Eric Villard sequence ID: Doritos 'Balloon Boy' spoof

This video was actually shot by Richard Waganer, a resident of my hometown (Eldersburg, Md.) who is also a professional videographer. It is a commercial he entered in the Doritos Crash the Super Bowl Challenge with hope of getting it aired during the big game. Waganer’s Doritos ad is his take on the recent ‘Balloon Boy’ media frenzy. The video is on the Doritos Web site, http://www.crashthesuperbowl.com/#/video/1258/, and the most recent version of the Adobe Flash Player is required to see it. When the site first loads a Doritos ad pops up – you can skip it by clicking the button in the lower right of the screen.

Unfortunately the site does not have time stamps on the video, but it is relatively short and the shots occur within a five second span. I’ll put by estimations on timing in parentheses. About two-thirds of the way through the commercial the main character, let’s call him ‘Jeff,’ is running through a field – this is where the sequence I’m identifying begins. The first shot (17 seconds in) is a very wide one with Jeff held in the rightmost third of the frame. It gives depth and a sense of place to the sequence. Immediately after this (18 seconds in) is a tight shot of the upper fourth of Jeff’s body as he is running through a field. The camera pans with him, mimicking the movements of his body. A similar shot follows this (19 seconds in), but it is pulled out to a medium distance and encompasses his whole body. Again the camera pans with him and mimics his body movement. Lastly we have close shot (20 seconds in) of Jeff’s face as if we were in the bottom of the Doritos bag looking up. This shot makes it clear that the focus is Jeff and removes and possible outside interference by framing his face within the bag.

Since it is a spoof on ‘Balloon Boy,’ this video was aiming to capture the frenzy that surrounded it. As a result the cuts in the video, especially toward the end, are tight and quick. I think having the camera bob and sway with Jeff as he runs clumsily through a field hoping to find his darling ‘Chip’ in the bag effectively captured this. The variance in sequence shot types made the video dynamic and helped to keep the audience’s attention.