The Great Outdoors

Paolo's shot is unlike anything else we saw this contest so instantly stood out as a contender for our top 10. We love his creative vision to capture a series of pictures of the sun and moon at regular intervals and then merge them together to add extra interest to his landscape and create a completely unique focal point - great work!

Peter's taken a beautiful landscape here with a clear focal point provided by the church which helps to anchor the foreground, fantastic snow-capped mountains and an incredible vibrant sky. It has all the elements of a great landscape and shows off the great outdoors at its best making it the winner of our competition this month. Congratulations!

There's a lot to love about Marco's fantastic travel shot - from the beautiful golden sunrise colours to the atmospheric mist receding into the distance with the temples standing out and guiding the eye through the frame. We look forward to seeing more from Marco in the future, great job!

Nguyen's landscape is photogenic on its own with brilliantly ripple textured sand dunes and a beautiful palette of tones in the sky. However, his creative choice to include a model posing in the really helps anchor the image and provide a focal point for the eye to lock onto - great work!

There's loads to like about Andy's wonderful bird portrait - it's nicely focused and he's been able to get close enough for a frame-filling shot. One slight issue is the lighting looks a little flat and this has also meant there's no catchlight in the wren's eye. Had the lighting been better Andy's picture would have easily been in contention for our top 10 - keep shooting and we look forward to seeing more from you in the future!

This is a brilliant capture of an elephant which is nicely exposed, full of colour and in sharp focus too. The low and wide angle works well, though we'd have liked to see the camera placed a little lower or tilting down a touch more as there's quite a lot of 'dead space' above the elephant and the frame would be better filled with more of the grass in the bottom third. Keep up the good work and we look forward to seeing more from you in the future!

This is an awesome capture with fantastic golden hour lighting and the composition works really well with the leopard's face falling about a third of the way in from the top and right sides so follows the classic rule-of-thirds. Unfortunately the eyes look a little soft so it'd be worth using a faster shutter speed in future and also checking the focus has locked on to the closest eye - this would really take your animal portraits to the next level. Best of luck!

This is a brilliant scene with some fantastic detail and colours. The sun is clearly overexposed so detail has been lost here. It'd be worth looking into HDR photography or investing in a graduated Neutral Density filter to help retain detail in your skies for future shots as this would really help take your landscapes to the next level and balance out your exposures. Best of luck!

Mohamad's incredible shot shows off the full force of mother nature - moody storm clouds loom over his Iranian landscape and he's used a long exposure of 25 seconds to have a chance at capturing lighting. The result is outstanding with these lightning forks cutting through the frame and make a striking focal point. Great job!

Erika has shot and edited together a seamless 180 degree panorama of this Icelandic landscape. There's a brilliant contrast between the cooler blue tones in the icy foreground and the last remains of the fiery sunset in the sky too which draws the viewer's eye through the frame. Great work!

The eye contact with the puffin in Ravi's shot couldn't get much better as he's caught this one coming directly towards him with wings outstretched and a beak full of sand eels. There's a good dose of colour in the image too with a vibrant blue sky in the background and hints of orange on the puffin that do a fantastic job of drawing the eye in, to top it all off it's pin sharp and expertly focused on its face. Great work!