A stroke of good luck has given a team of Tasmanian scientists an encounter with a pod of extremely rare whales.

The Australian Antarctic Division team was searching for blue whales off the coast of Portland in Victoria last month when they spotted the pod of Shepherd's beaked whales.

They captured video footage of up to a dozen of the black and cream-coloured whales which have prominent dolphin-like beaks.

Voyage leader Michael Double says the mammals have been seen in the wild only a few times.

"To encounter this group was amazing but the fact that they remained at the surface for so long that we could get many minutes of footage is unique," he said.

"I've never seen any other footage of Shepherd's beaked whale and since we've come back we've been doing a fair bit of research on this but really there are are so few photographs even, never mind about footage."

Voyage member Natalie Schmitt says the chance encounter will give scientists a better understanding of the mammal which was discovered in 1937.

"We can see the way they move and the way they blow and interact with each other and the colouration and characteristics have changed as well," she said.

The team is planning to publish its finding.

The last paper on the whale was published in 2006.