripod set up on the edge of a 500-meter-tall cliff face, I ran into position to create a sense of scale as the fog began drifting. After 10 minutes, the fog had completely engulfed the peak. I was lucky to be in the right place at the right time and capture this moment. #

Flabellina Eyes: Underwater-fluorescence photography of a flabellina on a red algae frond. Blue light stimulates fluorescent pigments causing them to glow. Photographed in Sund Rock Conservation Area in Hood Canal, Washington. #

Daredevil at Petra: After a long, uphill trek from the Treasury at Petra, we arrived at the monastery. We sat to rest our feet and appreciate the architecture, when a man appeared at the top of the temple. Before our unbelieving eyes, he leaped across a huge gap and was forever captured on camera. #

The Human Touch: I spent a lot of time in search of wild orangutans in Tanjung Puting National Park in Indonesia. I was fascinated by their long and humanlike hands, and was imagining various ways to portray the details and beauty of them. On one occasion, it was very interesting to see one scoop water from the river in his palms as he quenched his thirst. The image really came together as the golden light from the sun lit his beautiful, water-dripping hands and fur while the rest of his body was in the shadows of the trees. #

The Bell Man: This was during a traditional winter festival in the Maramures region of Romania. The bell man's job was to jump about all the festival day with these big, heavy bells on him. Eight bells were attached to his body. A bell weighs about seven kilograms (15.5 pounds). #

Unreal: The Volkswagen emissions scandal began in 2015, when the Environmental Protection Agency issued a notice of violation of the Clean Air Act to the Volkswagen Group, which had intentionally programmed turbocharged direct-injection diesel engines to activate their emissions controls only during laboratory emissions testing, which caused the vehicles' NOx output to meet U.S. standards during regulatory testing while emitting up to 40 times more NOx in real-world driving. Today thousands of Volkswagen and Audi models from 2009 to 2015 sit in the California desert. #

Lives Intertwined: This is the biggest village in Karamoja, Uganda, with thousands and thousands of households. People are divided by family but connected with all. Normally Karamojong people don't live all together, but this is a unique case. From above, you can see the huts combined with the fences and the numerous trails intersecting. #

Home Sweet Home: On a road trip, we stopped so I could take pictures of an abandoned barn in a beautiful golden-wheat field. There was a rubber boot covering one of the posts, so I asked my husband to remove it so I could get a better view of the barn. As he removed the boot, a pile of what seemed like 100 young mice scattered down the post; only one remained. I moved in slowly, speaking to him in a whisper. He moved in closer to me and so as a photographer, I realized my "decisive moment" and took the shot. #

Assertive Albatross: I had spent quite some time in the water so the albatross that were following the fishing vessels would get used to my presence. Here, I was able to get quite close to a large Antipodean albatross that took quite a keen interest in my underwater camera. #