Smithsonian’s Photo Contest

GRAND PRIZE WINNER: Photograph by Sergio Carbajo Rodriguez (La Garriga, Spain). Portrait of a young Suri boy going with his father to take care of the cattle.

GRAND PRIZE WINNER: Photograph by Sergio Carbajo Rodriguez (La Garriga, Spain). Portrait of a young Suri boy going with his father to take care of the cattle.

A smattering of beautiful and surreal images from the 11th annual Smithsonian Photo Contest. This year’s contest drew more than 50,000 images from more than 130 countries. Pretty amazing world we live on. Click to see them big.

NATURAL WORLD CATEGORY WINNER: Photograph by Graham McGeorge (Jacksonville, Florida). McGeorge spent a quiet 6 hours trying to get the perfect image of this eastern screech owl out of its nest.

NATURAL WORLD CATEGORY WINNER: Photograph by Graham McGeorge (Jacksonville, Florida). McGeorge spent a quiet 6 hours trying to get the perfect image of this eastern screech owl out of its nest.

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AMERICANA CATEGORY WINNER: Photograph by Willie Huang (Sunnyvale, California). A beautiful sunrise forms over an amazing set of ancient petroglyphs facing the heavens with the Eastern Sierras in the backdrop.

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Photograph by Matthew Zheng (San Francisco, California). FINALIST: Travel | “Navajo Bridge” is an image overlooking the Colorado River’s Marble Canyon. (Page, Arizona, August 2012

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Photograph by Vo Anh Kiet (Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam). FINALIST: Travel | Terraced fields during harvest season.

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Photograph by Vincent Cheng (Burnaby, Canada). FINALIST: People | A group of locals playing billiards by Namtso Lake.

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Photograph by Mark Kaplan (Carrollton, Texas). FINALIST: Americana | Dust swirls around citizens of Black Rock City as they peek into the “Black Rock Bijou Theatre,” an art installation at the 2013 Burning Man festival.