National Geographic have just revealed the winners and top entries from the 2015 Photo Contest, and as always, they’ve delivered a breathtaking array of images from around the globe.

The Grand Prize Winner, James Smart hails from our own backyard – with the Melbourne man captivating the judges with his photograph of a tornado in Colorado. Smart spent 15 days chasing storms with his brother and meteorologist pals, with the golden image was captured on the last day.

“The tornado was slowly getting bigger as it picked up the dust and soil from the ground on the farmland. It wasn’t moving very fast, so we kept getting closer as it tracked next to the home as you can see in the image. Driving down a Colorado dirt road, we were lucky enough to be on the west of the tornado, so it was front-lit. This really helped to get great detail out of the image and the perfect light for the sky and foreground,” he said.

See some of the winning images, honourable mentions and their stories below, while you can see all of National Geographics’ favourites right here.

GRAND PRIZE WINNER & FIRST PLACE WINNER IN THE ‘NATURE’ CATEGORY: ‘Dirt’ by James Smart

“A rare and jaw-dropping anti-cyclonic tornado touches down in open farmland, narrowly missing a home near Simla, Colorado.”

FIRST PLACE WINNER IN THE ‘PEOPLE’ CATEGORY: ‘At the Playground’ by Joel Nsadha

“Bwengye lives in a slum called Kamwokya in Kampala, Uganda’s capital city. He cherishes his bicycle more than anything and brings it to this playground in the slum every evening, where he watches kids playing soccer.”

FIRST PLACE WINNER IN THE ‘PLACES’ CATEGORY: ‘Asteroid’ by Francisco Mingorance

“While preparing a report on Spain’s Rio Tinto from the air, I decided to include the phosphogypsum ponds located in the marshes of red, whose radioactive discharges has destroyed part of the marsh. As an environmental photojournalist I had to report this story, but had to do it with an image that by itself attracts the viewer’s attention. On a low-flying training flight, this image caught my attention for its resemblance to the impact of an asteroid on its green waters.”

‘Orangutan in the Rain’ by Andrew Suryono

“I was taking photos of orangutans in Bali, Indonesia, when it started to rain. Just before I put my camera away, I saw this orangutan take a taro leaf and put it on top on his head to protect himself from the rain! I immediately used my DSLR and telephoto lens to preserve this spontaneous magic moment.”

‘Hill of Crosses’ by Hideki Mizuta

“There are many hundreds of thousands of crosses on the Hill of Crosses near Šiauliai, Lithuania. It represents Lithuanian Catholicism’s peaceful resistance to oppression. Many spirits of the dead are thought to live here on this small hill. When I visited this place, a girl in a pink dress ran through as if she brought peace, hope, and love.”

‘Acrobats of the Air’ by Alessandra Meniconzi

“A flock of Alpine choughs (Pyrrhocorax graculus), a species of mountain-dwelling bird, performs acrobatic displays in the air. During a windy day, I was able to immortalize their impressive flight skills.”

‘Changing Shifts’ by Mohammed Yousef

“In Maasai Mara National Reserve in Kenya, the cubs of the famous cheetah Malaika learned to hunt. They moved from one hill to another, scanning the lands. Here, they seemed to change shifts as one cheetah left the hill while another took her place.”

‘Surrealist Painting in Nature’ by Tugo Cheng

“As the largest system of mountain ranges in Central Asia, Tian Shan—which translates to “sky-mountain” in Chinese—has one of the best collections of natural landscapes in the world and is considered a paradise for outdoor adventures. Thanks to the richness of the land’s sediments, compounded by the power of erosion caused by rivers flowing down the mountains, the north face of Tian Shan is carved into stunning plateaus and colorful canyons hundreds of meters deep, resulting in this surrealist painting in nature.”

‘Overlooking Iraq from Iran’ by Yanan Li

“In October 2014 in Khuzestan, Iran, I came across a group of female Iranian students on the border between Iran and Iraq. Some of them climbed up the tanks left after the war between the two countries and took pictures of themselves. I pressed the shutter when I saw this girl stretch out her arms and turn to face the Iraqi border.”

‘Colorful Chaos’ by Bence Mate

“White-fronted bee-eaters gather on a bough before going to sleep in their burrows, scraped into a sand wall. I was working on this theme for 18 days, as there were only five to ten minutes each day when the light conditions were appropriate. Ninety percent of my efforts to capture this image were not successful. I used flashlights to light the bee-eaters sitting on the branch, but not the others flying above. At this angle, the backlight generated rainbow coloring through the wings of the flying birds.”