When Jules Verne wrote this classic masterpiece in 1870, submarines had not been invented, he had never been under water, yet there is so much detail in his book about the deep seas. He wrote about space, air and underwater exploration at a time when mankind was at-least 50 years from inventing them. He is considered as the father of science-fiction and helped pioneer the science-fiction genre by writing books like Journey to the Center of the Earth, From the Earth to the Moon, Around the World in Eighty Days and Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea.

I took these photos during a submarine dive in Hawaii. We were around 300 meters down below at the bottom of the ocean.

As you reach significant depths, there is extreme loss of color and contrast. The longer wavelengths such as reds and oranges are absorbed by the water and makes everything around look bluish green. If you are a photographer, this is bad news for you as your photos would have a strong bluish tint and the white balance would be completely off. Two known ways of overcoming this problem is to use a red filter in front of your lens to add the missing red spectrum or use a flash to re-create white light.

Some places underwater get sufficient sunlight because the water is clear and there is no obstruction to sunlight entering the water. You will see better colors in this case.

Trapped air bubbles are released due to pressure as the submarine starts its descent.

This title of this book refers to the distance traveled under the sea and not the depth. 20,000 leagues is approximately over 12 times the radius of earth and the greatest depth mentioned in the book is four leagues. This book gave us captain Nemo and his famous submarine, Nautilus.