By Leah Shaffer, correspondent

Ben Krueger, a native of Eden Prairie, is among the finalists that could have their Doritos ads aired during the Super Bowl

Thirty seconds of pure silliness has been the ticket to some serious career opportunities for two local aspiring filmmakers.

Ben Krueger and Cole Koehler created a 30-second ad that is now among the top six finalists in the Doritos “Crash the Super Bowl” contest. Their ad, “Snack Attack Samurai” which features a Samurai clad in Doritos armor, competed against more than 4,000 entries to make it to the top six in the contest. People can vote for their favorite ad at www.crashthesuperbowl.com. The top three vote-getters will be aired during the Super Bowl on Feb. 7.

“Ideally, it’s Snack Attack Samurai and the Vikings going to the Super Bowl,” said Krueger, who grew up in Eden Prairie.

Krueger, 32, works as a freelance production assistant in Minneapolis. He and Koehler put together the ad on a budget of less than $1,000. Since being selected as one of six finalists, they received $25,000 and tickets to the Super Bowl. The catch is they won’t find out if their ad made it on air until they see it themselves at the Super Bowl with the other contestants. If their ad does make it on air, there’s one more, major prize to be netted. If the ad is ranked first on the USA Today Ad Meter (which ranks all Super Bowl commercials), they could win $1 million. A second-place ranking would bring them $600,000 and third-place $400,000.

To rank first out of the USA Today Ad Meter would not be unprecedented. Two unemployed brothers from Indiana nabbed the $1 million pot of money after outranking all other ads during last year’s contest.

“The goal is to get it on the air,” added Krueger.

People can vote once a day between now and Jan. 31. Those registering to vote are entered into a contest to win Super Bowl tickets.

Krueger and Koehler met in film school in Minneapolis. The idea for the “Snack-Attack Samurai” stemmed from a brainstorming session.

“We knew we wanted to make something funny,” Krueger said.

They looked at the chip itself and thought “this looks like a throwing star,” recalled Krueger.

From there, they got the idea of dressing someone up in Doritos armor. The commercial was filmed in a boxing gym in northeast Minneapolis. Working with an artist friend, they constructed chip armor from foam. Krueger recalls a couple of nights where all he did was cut out chip triangles in foam.

“It was kind of surreal while we were doing it.”

Winning the contest would be a huge career boost for the duo.

The short-term goal is to continue working together and continue work as directors, he added.

When putting together their commercial, they knew they made a good spot and suspected they’d be considered as a finalist, but not necessarily make it this far.

“It was a shock, we were very excited,” he said.