In a time of viral sensations, the influence of photojournalism can go beyond newsworthiness, as images are propelled into an online world where stories are shaped in an instant. Think of the first image you saw of Thailand’s famous pygmy hippo Moo Deng, which spread across social media in September so rapidly you almost couldn’t keep up; it created a global star and drove new levels of tourism to the Khao Kheow Open Zoo. Or think of the image from the day of President Donald Trump’s attempted assassination in July, the one with his fist raised in the air in defiance. In the weeks following, it adorned t-shirts and posters, becoming a symbolic image to many who support him.
When TIME’s photo department got together to create our annual list of the year’s top 10 photos, we first had to tackle the definition of an influential photo. Because those images gained so much notoriety over the course of the year, did that mean we were obligated to place them on this list? (We did not.) Should an image receive recognition for the sheer fact that it was shared across the world and started a conversation? Or should it be chosen solely for the fact that it was beautifully framed and composed? Is viralness synonymous with impact?
The truth is that all these definitions can be true. In order to fully capture the essence of 2024, and to honor the power of photography, we needed to consider multiple categories and forms of importance. The ten photos below are the result of many conversations in which we weighed the images from this year that made us feel the most—and question the most. These are the images we always came back to.
Warning: Some of the following images are graphic in nature and might be disturbing to some viewers.
‘Two Powerful Forces of Nature’
After eight centuries of silence, a volcano in southwestern Iceland began erupting again in December 2023. Following its third recent eruption, in February of this year, photographer Marco Di Marco captured this image of lava after it crossed the main road to Grindavik, heading toward the area of the popular Blue Lagoon spa.
Di Marco was keeping a safe distance in the Blue Lagoon parking lot when he took this photo by drone. Knowing that he might have to move to an even safer spot soon, he still attempted to create the most effective image. “I wanted to get a closer view of the lava-flow front, trying to frame all the elements that can describe the situation: the molten lava, the road, the burning asphalt, and the snow-covered terrain,” he says.
The image, while beautiful to look at, still conveys a sense of urgency, as you witness the lava enveloping the road, contrasting with the cold snow underneath it. “I think it resonates because the photo shows an unusual combination of natural elements that most viewers don’t get to see on a daily basis,” explains di Marco. “Both lava and snow frame the road, the only witness of human presence between these two powerful forces of nature.”
‘Destruction, Pain and Solidarity’
On the morning of Jan. 23, Russian troops launched a strike on residential areas of Kharkiv, Ukraine. Photographer Sofiia Gatilova was there when the first explosion hit. “Here we hear explosions before the alarm, because Russian missiles take about 30 seconds to reach the city,” she says. “So I started to gather myself with the first explosion.” It was a scene Gatilova has seen many times before. “Firefighters putting out fires and raking through rubble to get to people, the wounded looking for medics, who are in short supply, volunteers providing medical care and setting up a first aid station, residents of the building looking at their destroyed home, relatives are looking for each other.”
When asked about what goes through her mind while photographing an image like this, Gatilova says, “I haven’t felt anything for a long time while working. I understand with my brain that what is happening is terrible, but you can’t let your feelings get the better of you, because in that case it will be impossible to work.”
“For me, any photograph that is published is a visualization of the general context of the event and it is very important to put certain meanings in the viewer’s head,” she explains. “The foreground is almost never enough. Medics provide assistance, this is logical, but the context is extremely important. That is why I chose this shooting point: all the consequences of the shelling are visible, from the destroyed house to the destroyed life. This is a reflection of the Ukrainian present—destruction, pain and solidarity.”
‘Keep Documenting the History’
Days before this image was made, Middle East-based AP photographer Leo Correa began hearing rumors signaling the start of an Israeli offensive in Lebanon. Then, on Sept. 30, Israel began to fire a large sequence of shelling that hit the country’s border with Lebanon.
Correa went to the Golan Heights “to have at least a glimpse of what was happening,” he says. “Maybe it would be possible to see the Israel shelling at the Lebanese villages located near the border.” Even from far away, he could see the flashes from explosions and the sounds of artillery.
Equipping himself with a longer zoom lens, he created this image using a 30-second exposure. The result shows a burning fire to the right and the trails of light from shelling directed at southern Lebanon. “It was one of these kinds of moments [when it] doesn’t matter the distance—we still need to find ways to keep documenting the history,” says Correa.
‘Some Questions Will Sometimes Remain Unanswered’
In March of this year, around the the holiday of Ramadan, Reuters photographer Amr Alfiky got access to the Emirates Humanitarian City in Abu Dhabi. The city, which takes in people who have evacuated crisis and conflict zones, houses many who were displaced from Gaza in the midst of the Israel-Hamas War. “We saw some familiar faces of Palestinian patients who were receiving treatment in the UAE [before moving to the Humanitarian city],” says Alfiky. “They recognized us and welcomed us into their little new world.”
“This photo was one of the first frames I captured that day,” he says. “While I was still familiarizing myself with the place and the people around me, I saw Tuqa and two other children coming towards me.” He stood in place and allowed the children to play as he waited for this image to form. “I was astonished by the juxtaposition in that scene: what Tuqa lost, what she could have been doing hadn’t she lost her legs to the Israel-Hamas War, and how it shaped her relationship with the children around her on roller-skates and bicycles,” he recalls. After he took the image Tuqa approached him, smiling. “One of the things I learned from that assignment and will always stay with me is that some of our most powerful work as photojournalists could sometimes be the simplest.”
After some time had passed, Alfiky and a fellow Reuters colleague contacted the Emirates Humanitarian City for a follow-up story. In that conversation they came to learn that some of the Palestinian children they had photographed in their previous visit had passed away. “Now that this photo is resurfacing, I ask myself how many more children I met that day that could possibly be dead as I write this,” he says. “I usually walk into the environments I work in with curiosity and questions that I could try to find answers for visually. But some questions will sometimes remain unanswered.”
‘Learned to be Tenacious’
In March, photographer John Moore was on assignment with Getty Images along the entire length of the US-Mexico border, from the Pacific to the Gulf of Mexico. “Having received a tip from a humanitarian aid worker, one night I drove to a remote spot where a group of migrants had just crossed the border into southern California,” explains Moore. “A group of Chinese migrants wearing donated ponchos huddled in the cold rain while waiting several hours for the U.S. Border Patrol agents to arrive and begin processing them for asylum. Although exhausted, people seemed generally relieved after finally arriving from such a long journey.”
With the only light coming from dimly lit campfires, Moore had to rely on high ISO settings and slow shutter speeds to be able to capture any sort of image. This resulted in the soft movement happening of the ponchos, and the glow forming the silhouettes of the mountains beyond. Looking back on what he had captured, he says: “On the back of the camera I scrolled through the take and this frame stood out. The forms within this photograph, including the painterly light and the body language between mother and child, made for a timeless image.”
Moore credits the ability to capture an image like this partly on newer technology but also, “I’ve learned to be tenacious,” he says. “Having worked in this profession more than three decades, half of it covering immigration along the border, I’ve had times where I’ve given up on a picture too early and then been disappointed later during the edit. We hope the public will remember our most powerful images but, as photojournalists, which ones will we remember most? The ones we miss. But not this time.”
‘Keep Going, Keep Making Pictures’
On July 13, photographer Anna Moneymaker was assigned to cover a campaign rally for Donald Trump in Butler, Pa. In an attempt to capture some new angles, she began to move around the podium where Trump stood. “My idea for a picture wasn’t really working and the Secret Service agents wanted me to move back to the front of the stage, so I started to crawl back—and that’s when what sounded like fireworks went off,” says Moneymaker. A would-be assassin had fired multiple shots toward the stage from an elevated position; one grazed Trump’s ear. “For a split second I thought it was just new theatrics for the rally, but then the mood of the crowd shifted to horror and all the agents rushed the stage to cover [Trump],” says Moneymaker. “I then crawled further towards the side stage and that’s when I saw his face through the agents’ legs.”
Moneymaker recalls at first going numb, but after the initial shock, telling herself keep going, keep making pictures. “I made that frame of Trump surrounded by agents because I wanted to see if he was alive or not. I wanted to make an image to prove what had happened,” she says. After being disappointed with her photographic coverage at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, Moneymaker credits personal growth and hazard training provided by her editors at Getty Images for her ability to act fast and make images at the rally in Butler.
Many powerful images were made that day, but Moneymaker was able to capture the essence of the moment. Her work allows us to see a full picture of what unfolded the moments after Trump was struck and “proves the importance of having plenty of photojournalists present for campaign events, to make sure everything is documented,” says Moneymaker. “I can be pretty hard on myself and compare myself to other folks in the industry,” she says, “but making this image reminded me that letting all that go can lighten the mental load and make you better at your job: [photographing] what matters.”
‘Walking on the Clouds’
When photographer Jerome Brouillet snapped this image of Brazilian surfer Gabriel Medina, he didn’t fully grasp how viral it was about to become. “At first, I thought it would make a great photo for news articles because it wasn’t a typical surfing shot,” explains Brouillet. “Gabriel’s gesture, the alignment of his board connected by the leash, really caught my attention. At that moment, I didn’t even realize looking at my small camera screen that he was literally ‘walking’ on the clouds.”
Still, it took Brouillet a few more days to fully understand why the image was getting so much attention on social media. “First, it looks almost unreal, which draws the attention of anyone who sees it,” he says. “The composition is also key. Gabriel in celebration, seemingly walking on a cloud, perfectly aligned with his surfboard. But for me, the real success of this photo is that it’s not a shot of someone surfing. It speaks to everyone. It’s like the iconic image of Muhammad Ali after he knocked out Sonny Liston. You don’t need to be a boxing fan to ‘get’ that picture.”
He remains surprised and grateful for the response the image got. “I received so much love and tons of kind messages and emails from all over the world, and a lot from Brazil,” he says. “But more than that, some people I didn’t even know tagged me in social media posts when I wasn’t credited, insisting that the photographer should be acknowledged.”
‘Fleeing Fast-Approaching Flames’
For many years, photographer Noah Berger has been documenting wildfires raging through California—experience that gives him the knowledge he needs to make images while navigating rapidly spreading fires. On July 25, he was shooting the Park Fire, which went on to become California’s second largest single-ignition wildfire in state history, burning just over 429,000 acres.
“I photographed this fox, fleeing fast-approaching flames, as the Park Fire raced into a mountain-top community near Chico, Calif.,” Berger tells TIME in an email. “Fueled by wind and dry vegetation, the fire’s dark column of smoke began rotating as it climbed a hillside—this is always a scary situation since it can cause erratic fire growth.”
Though he was there to document evacuating human residents, the sprinting fox caught his eye. In a split second he made this image, with the fox moving so quickly that most of his attempts were out of focus. “Many readers thought the fox was running through flames, but the grass is actually tinted orange by flames across the street, not on fire yet,” he says. “Embers flying high above the ground caused an extremely rapid rate of fire spread. Shortly after taking this image, I spent about 30 minutes bunkered down in a small dirt parking area surrounded by intense flames.”
‘Desperate Search for Signs of Life’
On June 14, Ali Jadallah, a Gaza-based photographer with the Anadolu Agency, heard the sound of an explosion in Deir al Balah, a city in the central Gaza Strip. Arriving before any ambulances and civil defense teams, he captured this image of civilians helping each other out of the rubble following an explosion from an Israeli strike. “Capturing the photo just minutes after the event was far from easy,” recalls Jadallah. “Thick smoke filled the air, people were in a state of panic, and screams echoed all around.”
Even after more than a year of war, doing such work remains shocking for the photographer. “I’ve never grown used to witnessing such devastation, and I doubt I ever will. No one can truly accept the sight of death, destruction, and blood. Each time I photograph the injured, the dead, and the aftermath of destruction, or inhale the acrid smoke still lingering after an attack, I am flooded with a familiar, haunting feeling,” says Jadallah. “It takes me back to the moment my family’s home was bombed and they were killed—a memory that has become a recurring nightmare. I relive it with every similar scene I witness. It’s a pain I cannot escape, made worse by seeing others endure the same agony.”
Through all this, Jadallah continues to work to document the story of the people of Gaza: “Perhaps the raw power of this photograph lies in the fact that I was there in those first critical moments—the moments of shock, chaos, and the desperate search for signs of life.”
‘Whatever Happened on the Field’
On the night of Super Bowl LVIII between the Kansas City Chiefs and the San Francisco 49ers, there were two sets of fans watching their televisions. Those who were rooting for their favorite football team and the other, supporters of singer-songwriter Taylor Swift hoping to catch a glimpse of her in the stands.
Photographer Charles Baus had photographed three other Super Bowls before so, as always, his main objective was to cover the action on the field, but his eye was also on the viral story of the relationship between Swift and Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce. “During the game I had spotted Taylor Swift in her luxury suite and figured she would eventually make it to the sidelines if the Chiefs had won the Super Bowl,” says Baus. “Since my photo position was going to be in the upper deck for the game, I came prepared with my long 600 mm lens. This would get me close enough to get good shots of whatever happened on the field.”
In the chaos of the end of the game, while capturing the excitement and dejection of each team, he simultaneously kept his eye on Swift as she made her way onto the field. “There were hundreds of people on the field and I managed to continue to follow her as she made her way through everyone and eventually to where she met Travis,” he says. Then, he was able to capture this quintessential image—a usual celebration between partners of players after a Super Bowl win, but one that reached far beyond fans of football.
