The 'mouse' that roared

It may look like a big-eared cartoon mouse, but the creature pictured in the Olympus BioScapes contest's top image is actually a rotifer (Floscularia ringens). A rotifer is a tiny underwater creature with hairlike cilia that sweep at lightning speed to bring food into its mouth. When the cilia beat, rotifers look as if they have two wheels spinning on top. You can also see this rotifer's reddish tube-shaped home, with one of the "bricks" in the process of being made inside the creature's body. The first-place image was produced by Charles Krebs of Issaquah, Wash., using differential interference contrast microscopy.

Although it's easy for Krebs to get his little critters, it's not so easy to capture a great picture of them. Krebs used a complex lighting scheme known as differential interference contrast illumination to freeze the motion of the cilia and bring out the fine details of the rotifer's structure.

"After I took the shot, I knew it was probably one of the nicest headshots of this particular animal that I had," he said. "You may look at 100 different specimens, and they're just not at the right angle, or they stick their head out and there's a big plate of glass covering it."

Krebs does a lot of other photographic work, including product shots. "There's a fair number of companies that need photographs of very small things," he explained. But tiny critters like the prize-winning rotifer rank among his favorite subjects.

"I'm not a scientist," he said. "I'm not a zoologist, I'm not a biologist. But it's always been an interest of mine."

To see more of Krebs' work, check out his website as well as his favorite hangout on Photomacrography.net. And while you're at it, take a spin through these galleries on msnbc.com: