Two ways in: describe an animal, or upload your pet
Text-to-video is the route for wildlife and any animal you don't own: 'a snow leopard picking its way along a ridgeline at dusk, long-lens compression, shallow depth of field'. The model invents a convincing animal to your spec. For your own pet, image-to-video is the honest path — upload a clear photo as the start frame, and the clip animates outward from your actual animal, keeping its real markings, face, and proportions.
With pet photos, gentle motion prompts hold likeness best: a head tilt, a tail wag, ears perking, a slow look toward camera. Large prompted actions — jumping, running toward the lens — give the model more room to drift away from your specific animal's anatomy, so save the big movements for text-to-video where no likeness is at stake.
Prompting believable animal motion
Name the gait, because 'a wolf running' is vague where 'a wolf loping through knee-deep snow' is specific — bounding, stalking, hovering, wading, and preening all produce distinct, recognizable movement. Slow motion is the single most flattering modifier for animals: it dignifies fur, feathers, and the water shake every dog does after a swim.
Camera height matters as much as the move. Drop to the animal's eye level — 'low camera at dog height' — and the clip immediately feels intentional rather than like security-camera footage of a yard. The SLOW ZOOM and LOCKED OFF presets suit observational wildlife framing; ZOOM PUNCH suits comedic pet energy.
Documentary framing versus social energy
For a wildlife-documentary read, borrow the genre's optics in your prompt: long-lens compression, shallow depth of field, the subject small in a wide habitat frame, natural morning or dusk light. Common species — dogs, cats, horses, big cats, birds of prey — render with strong anatomical accuracy; the more exotic or hybrid the creature, the more you should treat the output as stylized rather than zoologically precise.
For social content, go the other way: tight framing, bright light, exaggerated moments. Nidhogg's apps library includes ready-made pet workflows — pet superhero, pet dance party, royal pet portrait — that wrap this prompting into one-click templates.