Know your football from your fútbol. Knowledge of Spanish will allow you to keep up with the Latino influence on popular culture which is already a significant part and is growing every year

Learning another language keeps your brain sharp – Research indicates that knowing and using two languages reduces your chances of developing dementia, including Alzheimer’s Disease

Spanish will completely change the way you travel – just one language can provide easier access to more than 20 countries

Learning Spanish will even improve the way you speak English, not only understanding grammar structure better, but also knowing English vocabulary that is Latin based.

Learning Spanish is fun! Not only is it an exciting process to learn a language, but it opens the doors to friendships with warm and fun loving people.

Now that we understand why to learn Spanish, let’s take a look at how someone can go about learning the language. There are many avenues available, so be sure and pick the methods that work best for your learning style.

Recognize that learning another language is a lifelong process that never really ends. Keep in mind that it’s better to study a little bit every day than going on a studying marathon every month.

Take a course at a local community college. Native Spanish speakers will rarely correct you out of courtesy so it’s important to take a class where the teacher will catch mistakes. At Portland Community College (PCC) for example, it’s inexpensive and offers beginner level Spanish courses year round. For resident tuition, it’s just $316.

Immerse yourself. Apart from Spain, Spanish-speaking countries have a much cheaper cost of living than the United States, making extended stays fairly cost accessible. The major Latin American cities offer Spanish instruction for tourists as well, which tend to be cheaper and better than the classes found stateside.

Keep a “New Word Journal”. When you find words that you don’t know, immediately look them up and then write them down in an ongoing journal.

Watch Spanish television with the closed captioning turned on. From newscasts to variety shows to juicy dramas, you’re always likely to find programming that will entertain you while introducing you to new words and phrases. Don’t worry about the entire meaning, just focus on short words and phrases in their context. Turn on closed captioning, which is available for most shows and greatly helps understanding by showing Spanish subtitles underneath. The three top Spanish TV stations in Oregon are:

Univision – Channel 31 on Comcast

Telemundo – Channel 30 on Comcast

Estrella TV – Channel 82 on Comcast

Take advantage of the many online resources that provide great instruction and reference. Here are a few recommended by us but don’t be afraid to do some searching on your own. You will learn best from a variety of sources rather than sticking to just one.

About.com

SpanishDict.com

YouTube

Patrick is the multi-talented New York-based composer who brought the infectious ‘ACCESO SIN FRONTERAS’ jingle to life. We at Lara Media are proud to announce that Patrick will be going to the Cannes Film Festival next month for a film he scored titled ‘Birthday Girl’. The film is Olivier French’s ‘Birthday Girl’. You can learn more about the film here https://www.facebook.com/viralcinemastudio

Patrick also scored the trailer to Ron Morales’ film ‘Graceland’ which will be screening at the Tribeca Film Festival this month in New York. You can view this trailer and sample Patrick’s work at his official website.

Congratulations Patrick!

When a giant movie star ditches the big budget that typically characterizes most major Hollywood productions in favor of shooting a low budget passion project performed entirely in Spanish, people typically take notice. Especially when that movie star is Will Ferrell, one of the world’s most popular comedic actors.

His newest Spanish language film, Casa de Mi Padre, opened in select theaters this past weekend in the hopes of receiving nationwide expansion in the coming weeks.  This week members of the Lara Media team went to see Ferrell’s new film and we are happy to report that it was hysterical.  Not only was the film entertaining but the audience demographic for the film split equally between Latino viewers and viewers of other ethnicities. Since opening last Friday, the film has already grossed an encouraging $2.5 million dollars from only a couple hundred venues signaling the film’s appeal to all kinds of people, regardless of age or ethnicity.

With a budget of $6 million the film is a significantly smaller scale endeavor than anything Ferrell has attempted in the past, but it is also his riskiest.  Despite the fact that Hispanics represent the fastest-growing minority group in the United States according to the U.S. Census bureau, with a population of over 50.5 million counting, this demographic frequently finds itself underserved by most major media outlets. (www.census.gov) In 2011, only a few dozen Spanish-language films received distribution here in the US, including Pedro Almodovar’s critically-acclaimed The Skin I Live In. Not that any of this mattered to Ferrell or his production team, who set out to make a comedy that lovingly ripped off the standard telenovelas that air daily on stations like Univision and Telemundo.

In an article with the New York Times, Will Ferrell revealed it would be funny “not to have the joke be that [he spoke] bad Spanish, but that [he] actually spoke as proficient Spanish as [he could] muster” with “everything played really straight.”

Ferrell plays Armando Alvarez, a rancher whose family becomes embroiled with a violent drug lord. Well-known Mexican actors Gael Garcia-Bernal and Diego Luna lend their talents to the film as well as newcomer Genesis Rodriguez. Despite taking Spanish in high school and college, Ferrell required a crash course in the language in order to adequately prepare for the role. Luckily, flawless Spanish speaking skills weren’t a requirement as the shakiness of Ferrell’s accent added to the jokiness of the film.

Although the film was always destined to be a hard sell for audiences, the Casa de Mi Padre team received full financial support from the Santa Monica company Nala Films, who have produced other films like Steve Carrell’s Dan in Real Life. Nala Film’s CEO and president Darlene Caamaño Loquet told New York Times reporter Dave Itzkoff that to them “the definition of Hispanic or Latino themes is not the same as the general entertainment mind-set.” In financing and distributing Casa de Mi Padre, “the goal is to make mainstream movies that have people that sound and look like [Latinos], because we [they] are the mainstream.” In acknowledging the impact and importance of the Latino market, Mrs. Caamaño Loquet helps demonstrate what I can only hope is a continued trend in making films and other forms of entertainment that overcome language boundaries and enter the realm of mass entertainment. If the response to Casa de Mi Padre is any indication, we can expect to see more of these types of films in the years to come!

Also, our office needs to learn this song, pronto!

The 2012 Latino Vote – Turning Numbers Into Clout

Latinos will turnout in record numbers in the next Presidential election, with at least 12.2 million casting ballots, according to projections released today by the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials (NALEO) Educational Fund. This analysis also reveals that Latinos will account for a significant share of the electorate in several states.

According to NALEO Executive Director Arturo Vargas, “Latinos continue to reshape the nation’s political map, and the Latino electorate will play a decisive role in Election 2012.” The NALEO Educational Fund projects that the Latino vote will increase 26% from 2008, and Latinos will account for at least 8.7% of the country’s voters.

California, Florida and Illinois are likely to see the greatest percentage increase in turnout since 2008. In three states – California, New Mexico, and Texas – at least one in five voters will be Latino, with the Latino share of the electorate in New Mexico reaching 35%.

Not yet registered to vote? It’s super easy! Just Click HERE.

Photo Source

As we all know, no business can function without a team of dedicated people at its core. We all rely on each other to help Lara Media be the very best that it can be. And, as with all good advertising agencies, the team working behind the scenes at LMS are perfectly happy to remain invisible, letting the quality of their work speak for itself. But we felt it would be unfair not to recognize all of the incredible people who work here and their amazing efforts. Everyone has a story to tell and our staff has some great stories!

Today we are pleased to introduce a brand new video series called “LMS Staff Profiles.” Each week we will introduce you to a member of the LMS team and share with you their incredible stories.  First up is our awesome visual effects artist and event logistics coordinator. Check out his story below!

  “Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past or present are certain to miss the future.”  -John F. Kennedy

The Hispanic population, 50.5 million in 2010, will rise to 128 million in 2050, tripling in size. Latinos will be 29% of the population, compared with 16% in 2010. Latinos will account for 60% of the nation’s population growth from 2010 to 2050.  (US Census). Overall, the Hispanic population of the United States grew from 35.3 million in 2000 to 50.5 million in 2010, accounting for more than half of the nation’s overall population growth during that decade. (Passel, Cohn and Lopez, 2011)

There’s no denying the impact that the Latino consumer continues to have on the economy of the northwest. The growth is astounding, and the growth is growing, meaning Hispanics in the US are growing at an exponential rate. New births are far surpassing new immigrant arrivals, with there being almost two births per every new immigrant when it comes to the growth of Mexican Americans (Pew Hispanic Center).

As our communities continue to grow and diversify, advertising and marketing professionals must strive to understand this changing landscape. In the approaching fight for Latino market share and continued brand loyalty, the winners will be the companies that have actionable knowledge about the consumer behaviors of Latinos and what is most important to them.

New markets require new ways of collecting and analyzing information. What has worked well for the general market will not necessarily capture information well from Latinos. Language itself is an extremely significant barrier, as well as culture and different channels of communication. Considerations such as recruiting, sampling and research planning must be centered around the community model that is the cornerstone of Latino culture.

Lara Media combines a natural understanding of Latino culture and the Spanish language (as we are Latino) with market research expertise and flexibility of approach. We offer customized solutions to get at the heart of what is most important to both your customers and potential customers and we use the latest industry proven technologies to analyze results. While the barriers to entry and challenges are great, so are the opportunities that come hand in hand with understanding this unique population.

A tribe is a group of people connected to one another, connected to a leader, and connected to an idea. For millions of years, human beings have been part of one tribe or another. A group needs only two things to be a tribe: a shared interest and a way to communicate. Tribes need leadership. Sometimes one person leads, sometimes more. People want connection and growth and something new. They want change. You can’t have a tribe without a leader – and you can’t be a leader without a tribe.

- Seth Godin, Tribes

PATRICIA VERDUZCO
Hello! I am Patti Verduzco, the new Office Manager and Media Coordinator for Lara Media Services. I was born and raised in Oregon. My family is originally from Mexico. I have years of experience in office management. My heart beats to the sound of music and family is everything to me. I play accordion, dance, and sing in a popular family band, Grupo Antifaz. I’ve been performing all over the Pacific Northwest for since I was twelve years old. I am so excited for being part of such a great team at Lara Media Services.

HUGO ANGUIANO
I am Hugo Anguiano, Layout Artist and Brand Identity developer at Lara Media Services. I was born in Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico. I moved to the United States when I was 16. Coming to a different country with a language barrier and culture change, I developed an interest in what had no boundaries or rules — art and design. After high school, I followed my love of art and attended school for Graphic Design. In my free time, I choreograph and dance many styles, including Latin Jazz. I am excited to share my passion with Lara Media Services.

For the uninitiated, the 5D Mark II is a High definition single lens reflex cameras (HDSLRs) designed primarily for photographers. You’ve seen these types of cameras before – whether at weddings and Quinceañeras, studio photo shoots or simply hanging around the neck of friend or family member who loves to take pictures. While many of the earlier incarnations of these cameras came with video functions that allowed the operator to shoot some rudimentary video, the cameras were almost never used for anything other then still photography.

So how does this pertain to Lara Media and to you, our readers? As we enter into this new year Lara Media Services hopes to work with our local Univision affiliate and other media outlets to make the switch from standard definition analog broadcast to high definition. With a substantially higher resolution than what was the norm for the past few years, this new standard will conform to the higher resolution of the high definition televisions on the market right now.

Since early 2009 though, there has been a seismic shift in the technology being used for professional video production, with DSLRs (specifically Canon’s 5D and 7D) moving to the forefront of professional preference. In an industry that had been dominated for years by lower quality video cameras, DSLRs have revolutionized the game for professionals and consumers alike. And all for the affordable price of $3,000 or less. In contrast to the sharp, flat and altogether unexceptional images produced by video cameras, these remarkable cameras have a more cinematic look, akin to the 35mm film that was industry standard for most of the past century. The focus is sharper, the depth of field more shallow and impressive.

Pictured: Seanacey Pierce. LMS 2012.

After cinematographer Vincent Laforet released his short film “Reverie” to the online community, filmmakers all around the world began to take notice. The film, which was shot entirely on the 5D, showed the potential of the camera to a brand new audience. Since Reverie’s release, the technology has been embraced by such high-profile TV shows like 24, House, and Californication and big budget feature films like Black Swan and Captain America, all of which used either the 5D or 7D for portions of their shoot.

All of us in the media production department at Lara Media are excited to have the 5D in our inventory, especially now that the broadcast technology has caught up with the quality of the equipment producing the content.

It’s a powerful tool but in the immortal words of Spider-Man – “with great power comes great responsibility.” At the end of the day, the quality of the camera means very little if the story being told isn’t interesting or unique. What we at Lara Media are constantly trying to do is raise the bar for storytelling. Commercial production, like all other forms of media production, boils down to one very simple concept – the viewer has to care. If they aren’t interested in what is happening on screen, no connection has been established and you’ve failed. Any hope you had of selling your client’s product or promoting their business has been forfeited and then it’s the just tedious wait for your favorite show to come back from the commercial break. So putting our best foot forward to tell the most innovative story we can has always been priority number one. It’s not easy but in the end the payoff is much more rewarding.

Think you have what it takes to get into commercial video production? Want to go out and purchase a 7D or 5D for your own collection? Great! There’s never been a better time to jump into the industry. But before you do, I urge you to sit down, unmute the TV, and really watch some of the commercials playing on TV right now. How do they look? Are the shots clever and exciting? Is the story compelling? Do the creators do a good job making you interested in the product? Are you interested in learning more? What separates a successful ad from an unsuccessful one? It’s not an accident. Each one had a group of dedicated storytellers working behind the scenes, making it all happen. They were conscious of the details, of which camera they would use and why. Even though the technology is always changing, it is the most old-fashioned of tools that remains the most important. Find a good story and the rest will follow.