Data Sources

All data used by OceanCanvas is free, open, and requires no registration or API key. The sources are government and intergovernmental scientific archives.

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Active sources

Source	What it offers	Resolution	Freshness
NOAA OISST	Sea surface temperature. Global, daily since 1981. Thermal colour fields, the Gulf Stream as art, anomaly maps.	0.25°	1–2 day
Argo Float Program	~4,000 autonomous floats measuring temperature and salinity from the surface to 2,000m. The observing network is itself visually compelling.	Float positions	~10 days
GEBCO Bathymetry	Global ocean floor depth. Used as context data underlying surface renders.	450m	Static

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Future sources

Source	What it offers
ESA SST-CCI	Gap-free SST at 0.05° resolution. Multi-decade, cross-calibrated. Better for long animations.
ESA Sea Level CCI	Sea level anomaly grids + global mean sea level time series. The 30-year rise curve.
ESA SSS-CCI	Sea surface salinity. The Amazon freshwater plume. Evaporation patterns.
NSIDC Sea Ice	Arctic/Antarctic ice concentration. The seasonal cycle.
ESA Ocean Colour CCI	Chlorophyll concentration. The spring phytoplankton bloom.
OSCAR Currents	Near-real-time surface current vectors. Natural for particle flow animations.
Open-Meteo Marine	Wave height, wave period, wind speed. Audio drivers for the video editor.
NOAA NDBC Buoys	~1,800 buoy stations. Waves, wind, SST, pressure. Point scatter renders.
SOCAT	Ocean surface CO₂ measurements from ships. 1957 to present.
HadSST4	UK Met Office SST anomaly record. 1850 to present. The long view.

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Why these sources

Every source is chosen because it tells part of the ocean's story — and because it's genuinely interesting as visual material. SST shows the Gulf Stream. Argo shows the observing network. GEBCO shows the seafloor.

Each is free. Each is open. Each updates without human intervention. No API keys, no accounts, no institutional agreements.