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Online videos
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Thursday, 25 June 2009 |
Written by Leslie
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For training videos, institutional films and product promotion videos
I was recently given an audio file of several speakers debating at a conference and asked to transcribe it. Those were the only instructions. “Transcribe it.” Fine, I thought. “But what’s going to happen to the transcript afterwards?” I wanted to know. Before the project went any further, I needed fuller, more precise information. If you’re a translator, make sure you ask for more information. If you’re contracting the job out, make sure you give it. Providing a briefing ahead of time will make all the difference in the final product.
Provide project briefing
• Is it a press release or article based on the transcript?
If, for example, a journalist is asked to write an article about the conference, a transcript may be required, but a summary of what each speaker said may be sufficient. The summary transcript gets rid of any stumbling, stuttering or repeated words, unless they are of importance to the content.
• Is it a dubbing project?
If, for example, different voice-over artists are going to “play” each conference speaker’s part in the target language, then a verbatim, uncondensed transcript is required. A clear distinction of which speaker said what is of utmost importance.
• Is it a subtitling project?
If subtitles are to be created from the transcript, a verbatim transcript may be the first step. But once transcribed, the text must be condensed, cut into lines and time-coded to synchronize the subtitles with the images. The onscreen, end product won’t correspond to the original sentences and paragraphs.
Several language versions: subtitling vs. dubbing
In this particular case, the answer was “Several language versions would be created from the transcript and used as subtitles.” Subtitles had been chosen as opposed to dubbing for this project due to cost and time imperatives.
The overall cost of dubbing is about three times more than subtitling. The cost difference is mainly due to the number of voice-over artists (or dubbers) involved and the difficulty of coordinating the artists’ schedules in all the target languages for the actual recording sessions. In the long run, it will be much less expensive to subtitle in several languages than record several voice-overs. Once transcribed and condensed into subtitles, the project will require only one translator per language, and a single technician for embedding all the subtitles into the different language versions.
Obviously, we’re not talking about making a full-feature movie for the general public here. In that case, dubbing may be preferred, depending on the type of movie and/or audience. Here, we’re talking about management training videos, institutional films, product promotion videos and the like.
Subtitling isn’t about cutting a transcript into lines
As said earlier, subtitling does not mean just cutting a transcript into lines and slapping it on the screen. If that’s all you do, you’ll get overly long subtitles that cover the whole screen; they’ll be too long for any audience to read, let alone digest. No matter how good the original was, you’ll ruin the film and any chance it had of being effective in its translated version.
Specific instructions and key parameters for subtitling
If you’re “ordering” a transcription for subtitles, specific instructions should be given to the subtitler and if you’re the subtitler make sure you take a few key parameters into account. Remember if you do a verbatim translation first, you’ll need to go back and edit it substantially afterwards.
Example, spoken version: "It is our deep-hearted and strongly held belief that..."
Subtitled version: "We really think that..."
To master the art of subtitling, here are some important pointers:
- Condense the content into shorter phrases (almost re-translation), with as few words as possible
- Convey the idea of what's being said while allowing the audience as much time as possible to watch the action onscreen
- Do not translate literally, capture the essence and filter out what is non-essential
- Maintain the right register (technical, idiomatic, slang, literary…)
- Adapt, replace and recreate, especially when puns, play on words and proverbs are concerned. Be creative.
- Be consistent in punctuation, italics and spelling
- Divide lines with speed of reading and comprehension in mind
- Keep idea units and semantic units together
Time + amount of text = rhythm
As Paul Cohen, a professional French/German/Danish subtitler says: “It's essential that your subtitles respect a number of parameters, the key ones being time and space. You need to establish a rhythm that the reader can settle into and depend on…Remember, it takes the eye a certain amount of time for a viewer to realize that new text has appeared on the screen and to start reading...It is not acceptable to have, for example, a two-line subtitle that flashes on the screen for 2 seconds followed by another two-liner that hangs on the screen for 7 seconds (you can tell the subtitling has been done by an amateur).” Find out more on proz.com, the translation workplace, in the forum on subtitling.
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Last Updated ( Thursday, 25 February 2010 )
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