Photographers were invited to enter their submissions into four categories: Travel Portraits, Outdoor Scenes, Sense of Place, and Spontaneous Moments. The breath-taking winning photography called ''Whale Whisperers'' was taken by Anuar Patjane Floriuk and almost magically depicts divers around a humpback whale and her newborn calf while on a cruise around Roca Partida in Mexico.

The modest photograper stated that "the photo wasn't planned." Floriuk then added: "I was taking photos near the head of the whale, and all of a sudden she began to swim toward the rest of the diving team. The divers gave the whale and her calf space, and I just clicked at the moment when the flow and composition seemed right."

As a well-deserving winner, Floriuk will be awarded with an eight-day National Geographic Photo Expedition to Costa Rica and the Panama Canal for two.

Next to the grand prize, the second and third place, the judges selected seven other photographs as merit winners - all uniquely remarkable and worthy of your attention.