Gallery: The Best WIRED Photo Stories of 2016
Danila Tkachenko01Danilla-Tkachenko-2016-1.jpg
*[The Snowy Graveyards Where Soviet Subs and Planes Go to Die.](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/05/danila-tkachenko-restricted-areas/ )* During the Cold War, dozens of cities in the Soviet Union housed secret scientific and military programs. Photographer Danila Tkachenko visited several for *Restricted Areas*, and found them strewn with technological relics, like the only surviving prototype of VVA-14, a vertical takeoff aircraft.
Paolo Woods & Gabriele Galiberti02Paolo-Woods-and-Gabriele-Galimberti-2016-1.jpg
*[Beyond the Panama Papers: See Inside the World’s Tax Havens.](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/04/inside-the-worlds-tax-havens/ )* There are over a dozen places around the world to stash cash if you don’t want it taxed. The amount of wealth hidden away in secrecy jurisdictions is estimated upwards of $32 trillion. Photographers Paolo Woods and Gabriele Galimberti hunted these tax havens down, trying to document a world that’s invisible by design.
Tod Seelie03Tod-Seelie-2016-1.jpg
*[Wasteland: The Mad Max Festival That Makes Burning Man Look Lame.](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/09/wasteland-mad-max-festival-makes-burning-man-look-lame/)* The Mojave Desert is home to the self-proclaimed “world’s largest post-apocalyptic festival.” Photographer Tod Seelie gloriously captured the grime and sweat of 2,500 wannabe vagabonds clashing in the Thunderdome and parading around in tricked-out jalopies.
Reuben Wu04Reuben-Wu-2016-1.jpg
*[Drone Lighting Brings Out the Desert’s Otherworldly Side.](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/04/reuben-wu-lux-noctis-drone-lighting-brings-deserts-otherworldly-side/ )* Reuben Wu outfitted a drone with LEDs, then flew it over rock formations in the American West at night. The spotlighting lends a momentous aura to already awe-inspiring sights.
Samantha Appleton05Samantha-Appleton-2016-1.jpg
*[What It’s Like to Photograph the President (Hint: Be Quick).](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/10/like-photograph-president-hint-fast/)* Magnum photographer Christopher Anderson only had a few minutes to capture President Barack Obama for WIRED’s November issue, guest-edited [by POTUS himself](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/10/president-obama-guest-edits-wired-essay/ ). “I wanted the photograph to feel more intimate,” Anderson says. “I wanted the viewer to feel like they were being introduced to him in a way they had not seen before.”
Maggie Shannon06Maggie-Shannon-2016-1.jpg
*[Boldly Go to Upstate New York to Board the USS Enterprise.](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/12/maggie-shannon-james-cawley-guy-built-exact-replica-starship-enterprise/)* James Cawley spent 20 years constructing an exact replica of the Starship Enterprise, down to Scotty’s wrenches and Klingon costumes. Photographer Maggie Shannon captured his intense labor of love for WIRED.
Laura Morton07Laura-Morton-2016-b.jpg
*[Hack, Hustle, Nap, Repeat: Life as a Young Techie in San Francisco.](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/05/laura-morton-wild-west-tech/ )* Shows like *Silicon Valley* is often a caricature of the Bay Area tech scene. Laura Morton’s photos show what it’s really like, capturing moments of tedium and despair—along with the occasionally cuddle party—as Millennials seek their fortunes.
Kai Caemmerer08KaiCaemmerer-2016-b.jpg
*[The Unreal, Eerie Emptiness of China’s ‘Ghost Cities.’](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/02/kai-caemmerer-unborn-cities/)* Photographer Kai Caemmerer's haunting images reveal skyscrapers gleaming above empty streets, waiting for people to come inhabit them. They're the product of rapid urbanization in China. Except no one’s moving in.
Mark Abramson09MarkAbramson-2016-1.jpg
*[Bizarre Double Exposures Perfectly Capture Election Chaos.](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/07/2016-election-pure-chaos-photos/ )* When Mark Abramson set out to document the 2016 presidential election, he knew he must do something different. The jarring multiple exposures reflect the headache-inducing madness of small town hall meetings and cavernous stadium events. “For me, applying this technique made me feel like I could actually say what I was feeling,” Abramson says. “Which was this shivery feeling.”
Simon Menner10Simon-Menner-2016-1.jpg
*[Can You Spot the Snipers Hidden in These Photos?](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/02/simon-menner-hidden-snipers-there-are-snipers-in-these-photos-can-you-find-them/)* The job of a sniper is to be undetectable. Those in Simon Menner’s disconcerting series *Camouflage* are doing it creepily right. Question is, can you find them?
Amy Lombard11Amy-Lombard-2016-1.jpg
*[Pug Owners and Redheads Unite! Online Groups Meet IRL.](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/12/pug-owners-red-heads-unite-online-groups-meet-irl/)* Amy Lombard's quirky photos showcase how the internet unites us. She hung out at online meet-ups around the country, from a poolside pug party on Staten Island to a diner in Reno where “women of a certain age” brunched. “It’s a great time to be accepted, no matter your interests,” Lombard says.
Glenna Gordon12Glenna-Gordon-2016-2.jpg
*[The Subversive Women Who Self-Publish Novels Amid Jihadist War.](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/02/glenna-gordon-diagram-heart/ )* “Littattafan soyayya” means “books of love” in the Hausa language. Penned by Muslim women in Northern Nigeria, the self-published novels tell tales of romance, scandals, and independence. The authors brave censorship and become leaders of their community, working within the bounds of society even as they change it. “\[They are\] not what I thought feminism looked like,” says photographer Glenna Gordon, “but then I had to change my idea of what feminism looked like.”
Benjamin Grant/DigitalGlobe13Benjamin-Grant-2016b-1.jpg
*[You’ll Never See Earth From Space. But This Book Is Close.](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/10/explore-earth-as-only-seen-by-satellites/ )* Satellite images curated by Benjamin Grant let you peruse the earth from thousands of miles high. The POV allows you to appreciate the beauty of the Earth, and the ways humanity alters it.
Brian Finke14Brian-Finke-2016-b.jpg
*[Here’s How Sad You Look When You Eat Lunch at Your Desk.](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/06/brian-finke-desktop-dining/)* Work-life balance takes a hard hit in Brian Finke’s deadpan series *Desktop Dining*. The images of office employees shoving food into their mouths as they type away might be exactly the kind of motivation you need to start taking real lunch breaks.
Nikita Teryoshin15Nikita-Teryoshin-2016-1.jpg
*[Buy a Tank and Sip Some Wine at Poland’s Giant Weapons Fair.](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/10/nikita-teryoshin-nothing-personal-weapons-fair/ )* War is an ugly business, unless maybe if you’re making money at it. German photographer Nikita Teryoshin captures the callous pragmatism of business men and women sipping cocktails and browsing tanks at a massive weapons fair in Kielce.
Alberto Bernasconi16Alberto-Bernasconi-2016b-1.jpg
*[All Aboard the Most Ridiculous, Most Stupidly Huge Cruise Ship on Earth.](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/09/alberto-bernasconi-harmony-of-the-seas-cruise-ship/)* Welcome to the ‘Harmony of the Seas,’ a 226,000-ton cruise ship guaranteed to give you the synthetic experience of a lifetime. The boat features mini golf, casino, and even catch a theater production performed on an ice rink. There’s so much do you’ll never have to leave. “It gives you the sense of traveling without doing it,” says photographer Alberto Bernasconi, who attended the cruise in July.
Justin Barton17Justin-Barton-2016-1.jpg
*[Meet the People of a Soviet Country That Doesn’t Exist.](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/03/meet-people-transnistria-stuck-time-soviet-country-doesnt-exist/ )* Transnistria is not a real nation, but many of its citizens desperately want it to be. Photographer Justin Bartin chronicles their struggle in this poignant portrait series.
Reginald Van de Velde18Reginald-Van-de-Velde-2016-1.jpg
*[Wanna Feel Small? Step Into an Abandoned Cooling Tower.](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/11/reginald-van-de-velde-abandoned-enormous-cooling-towers/)* Reginald Van de Velde’s photos look like scenes from apocalyptic film stills. They feature the interiors of cooling towers, massive structures up to 800 feet high that are used to cool water in thermoelectric power plants.
Michael Benson19Michael-Benson-2016-1.jpg
*[Here’s What Space Actually Looks Like to the Human Eye.](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/03/heres-space-actually-looks-like-human-eye/ )* Michael Benson offers a vision of space as true to living color as possible. The images in his exhibition *Otherworlds: Visions of Our Solar System* give you an idea of what Saturn or Pluto might look like if you actually saw them out the window of a rocket.
Ricky Rhodes20Ricky-Rhodes-2016.jpeg
*[Venture Into a Surreal Salt Mine 2,000 Feet Below Lake Erie.](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/05/venture-surreal-salt-mine-2000-feet-lake-erie/ )* Want to know where all that rock salt scattered across icy winter roads comes from? Photographer Ricky Rhodes takes you there in these gorgeous photographs.
David Fathi21David-Fathi-2016-a.jpg
*[The Strange, Totally Not True Story of a Cursed Physicist.](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/03/david-fathi-wolfgang/ )* Wolfgang Pauli was an acclaimed 20th century physicist, but rumor has it he was also cursed. Artist David Fathi toys with the myth that fooled even rational scientists in his comical, unsettling series *Wolfgang*.
George Stoyle22George-Stoyle-2016-1.jpg
*[Get Up Close and Not at All Personal With an Enormous Jellyfish.](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/11/george-stoyle-jellyfish/)* It was the largest jellyfish George Stoyle had ever seen, and luckily, he had his camera ready. The enormous lion’s mane jellyfish (which can stretch 200 feet) ended up posing for the perfect portrait.
Esther Hovers23Esther-Hovers-2016.jpg
*[Can You Spot the Suspicious Behavior in These Photos?](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/02/esther-hovers-false-positives/ )* In her fascinating series *False Positives*, Esther Hovers documents human actions that might alert a security camera programmed to detect abnormal activity. You probably do some of them.
Andreas Rutkauskas24Andreas-Rutkauskas-2016-1.jpg
*[The Invisible Security of Canada’s Seemingly Chill Border.](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/04/invisible-security-canadas-seemingly-chill-border/)* Photographer Andreas Rutkauskas drove some 12,500 miles along the US-Canada border to photograph the sleepy state of the US’s most permeable border. He captured serene cutlines, little-visited monuments and even the occasional telephone booth.
Sergey Novikov25Sergey-Novikov-2016.jpg
*[Inside the Post-Soviet Towns Built Around a 40,000-Foot Hole.](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/03/inside-post-soviet-towns-built-around-40000-foot-hole/ )* In the remote Kola Peninsula of Russia, there’s a hole in the ground over seven miles deep. It’s an odd legacy of a Cold War-era scientific experiment. Photographer Sergey Novikov traveled to the region to document the hole and the nearby village for *Kola Superdeep*.
Tom Fowlks26Fowlks-Best-01.jpg
*[Epic Photos of the New Panama Canal Will Make You Feel Teeny.](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/06/tom-fowlks-panama-canal/ )* Tom Fowlkes spent a decade photographing the expansion of the Panama Canal, a massive project that involved 11,00 workers, 4.4 million cubic meters of concrete and 220,000 tons of steel.
James Ball27James-Ball-2016-1.jpg
*[The Hulking, Retro Computers That Made Way for Your iPhone](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/05/james-ball-guide-to-computing/)* To James Ball, there’s nothing quite so beautiful as a 4,500-pound analog computer. He visited museums around the world to photograph them for *Guide to Computing*, then digitally retouched the images to make the machines look as pristine as they did in their heydey.
Marc Yankus28Mark-Yankus-2016-1.jpg
*[NYC’s Busy Streets, Photoshopped Into Beautiful Desolation.](https://stag-komodo.wired.com/2016/10/mark-yankus-new-york-city/)* New York wouldn’t be New York without the constant possibility of colliding with a car or stranger. Photographer Markus Yankus makes all that chaos vanish in *The Secret Lives of Buildings*.
