I used a pre-production Canon 5D Mark II and a 24 mm f/1.8 lens for this clip. Support was Manfrotto 455B tripod and 410 geared head. The footage is unedited, except trimming of ends, addition of watermark, replacement of ambient sound with background music and conversion to 1280x720 WMV file.

First, I placed the right-most figurine (from my son's chess set) such that its left eye is in focus at the lens's MFD (MF via Live View 10x). Lighting was ambient illumination in my living room, courtesy of two windows that allow indirect sunlight to come in. Next, I MF'ed the lens to infinity, started video recording, then turned the focus ring by hand slowly towards MFD (I obviously didn't do a good job focusing as shown by the jerky movements of the sharp zone, this thing was done in less than 5 minutes). When the focus ring hit the MFD stopper, the right-most figurine came in good focus.

For somebody like me whose only exposure to video shooting is a consumer videocam, DOF control like this is extremely fascinating and opens up a lot of shot possibilities. :)