Bonus points for ambition. It’s the absence of any big name stars (or massive crowd shots) that stands as the only hint that The Underwater Realm isn’t a tentpole movie set to light the summer on fire. It’s got high adventure with some excellent CG work, some tricky shots, and the whole thing was rendered in 4K. They’ve even got the blockbuster marketing formula down.

With this kind of trailer, there’s no telling whether there’ll be a story to speak of or character we want to engage with, but it’s hard to deny that it’s incredible — a glimpse into the future of what a team can do with the right technology and the right effort. They’ve even kept a running log of how they pulled all this off. If this is what indie filmmaking can look like, the future is going to be bright.

Check it out for yourself:

From the production:

“Created by a fully volunteer team, THE UNDERWATER REALM is arguably the most ambitious independent film project ever attempted. Made for less than half of the coffee budget for Peter Jackson’s THE HOBBIT, the team has recreated five different time periods, developed their own underwater lighting and speaker systems, and built a life size, fully rocking gun deck of a Spanish Galleon. The team have trained and worked with some of Britain’s top SCUBA and free diving experts in order to bring this ambitious project to reality.”

The Underwater Realm is coming to YouTube on December 25th.