Traveling 5 miles off the coast of Florida at night and jumping into the ocean to drift near the surface in 600 foot depth, one can come across many wonderful and strange pelagic animals. One of these amazing animals is this pelagic Nudibranch (sea slug) that swims and lives up in the water column.

Just coming across these wonderful creatures is rewarding enough but on one particular dive I was fortunate to come across two of them together. It took a moment to realize that they were connected to each other and were, in fact, in the process of mating. What made this super rare encounter even more special is that in the split moment the photograph was taken, it appeared as if the nudibranchs were introducing themselves face to face with a handshake. A truly unique encounter in an other worldly setting.