JAMSTEC E-library
of Deep-sea Images (J-EDI)

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About
The Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology (JAMSTEC) investigates and observes deep-sea environments using manned and unmanned research submersibles such as SHINKAI6500, HYPER-DOLPHIN, etc.
On this site, the numerous data of deep-sea videos and photos are available to the public. As of July 2021, approximately 40 thousand hours of videos and over 1.7 million photos are available at this site. These data of moratorium periods have expired, and the site provides them with detailed information including research location, contents (ex. living organism or phenomena), etc.
Things you can do
View and search deep-sea videos and photos
You can search by keywords, hierarchical classifications, and dive information. Search results are displayed in thumbnails, and click them to play videos and view photos.
Use deep-sea videos and photos
You can download the video/photo you are viewing from video player or photo viewer.
Know about deep-sea surveys
Viewing videos and environmental data together, which were taken during dives, helps to know about deep-sea surveys.
Data you can view
Videos and photos
The website provides users with access to the 5,759 dives of videos and photos taken by seven manned and unmanned research submersibles in 1982 to 2019.
Updated July 2021
Name of
Submersible
Years of
Dive
Number of
Registered
Dives
Hours of videos Number of
Available Photos
SHINKAI6500 1990-2019 1,313 10,778 409,455
HYPER-DOLPHIN 2000-2019 1,803 13,079 850,482
KAIKO 1995-2019 607 5,582 107,576
KM-ROV *1 2017-2019 50 675 0
YOKOSUKA DEEP TOW 2005-2018 165 1,940 35,640
SHINKAI2000 1982-2002 1,304 6,660 278,945
DOLPHIN-3K 1987-2002 517 1,998 31,853
Total 5,759 40,714 1,713,951
  • Values of total length of all videos are approximate.
  • Click a name of submersibles above to find more about a submersible. It will take you to the JAMSTEC's site where a submersible are explained in details.
  • KM-ROV is a remotely operated vehicle equipped with the research vessel KAIMEI.
Information provided with videos and photos
All of the videos and photos have information that was taken during dive surveys, including dive dates, dive areas, etc. We, operating staffs of the website, have watched and cut editing all of the videos and photos to classify organisms and geological environments based on literature, cruise reports, etc.
※The biological classification is based on BISMaL(Biological Information System for Marine Life).
Some of the videos and photos have keywords of biological features (crowd, forage and eating, etc.) and stages of dive processes (descending, sampling, etc.)
In case there are public relations and academic journals related to videos/photos, you can refer to JAMSTEC Document Catalog at "Related Links" of the player/viewer.
Selected and recommended videos and photos have crown marks.
Although high-resolution photos are available on this site, the resolutions of videos are low due to online services. High-resolution videos are archived and provided to users upon their request. Please refer to Terms and Conditions for more detailed information.
Map data
Data used for background maps are in the following.
Thirty seconds gridded data of General Bathymetric Chart of the Oceans (GEBCO)
Imagery reproduced from the GEBCO_2014 Grid, version 20150318, http://www.gebco.net