Mesmerizing 4K Footage of Deep-Sea Creatures that Live in the Unexplored Ningaloo Canyons

The Schmidt Ocean Institute has released a stunning 4K highlight reel of footage captured during their ROV expedition to the previously unexplored Ningaloo Canyons in the Indian Ocean. Over the course of 180 hours of exploration, researchers uncovered some 30 new species, as well as “the longest animal ever recorded.”

It’s hard to overstate the scientific value of the footage above, and yet, it’s also easy to ignore the research aspects and just enjoy the hypnotic footage for what it is.

The video was captured by the ROV SuBastian, a robotic underwater exploration vehicle that can dive as deep as 4500m (14,750ft)—far deeper than any human could possibly dive unassisted–stay down for much longer than a human occupied vehicle, and capture 4K video while it’s down there. The footage you see is literally showing parts of the sea floor that no human had ever laid eyes on before.

Many never-before-scene animals were recorded during these dives—around 30 new species, the researchers reckon—but the most newsworthy is a new specimen of Apolemia that might be the “longest animal ever recorded,” at approximately 47m (154ft) long.