Pictures: The world's best animal photographs 

This site is optimised for modern web browsers, and does not fully support your version of Internet Explorer

Winners of the 2017 Sony World Photography Awards have been announced! Check out some of the stunning photos from the finalists.

Jonatan Banista, 2017 Sony World Photography Award

Over 200,000 photos were submitted to the world\'s largest photo competition, and here are some incredible wildlife pics from the National Awards category. These photos came 1st, 2nd or 3rd place in their countries. In Panama, Jonatan Banista picked up 1st place for his photo of an iguana. Jonatan took several shots of the reptile before he managed to snap this one!

Petar Sabol, 2017 Sony World Photography Awards

This colourful photo was taken by Petar Sabol at his local pond near Palovec in Croatia. He also got 1st place for his country! Petar said he used burst mode on his camera to capture the swirl of the water as well as the bird catching the fish in its mouth.

John Tao/2017 Sony World Photography Awards

John Tao, from Taiwan, took home 3rd place for his beautiful photo. He described how the mother whale was teaching her child how to jump out of the water quite near to where he was taking photos!

Nadia Aly/2017 Sony World Photography Awards

In America, Nadia Aly got 3rd place after taking this photo of Gentoo penguins hunting in the cold waters of Antarctica. She thought it was interesting to see how they move together - in this photo a group of them jump out of the water at the same time.

Can you spot the lion? When they were in Lake Nakuru national park, Deveni Nishantha Manjula and friends noticed this lioness in a tree. Their beady eyes and this great photo won 1st place for Sri Lanka.

Lions aren\'t the only animals comfortable in trees... Bjorn Persson from Sweden got 3rd place for his photo of a leopard resting on a branch.

This incredible photo of a giraffe and zebras running was captured by Mohammad Alnaser. He received 3rd place for photos submitted by people in Saudi Arabia.

Husain Hakin, 2017 Sony World Photography Awards

And this little fella got 2nd place. Husain Hakin Alfraid from Saudi Arabia took the photo.

Danny Ocampo, 2017 Sony World Photography Awards

In the Philippines, Danny Ocampo captured this school of bigeye trevally and got 3rd place.

And in Spain, Carlos M. Almagro got 3rd place for his photo of birds. He said he approached the birds slowly with his camera, waiting to take a photo when some of them took off. He took different photos before sending in this one.

Pictures: Creatures named after Sir David Attenborough