Many want to feel what it is like to fly in the cosmos—how one’s body levitates in dark space. Personally, I have never been in space, but I have found this feeling on night dives.

Many would look across the ocean at night and feel a tinge of fear. I guess that is normal—fear of the unknown, fear of the dark, fear that something out there is coming to get you. But for those that have embarked on diving in the open ocean at night, it can bring on a feeling of curiosity, excitement and discovery.

Pelagic black water diving is not for the novice underwater videographer. Without visual references, routine tasks, even for an experienced diver, must be constantly on the conscious mind. Add a camera to the mix and the task loading easily becomes too much. However, with a little preparation, you can set yourself up to capture some amazing video on a world-class dive.

The original concept of black water diving consists of going to an offshore location in the middle of the ocean at night and jumping into the abyss to watch the ocean’s diurnal migration. By hanging lights at around 15m for a stable reference depth and drifting over a contour of a 1,000 meters, or as deep as you can, one can see microscopic zooplankton rising from the depths, bringing with them an array of magical creatures.

As divers, we watch underwater documentaries from the BBC, National Geographic and other media with keen interest. Deep water explorations, or photos and video from exotic locales, hold us rapt. How many times have you wished you could sail on one of those research vessels, if only to catch a glimpse of a rarely seen species? For those without the resources to join such expeditions, there is an affordable alternative: Enter the black water dive—long offered in Hawaii but now available on the east coast of the continental United States.

Fluorescence night dives, or fluoro, UV and glow dives, as they are also known, are becoming increasingly popular as more and more dive centres offer scuba divers and underwater photographers the chance to experience this unique underwater phenomenon.

There are also an increasing number of vendors offering diving equipment for use on these special dives, and the purpose of this article is to explain the basics, background, techniques and equipment associated with this interesting aspect of the underwater world.