‘I was relieved I got the shot without my phone ending up in the sea!’: Easelyn Pineda’s finest telephone image | Photography

Laiya seashore is a three-hour drive from the place Easelyn Pineda lives, in Quezon City, the Philippines. Last September, she was visiting the world with associates. “It makes for the perfect getaway,” she says. “We ate fresh seafood, went snorkelling and beachcombing, sifting through the tide pools to collect the most beautiful seashells we could find.”

On the day Pineda took this picture, she and her associates had been exploring the seashore when the climate turned. “Late afternoon, the ocean breeze picked up and brought a light rain shower, then it became progressively gloomier. This scene unfolded in front of me,” she says. “Two young men from the local community were spearfishing right off the shore. It seemed like they were braving the weather to see if they could add some food to the table for the day. It was a very humbling thing to witness and capture.”

She provides that the rain and fading mild helped emphasise simply how difficult and labour-intensive conventional spearfishing is. “It made the subject’s effort stand out even more.”

Pineda waded into the water along with her telephone to get nearer, later making changes to make sure the types of the fishers weren’t misplaced in silhouette. Her picture went on to be shortlisted within the movement class on the 2026 Sony World Photography awards.

Watching the lads work made Pineda mirror on what she calls the “enduring strength and resilience of the Filipino spirit”. She was, she provides, “thrilled to capture such unscripted authenticity, and even more than that, relieved that I got the shot without my phone ending up in the sea!”