Behind the Cover: Jamie Chung on Photographing the Hummingbird Drone

Don’t be fooled by its colorful exterior. This tiny Hummingbird is actually a surveillance prototype for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, developed by the California based AeroVironment. The Hummingbird—officially called the Nano Air Vehicle—is among 50 new inventions, which appear in the new issue of TIME.

A court in Cairo sentenced a police officer to 10 years in jail Tuesday for his part in the deaths of 37 Islamists last year. Lieutenant Col Amr Farouk was jailed for his role in the asphyxiation deaths of members of the Muslim Brotherhood as well as their supporters. Three other police officers were also convicted and given one-year suspended sentences, reports Reuters. The Interior Ministry claimed at the time that the prisoners had died from gas suffocation while attempting an escape. However it was later confirmed the men were killed by asphyxiation in the back of a cramped police van while they were being transported to a prison on the edge of Cairo. Since the ouster of Egypt's Islamist President Mohamed Morsi in July 2013 in response to widespread protests against his rule, the Egyptian government has been cracking down heavily on the Islamist movement. The Muslim Brotherhood has accused them of committing systematic human rights abuses. However the government has denied the allegations and labeled the Brotherhood a terrorist group. [Reuters]

New York photographer Jamie Chung spent two and a half weeks shooting the Hummingbird—among a handful of other inventions, including the artificial leaf and a $100,000 razor—for the annual Invention Issue. “It was inspirational,” Chung says of the project. “Meeting the inventors was the best part. They’re totally comfortable with their nerddom, but so am I, so we had a lot of fun together.”

AeroVironment lead engineer Matt Keennon brought the Hummingbird to Chung’s studio, where the photographer shot it in several positions. The remote-controlled device weighs just 0.66 ounces, allowing it to go where humans can’t, be it spying or scouting out safe spots in combat zones. “It’s crazy to think something so pretty is used for something so dangerous,” Chung said. Indeed, who knew the canary in the coal mine would turn out to be a Hummingbird?

Jamie Chung is a New York based photographer. See more of his work here.

Feifei Sun is a reporter at TIME. Follow her on Twitter at @feifei_sun.

Contact us at letters@time.com.