Cop jumps into stranger's car to escape pack of wolves running on freeway: Real or Fake?

Update: Astute Boing Boing readers have identified the video as fake. Good comment thread.

Details are as fuzzy as the video, and I'm jaded enough to believe it could be an ARG or a viral promotion for online traffic school. But if this video is to believed, a policeman in Russia jumped into a stranger's car when he saw a large pack of wolves running on to the freeway (the cop was making a routine traffic stop). Wonder if he still gave the driver a ticket.

YouTube Video, and Dagbladet report.

What do you think? Fake/staged, or video verité? I'm having a hard time believing it, but it's a cool clip.

(Via BB Submitterator, thanks Ferenczy)

Boing Boing editor/partner and tech culture journalist Xeni Jardin hosts and produces Boing Boing's in-flight TV channel on Virgin America airlines (#10 on the dial), and writes about living with breast cancer. Diagnosed in 2011. @xeni on Twitter. email: xeni@boingboing.net.

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Anonymous

I don’t know about the wolf situation in Russia, but it’s been well documented in Russian and non-Russian media reports that there’s a really big feral dog problem in Russian cities, with dogs acting as aggressively as the wolves in the shopping center parking lot video.
- Anonymous
  
  I have also heard that dogs roam in packs, with no place 2 keep unwanted animals.
alllie

I don’t know if the video is faked but some or all of those “wolves” are dogs. It’s common for dogs to run together at night, forming packs and hunting. We have forgotten that in the US because we keep our dogs prisoners these days so they don’t have their own lives. But I grew up in a world without leash laws and the dogs would commonly go hunting at night. We’d find bits of their prey in the yard in the morning. But even a pack of dogs can be dangerous. Or harmless, depending on the dogs.
- Anonymous
  
  My childhood years were in St. Paul MN in the 70′s. I’d say it was around ’76 when we had packs of dogs in the neighborhood. Sure, we could all go “Oh, there goes Mrs. Gunderson’s little Mitzy with Dodge’s dogs. We’d just play around them. Sometimes though, there would be one or two strange dogs we hadn’t seen with them before, and they were scary. It’s amazing what your imagination will do when you’re seven.
Anonymous

all staged…
shit
found the making of
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PsrORuKe7mY
Napalm Dog

I’m calling ‘fake’. The wolves’ (dogs’?) shadows only crossed once , they all are too close to the same size and markings and there was no indication that a pack leader was being followed.
LuckyLeilani

I have a hard time believing this is a fake.

Hollywood should hire the director of this Russian video because watching the movement of the cop, the car, the wolves, and the traffic in slow motion you can see the shadows on the ground match up with the movement directly above them ~ wolf moves and the wolf shadow moves at the same time ~ as an artist, I see the slant of the shadow is also consistent with the direction of the movement. Maybe I’m a fake too? :)

Most convincing is the white lettering on the roadway and the wolf shadow running across it ~ and yes, the car has a headlight out and the cop across the street yells for the other officer to get his attention. Seems real to me ~ especially taking the culture of Russian into consideration.
- LuckyLeilani
  
  And I’d also like to add that it’s not uncommon for EVERYONE to have a cell phone that can also take video ~ especially when someone is pulled over ~ They were probably trying to document the traffic stop and caught the wolves in the process. Nothing strange about that.
Anonymous

A couple of those canids look to be not full bred wolves. FYI.
Anonymous

Wild Wolves don’t generally run in packs they run in families… At most there will be 5 or 6 adults. There are 13 in that video… it would be extraordinary for that many adults to be in one place, outside of a zoo
humanresource

Reality is one lousy photoshop job. You can tell by looking closely at the shadows. Descartes and the Wachowski brothers tried to tell us.
Anonymous

obviously viral ad for Alpha and Omega
Anonymous

quite possibly faked, but it isn’t at all unlikely that a policeman who was pulling people over would do it in direct view of a traffic camera. That way, if somebody doesn’t pull over and is then arrested by the chase car just around the bend, there’s evidence in court that the driver was attempting to evade police.
freetard

Aside from the fakery issue, cops in many countries pull motorists over this way- the RCMP do it here in Canada all the time. Although usually at night they have better lighting that is provided by the streetlights.

Also, where I live I see wolves, coyotes, and foxes on a daily basis (along with the rest of the standard Northern Canadian fauna such as moose, bears, beavers, porcupines, deer, lynx, etc). They do not run like domesticated dogs, as was pointed out by an earlier commenter. It’s easy to breed or find dogs that look like wolves, but they won’t behave like wolves no matter what you do.
Anonymous

Apologies for the bad machine translation. Withheld reading your comments, so they look amusing. In Russia we are wolves in the cities do not run, unless it is small town in a remote area, but even there it is a rarity and definitely not stai. Judging by the shots this aberrant pack of dogs. Alas, in our country there is a problem, pets are sometimes just thrown into the street where they get in packs, but I assure you, this is still an exception to the rule.

Reader from Russia
Ez

My two cents: if it was digitally faked, the overlapping shadows are perfect. There is a large wild dog population in major cities in Russia (Moscow) that often travel in packs and know the layout of the city probably better than the residence. It doesn’t seem a stretch to have wild wolves, coyotes or large dogs wild for generations taking a short cut across a freeway.
TEKNA2007

A friend who lives in Russia was complaining to me about the cops a couple weeks ago. That’s exactly how they do it: they stand outside looking for reasons to wave people over, and the victim-violators have a chance to pay a huge bribe (like a couple hundred bucks) or go without a license for a month or two.

He didn’t mention the wolf problem.
Chocodile

I’m surprised no one has pointed out the tell-tale pixels.
turnstostone

you have an interesting way of looking at things, knoxblox.

anyway…

no matter how much i want this to be real (and i’m not saying this kind of stuff doesn’t happen), this is so fake (but really, really well executed!).

after careful comparison, the surveillance camera angle and the in-car angle DO NOT match: the smoking gun is the fact that in the in-car angle the officer is reviewing the drivers documents, and in the surveillance angle, no documents have changed hands. i will give you that the shadows match up pretty well with the wolves, and the effect is pretty convincing overall, BUT given the unusually high resolution of the “surveillance” angle, and the direction the pack is coming from, the pack should be at least slightly visible before that patch of shade at the side of the road on the upper left side of the frame. also, said patch of shade gets slightly shadier before wolves come into view. i wanted to believe this one… had me fooled for a minute.
Anonymous

I’m not sure that this video is really fake, maybe only the second one from inside is, and this one is real?

But if they are both fake, than I think the videos were made to be slightly different specially, so that viewers would start comparingï»¿ and guessing what viral campaign of a film or whatever this is for. Have us play spot the differences.

If this is is true – then well done to the marketing department.
Goorpy

Also the shadows are wrong as the wolves pass in front of the oncoming vehicle headlights.

The shadows should shift and come towards the camera, as the headlights would overpower the streetlights to create the deepest shadow.

The shadow angle remains constant, even as the strong light (headlight) angle shifts behind them.
Anonymous

another one…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x-VqMepWdKc
Nom_de_Guerre

Moscow has a well known feral dog problem which is now being studied by a biologist that discovered that packs have become specialized for begging, attacking cats and dogs, subway riding, etc.

You can find out more in this very BoinbBoingable interview with the scientist here:

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/628a8500-ff1c-11de-a677-00144feab49a.html
Anonymous

This is a fake for sure. The matting around the car is what gives it away. Watch the “wolf’s” shadow as it passes the car right after the cop calmly closes the door. The matte breaks the shadow. Anyone who has done post work could spot it easily as a mistake.
Anonymous

It took a while for me to look at both videos over and over a handful of times (10 minutes), but there are subtle differences between the two videos.

The traffic cam shows the officer with his radio in his right hand, putting it up to his mouth to speak into it, standing there for a bit, and then opening the car door with is left hand.

In the in-car cam, the officer has his radio in his left hand, takes papers from the guy in the car, and opens the car door with his right hand.

I call a fake.
Brother Provisional

People are talking about it, so the folks who made this viral marketing video have succeeded.
Anonymous

Edited look at 1:00 when wolf pass over M.
- BikerRay
  
  Reply to #35 and #37 – Not saying it’s real, but could those be video compression artifacts?
  Also agree it’s more likely to be feral dogs.
Anonymous

Funny that it’s enough for someone to make a second, fake, video to make everyone believe that the first video is fake/staged as well. How does that inference follow?
Anonymous

well directed viral
what could it be for?
agnot

Bravo to the directory indeed.

But it was hard to suspend my disbelief. Those pet/circus dogs, although bearing some likeness to wolves, ran like idiot dogs compared to any farm dog. They wasted all sorts of energy and motion in these bouncy, playful looking movements–not to mention they all matched nicely which would not be true in an established wolf pack.

Any country dog would make them look silly by comparison. And any wolf, in turn, would make a country dog look like dead meat in comparison.
agnot

That is to say, wolves have a fluidity and ease of motion which is very striking and a little frightening to behold.
knoxblox

Although it is stuff of myth that people were screaming and running for the doors when confronted with moving pictures such as Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat or The Great Train Robbery, films such as these definitely caused some excitement and astonishment.

Fake or not, I find it interesting how over a century later our first gut reaction to media presented in this manner is to prove it as fake, rather than to suspend our disbelief.

If only the general public thought this way when they were passing out holy finger bones…
Anonymous

Anon # 35 – good spotting. Either this video is faked, or there’s a Predator riding that wolf.
ackpht

The thing that twitched my Fake-O-Meter wasn’t the wolves, but the cop standing in a lane of traffic while talking to the driver. Any experienced cop will conduct business from the curb side of the car. Not only are there inattentive/sleepy/drunk drivers in oncoming traffic, but there are people out there who really, really, REALLY don’t like cops, and will purposely nail one if the opportunity arises.
Anonymous

not fake, second video from the car

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mMSN8HW4VFQ
Anonymous

My first thought upon watching this, before I knew so many others thought it was fake, was that they’re all the same dog. It even looks at many points like it’s the same footage, just layered over and over. I’m surprised no one else mentioned that, and upon reviewing it a few more times, I still think that if it’s not the same footage for each “dog”, it’s only a couple of passes, simply multiplied.
Ryanwoofs

Also, the police car flashes it’s lights for no apparent reason just before the wolves appear. “Release the hounds!”
martior

The Norwegian newspaper vg.no (competitor to Dagbladet which was one of the sources for this article) is reporting it as fake: http://www.vg.no/nyheter/utenriks/artikkel.php?artid=10033866

They basically say the same thing as other commenters her regarding the two angle video, but are also quoting official russian sources.

VG is no more reputable then Dagbladet, but as I understand it they provided the initial funding for the Varnish caching server, so that should at least count for something.
Anonymous

Looking at the news report that is linked there (assuming no horrible Google-translation error), it says that there is video from inside the car that was pulled over, too. That seems a little suspicious?
Ceronomus

Holy Crap! That would be a pretty unnerving sight.
cEris

I don’t understand what happened there. The cop was standing on the road, saw the car and pulled him over just by waving at him. Is this a British thing? Can cops pull you over like that? Was he pulling him over for having a bad headlight or was his squad car broken down on the side of the road and he was asking for help?
- cEris
  
  Ah wait, I see the other cop across the way doing the same thing. So if you see a squad car on the side of the road you have to pull over? What if you don’t see him? Do they give chase? After years of loving Boingboing I finally signed up for an account to ask this question! hah
- Anony Mouse
  
  Yeah, we have tons of wolves in the UK, and adopted Cyrillic due to EU standardisation legislation.
  - Anonymous
    
    this made me laugh more than the video
Anonymous

Im a visual effects artist so I kind of know what Im talking about in terms of video manipulation. Look at the last wolf. When we walks over the M on the highway, you can see a slight warp or shift on the M. That is a telltale sign of “split screen” manipulation, which is probably how this was shot (different takes with multiple elements stitched together, with a slight misalignment in that case). This could have been avoided by rotoscoping the wolf instead of using a soft mask.
Anonymous

interesting that its exactly a dozen wolves…but if this was staged…bravo to the director…looks pretty real to me.
Anonymous

In Soviet Russia, dog waves down car, feral cops run by.
rossgrady

Hmm, seems awfully convenient that there’s also video from *inside* the stopped car: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mMSN8HW4VFQ

. . . and that both videos managed to make their way onto Teh Internets within 4 days of the incident.

The thing that seems more remarkable to me is that a cop can just kind of wave his arm at the side of the highway & a car with a burned-out headlight will see him & obligingly pull right over to get a ticket. But maybe that’s the way they do things in Russia.
- capl
  
  I agree, it seems staged with the two cameras, but the cop on the side of the road pulling people over is common. They are the State Inspectorate For Traffic Security (STSI).
  
  http://www.theotherrussia.org/2008/05/19/trying-to-control-russias-traffic-cops/
- That Evening Sun
  
  There is also third video of wolves in shopping center parking lot.
  
  http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=c50_1287081631
  
  Is strange, no?
  - Anonymous
    
    And that video looks completely staged. Especially when the wolf jumps at the camera. There are almost as many humans as wolves in the parking lot – so a wolf would just jump at one? Rather than growl, growl louder, bristle, snarl, look for other wolf backup and *then* jump – which is how I think it would go down.
    
    Some film or some security-related product or something is coming out, and this is the PR campaign for it.
GreenJello

Bizarre, makes about as much sense as a clown troop running down the freeway. Here you have a group of dogs/wolves all running parallel to traffic on a somewhat busy highway. You think if this was a regular issue that the dogs would get killed/run over.

The policeman’s attitude is pretty strange too. He seems pretty relaxed. He doesn’t make a lunge for the door, or move frantically, and it doesn’t seem like he spends enough time talking to the guy he just stopped. If this was truly strange, you’d expect the driver to be very hesitant about letting the cop in, or at least very surprised. Instead, it seems almost orchestrated.

Finally, why do the wolves/dogs completely ignore the men in the car? You’d think there would be some interest, and yet they just seem to run right by, like they knew exactly where they were going.

I think this is a fake.
Anonymous

the real video is here:

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xf84i8_foxes-originals_animals

He just ignores them.
ill lich

I don’t think those are wolves, but domestic dogs. There’s something about the way they are running and acting that doesn’t look “wild” enough, at least not compared with nature film footage of wolves. Wolves tend to have a purposeful look about them, whereas these dogs look like domestic dogs out for a lark, not an actual “pack” of wolves or wild animals.
Anonymous

@rossgrady The second matching video is even more suspicious that this rather small “pack of wolves” seem to growl at an even volume and clarity while running past a car with its windows closed.

Since only one video has sound I opened them beside each-other in two browser tabs and set them both running from the moment the drivers door opens, in the hope it might explain the lack of doppler shift or consistent volume.
The videos don’t match in the slightest.

In the drivers video the policeman leans in, takes notes, and struggles with a locked door at first before he can get inside. In the original video the police officer stands back looking into the distance for some time, takes no notes and gets into the car without a problem.

So yeah a fake, and a fake by people who can only rig one camera at a time.
- Bouillion Cube
  
  You are absolutely correct. They ran the event twice and didn’t even bother to try to make the details match.
- cinemajay
  
  “The second matching video is even more suspicious that this rather small “pack of wolves” seem to growl at an even volume and clarity while running past a car with its windows closed.”
  
  When the first growl is heard the back door is still open and then the in-car camera actually pokes out of the driver’s window. While I agree it’s fake, your observations would seem to be inaccurate.
grimc

It’s not unusual for US cops operating speed traps to wave down cars on freeways. Odd that people would find it so strange.

I’ll buy it. Doesn’t seem like a setup to me.
xzzy

The way the surveillance camera just so happens to be in a position to perfectly capture the action is enough red flag to me. The quality is a lot better than most surveillance footage that makes it to the internet, as well.

Faaaaaaaake.
chimonkey

I don’t know about Europe, but in China there are many cops on foot on various intersections and city-roads that can pull you over like that. The car had a broken headlight, and that was probably why he got pulled over. Most of time they just give out tickets (which can be conveniently forgotten if you offer them a bribe).

As for wolves, yeah, there’s a crap load of wolves in eastern part of Russia. I remember growing up hearing stories of huge wolf packs (like thousands) out in the western part of China (Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia). The Chinese Red Army would actually come out on trucks full of machine guns and hunt them down so they wouldn’t threaten the local farm animals.
Stbalbach

Wolves are not uncommon in Eastern Europe, as far west as Eastern Germany, and this video is way over by the Black Sea. Wolves seem exotic to us in the USA because we shot most of them, they are now an endangered species in the lower 48.
Sorcerer Mickey

“Listen: The Children of the Night! What traffic hazard they make!”
knoxblox

Even if they hadn’t used CG, I’m not thinking it would have been too hard to round up some wild dogs and set them loose, just for the effect.
I haven’t been to the Russian Federation, but I have traveled Romania, Moldova, and Ukraine, and I’m told the dog situation isn’t much different. Stray dogs are common, and almost as common are the people who might be willing to help pull off a stunt like that.
wessun

I am from Russia, and there are both national features here covered by this clip.
first – a waving traffic cop. it is ok to stop the car with no reason, “papers check”.
car in the video had a broken headlights, but in most cases its a reason for a cop to take a bribe just like it says in post #30 and fine you for a petty offence or even let you off with no tickets.
second – feral dogs. all over the country. pack of them in most cities last years. has no idea why officials keep it off.

so, the plot of the first vid by “traffic cam” = it ok, seems to be true.
but.. the footage from the car with its gaps.. and the “wolf’s shadow”.. truly fake.
Anonymous

I’m agree with GreenJello.
I think this video is a fake.
the truth to the police is not seen at all nervous when he sees the dogs / wolves.
then when the driver stops looks as if they were planning.
also the behavior of dogs / wolves is strange. Why? in the video the dogs / wolves not pay attention to the car and I think is strange that one of them pass on the right of the car.
for me this video is fake but is very curious.
Micah

Judging by the big “M23″ on the ground, it would appear this was shot somewhere in the vicinity of Rostov-on-Don, as the M-23 runs from there west to the Ukranian border.
- bobrk
  
  M23, in the UK? Don’t they drive on the other side of the road?
Anonymous

My guess- viral campaign for Fimbulwinter: The Movie.

Actually, that sounds awesome. Fenrir is coming!
pignoli

There is a part of me that really wants this to be a STALKER 2 viral…
Anonymous

For what it’s worth, that is how police operate in Russia. They set up checkpoints and wave down cars with a baton to check their papers, etc. On the highway, you run into these every 30 miles or so. Usually they have a little station on the side of the road, too.
lectio

Viral video for a new movie, I’d guess…the quality of the traffic camera clip is just too good.
- lectio
  
  And…dare we hope it’s for 28 Months Later? It’s rumoured to be back on the table, and it was going to be set in Russia…
  
  http://www.totalfilm.com/news/danny-boyle-up-for-28-months-later
  
  Oh, squee!
Anonymous

I love how the pack just materialized out of thin air.
(captcha: authentic arvaded)
cEris

Here is what Reddit has in it’s comments and I have to agree. “The videos don’t match up. Here, see for yourself. I’ve tried a bunch of times to get the two to sync, and I can’t. Then I noticed that in your video, the cop reaches into the cab to grab the driver’s papers and holds the papers in front of him. In the original video, the driver never hands him anything, and the cop keeps his hands at his sides the entire time.” and “oldno7brand is absolutely right. They don’t match up. Along with what he said, the time between the door opening and the wolves appearing doesn’t match up.

This is viral marketing of some sort. It’s got to be. I can’t think of any other reason to stage this event twice for two different angled shots.

edit: Unless it’s for a movie and somebody just decided to put these shots online. But either way, it was definitely staged.
”