WHAT IS PARANG? Parang as a word is an interpretation of the word “Parranda” - this means basically “the action of merry-making, group of serenaders”. In Spanish this word is used in the form “andar de parranda” or “parrandear” (used in Venezuela), meaning basically “to go Paranging”. Originally the “Paranderos” - as the singers and players of instruments are called - went carol singing and playing from house to house in the neighbourhood, serenading family and friends spontaneously. These would in return often serve some food and refreshments such as pastels or other snacks and ponche-a-creme to the merrymakers, and the resulting atmosphere would be that of happy togetherness and the joy of a good Christmas lime that could continue to early hours of the morning. Parang season began in early November and lasted until the sixth of January, the date of the the Feast of the Epiphany (also known in T&T as “Dia de Los Reyes” or “Les Rois”) - sometimes until the beginning of February (the feast of Purification on the 2nd). Though Christmas was and especially nowadays is THE season for Parang, other religious and social events could also inspire Paranderos to come and play (Easter, Our Lady of Mount Carmel, weddings). The usual instruments that were (and are still) used in Parang were mainly string-instruments, such as the Guitar, the Cuatro (a four-stringed small Guitar), the Violin, the Mandolin and the Bandolin, accompanied by some light rhythm-instruments such as the Chac …

Anyway, not much to say, and honestly not much to see. Christmas was hot and humid, plus there were a lot of wet patches of pavement and a few puddles to avoid. This clip is pretty much another test piece to see if I have the HD stuff down right. No hammers, no super tech, just some basic skating and some dumbassery. Have fun and go skate if you can. If you can’t skate right now, go eat some Little Debbies and some pork rinds. Eat the rinds first though, ’cause you’re not supposed to have dessert before dinner. TECHNICAL INFORMATION First of all, thanks to ebbixx and lukenmire77 for their invaluable assistance and advice. The footage was filmed with a consumer-model HD camera (the Sony HDR-HC9), then imported via Firewire onto a Macbook Pro (running Leopard). None of the software that I have that normally batch-captures regualr mini DV footage will allow you to batch capture HD footage, so I used both imovie 08 and Adobe Premiere Pro CS3 (with updates from Adobe that have 1080i HDV presets). The footage was mostly edited in Premiere, with some stuff done in After Effects CS3. I exported the movie (.Mov by default on Mac, would have been .AVI on my PC) uncompressed. Note: I’d tried adding the H.264 codec in both Premiere and imovie on previous occasions, but my HD playback was screwed up both times (on youtube, not my computer). The difference this time is that I downloaded a program called Streamclip (there are Mac and PC versions) from here: www.squared5.com Streamclip’s …

I have a dream… and that dream is to be in ijustine’s Christmas Music Video!!! I have got to be in it Click on the link below for information if you decide you have a dream… Like mine: www.youtube.com and here’s my blog if your interested for more info: www.turelx-channel.blogspot.com FOLLOW ME ON TWITTER!!! www.twitter.com ENJOY MY COMEDY SKILLS! AND DANCING SKILLS! LOVE YOU IJUSTINE!!!

I do not own this track . INFO: Jetson Christmas Carol Part 2 Part 1 - www.youtube.com Part 2 - www.youtube.com Part 3 - www.youtube.com

23 torches, 14 Air NZ staff volunteers, 2 cameras, 1 cold evening at the beach, and a whole lot of Christmas spirit! This year’s Xmas card was produced by Air New Zealand staff enthusiasts and uses a photographic technique called “light painting” combined with a “Stop-motion” animation technique. No computer drawing or visual effects at all were used, everything was done in-camera. More info on how it’s done can be found here: en.wikipedia.org and here: en.wikipedia.org Happy Holidays from Air New Zealand!