--- title: How nature documentaries are made: hides, camera traps, drones and years of waiting — a lesson of Mova's school · trees and pragmatics description: «How nature documentaries are made: hides, camera traps, drones and years of waiting», a lesson of the biology course of Mova's primary school, sentence by sentence with dependency trees and pragmatics. It begins: You watch a snow leopard creep across a cliff for three thrilling minutes. --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/394-how-nature-documentaries-are-made-hides-camera-traps-drones-and-years-of-waiting/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/) / [Biology](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/) / How nature documentaries are made: hid… # How nature documentaries are made: hides, camera traps, drones and years of waiting Lesson 394 of the biology course of Mova's primary school: 19 sentences, each with its syntax tree and pragmatics. The lessons are written for Mova, and their agreed trees are part of Mova corpus 0.4 (CC BY-SA 4.0). How Mova does on its tests: [the lesson at school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/school-run/biology/394-how-nature-documentaries-are-made-hides-camera-traps-drones-and-years-of-waiting/). - [0](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/394-how-nature-documentaries-are-made-hides-camera-traps-drones-and-years-of-waiting/0/) — You watch a snow leopard creep across a cliff for three thrilling minutes. - [1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/394-how-nature-documentaries-are-made-hides-camera-traps-drones-and-years-of-waiting/1/) — Behind those minutes there may be months of a crew sitting in freezing tents, hidden cameras on rocks and hundreds of hours of film that nobody ever sees. - [2](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/394-how-nature-documentaries-are-made-hides-camera-traps-drones-and-years-of-waiting/2/) — Wild animals stop behaving naturally when they see or smell people, so film-makers hide. - [3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/394-how-nature-documentaries-are-made-hides-camera-traps-drones-and-years-of-waiting/3/) — They sit in hides made of branches, leave camera traps that film by themselves, fly quiet drones overhead and even build robot animals with cameras inside. - [4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/394-how-nature-documentaries-are-made-hides-camera-traps-drones-and-years-of-waiting/4/) — Special cameras show what our eyes cannot: high-speed cameras slow a hummingbird's wings, time-lapse speeds up a flower opening, and heat cameras see warm animals glowing in the dark. - [5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/394-how-nature-documentaries-are-made-hides-camera-traps-drones-and-years-of-waiting/5/) — Most crews also follow a rule: do not interfere. - [6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/394-how-nature-documentaries-are-made-hides-camera-traps-drones-and-years-of-waiting/6/) — They film what happens, even when it is sad, because nature has to take its course. - [7](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/394-how-nature-documentaries-are-made-hides-camera-traps-drones-and-years-of-waiting/7/) — People still argue about the rare times crews have helped. - [8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/394-how-nature-documentaries-are-made-hides-camera-traps-drones-and-years-of-waiting/8/) — Wildlife film-makers sit in hides so animals carry on as if nobody is there, because animals that see or smell people often stop what they are doing or run away; some crews waited in hides for weeks to film one short scene. - [9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/394-how-nature-documentaries-are-made-hides-camera-traps-drones-and-years-of-waiting/9/) — Camera traps are boxes that take pictures or film when an animal passes in front of them; they can wait for months in places people rarely go, and they have filmed rare animals like snow leopards. - [10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/394-how-nature-documentaries-are-made-hides-camera-traps-drones-and-years-of-waiting/10/) — A normal film shows about 25 pictures every second, while high-speed cameras film thousands a second, so one fast second can last for minutes when played back. - [12](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/394-how-nature-documentaries-are-made-hides-camera-traps-drones-and-years-of-waiting/12/) — Drones are small flying cameras that film animals from above without a helicopter; they are quieter but must be flown carefully so animals, especially nesting birds, are not scared. - [13](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/394-how-nature-documentaries-are-made-hides-camera-traps-drones-and-years-of-waiting/13/) — Scientists use drones to count whales and even to collect whale breath from the spray of their blow. - [14](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/394-how-nature-documentaries-are-made-hides-camera-traps-drones-and-years-of-waiting/14/) — Infrared and heat cameras film at night by catching light or warmth our eyes cannot see; warm animals glow bright on heat cameras, while cold ground looks dark. - [15](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/394-how-nature-documentaries-are-made-hides-camera-traps-drones-and-years-of-waiting/15/) — Some divers use special breathing machines that let out no noisy bubbles, because bubbles and noise scare many fish; some deep scenes are filmed from small submarines. - [16](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/394-how-nature-documentaries-are-made-hides-camera-traps-drones-and-years-of-waiting/16/) — A single scene of a rare animal can take years to film, because weather, luck and the animal must all be right; an hour-long programme may be made from hundreds of hours of film, and most is never shown. - [17](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/394-how-nature-documentaries-are-made-hides-camera-traps-drones-and-years-of-waiting/17/) — Some film-makers built animal-shaped robots with cameras, such as a robot penguin, because animals often ignore a robot that looks and moves a bit like them. - [18](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/394-how-nature-documentaries-are-made-hides-camera-traps-drones-and-years-of-waiting/18/) — Scientists also fix small cameras to animals to see the world from the animal's point of view. - [19](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/394-how-nature-documentaries-are-made-hides-camera-traps-drones-and-years-of-waiting/19/) — Most nature film crews follow a rule not to change what happens; once in a while crews have helped, for example by digging a ramp for trapped penguins, and people still argue whether that was right. - ← previous: [Mushrooms and creatures to avoid in the woods: death caps, adders, ticks and hornets](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/393-mushrooms-and-creatures-to-avoid-in-the-woods-death-caps-adders-ticks-and-hornets/) - next →: [Documentaries vs cartoons: added sounds, edited stories and what is real](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/395-documentaries-vs-cartoons-added-sounds-edited-stories-and-what-is-real/) - ↑ back to [Biology](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/)