| Pagine: < [1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41] > | Ask me anything about subtitling Iniziatore argomento: Max Deryagin
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Max Deryagin 
Russia
Local time: 21:21
Da Inglese a Russo
AVVIO ARGOMENTO
Ticiana Massi Grenga wrote:
Hi,
I have been working with translation/ subtitling since 2013. I had subtitling classes on a post-graduate program and then I attended two courses. As a translator, I am always looking for more and more to learn. I like the networking also. Do you know (and recommend) any courses online for subtitling? My first one was using SW, the second Genius and the third Subtitle Edit. I also used Aegisub sometimes.
And, could you give an idea of the rates of subtitling in US and/ or Europe? My pair is English-Portuguese. I understand it may be hard to talk about rates because it may vary with the language pair...
This post is very interesting.
Thank you!
[Edited at 2016-03-13 01:13 GMT]
Hi Ticiana,
My favorite online course is SWw: http://www.subtitlingworldwide.com/outline.html
It is 300 euros, but it's worth it. The software you'll be using is the trial version of SPOT, a professional subtitle preparation system.
Speaking of rates, they vary greatly, from $1 per minute in developing countries to $80 per minute in EU and NA for feature and festival films. How much you get depends on your language pair, talent, experience, business sense and luck.
It'd be best if you asked the rate question Jose who works in your exact language pair: http://www.proz.com/profile/19091
| | | | | I'm off the grid | Mar 13, 2016 |
I am definitely off the grid on several counts, an oddball subtitler.
First, I came from the translation for dubbing world, where I lived for 17 years before I first crossed the border into subtitling. Right now, thinking about it, an analogy with (what I was TOLD about) Germany struck me.
I could build an analogy associating translation for dubbing with the (former) West Germany, and translation for subtitling with the (former) East Germany. In this framework, since 2004 I've been living in the video-translation unified "Germany".
Let's see if it holds any water...
Germany before WWII was one country. Likewise, both dubbing and subtitling in the analog video days required one helluva lot of equipment.
Digital video dubbing has significantly cut down on hardware, yet it still calls for a lot of resources, human resources included, though the hunt is still under way... some dubbing - particularly narration-only - is already being done with computer-based human voice synthesizers. Meanwhile digital video subtitling has got rid of ALL the hardware... but a plain-vanilla PC.
According to what I was told by people who have been following technology development in Germany (don't get fooled by my surname - it's from Southern Poland since the early 1700s), there was an interesting East/West difference before the Wall was torn down.
In West Germany (= dubbing), they had plenty of resources, so they could make their things look really great; their design has always been great. In East Germany (= subtitling), they had to learn to do (much) more with (much) less; the Soviet resources they had access to were quite "primitive", to say the least.
When Germany reunited, and the local "nerds" got together, they discovered that West Germans' design was artistically superb, however East Germans were astoundingly resourceful and creative in their ability to do anything out of almost nothing.
Indeed, I had the opportunity to see the leading (American) actor in a video watching his own performance onscreen dubbed in Portuguese with my translation and the superb dubbing work of what I consider the #1 dubbing studio in Brazil. His astonishment was mostly from having deeply ingrained the obvious notion that he didn't speak any Portuguese at all. His effort was aimed at spotting whether we had - or not - 'doctored' his mouth movements onscreen to match "his" speech in a foreign language so accurately. That's "West Germany's art" in dubbing, of course, with plenty of resources.
The wonder in subtitling is being able to do the entire process using nothing else but a standard PC, and getting quality (at least I get it) much better than what was possible with the traditional Betacam/U-Matic editing suite, a CG (character generator) and a Genlock.
Before unification, West German products were, of course, much more expensive than their East German counterparts. Maybe this is the reason why the Brazilian Translators' Syndicate suggests (at the bottom of the chart) that regardless of anything else, translation for dubbing should cost 2x as much as the same for subtitling.
IMHO that's passé. As I work on both sub/dub translation, my point is that both East/West Germans supposedly speak the same Deutsch, so you can't exactly tell them apart on this count. As a house policy, I charge exactly the same per minute to translate for dubbing or for subtitling.
However I do reckon that while translation for both dubbing and subtitling often uses the same software (= German language), each one calls for a completely different frame of mind. In dubbing, it's metrics... the art of making a script that will allow clever voice artists to match the lip motion onscreen. In subtitling, it's conciseness... the craft of packing a longer-content message with less characters (= dong more with less).
The reason why I'm off the grid is that I specialize in corporate video... training, institutional, product launch. Bluntly stated to an outsider, this could be defined as "Disney-level quality with technical vocabulary". It's quite different from feature films and TV series, a matter that focuses on high productivity and considerably lower translation rates.
Do I translate feature films on ready, pre-timed templates? Yes, occasionally. Of course, my rate per minute drops to about one-third of my standard, and my productivity trebles, so it's all the same. An analogy (yes, I love making analogies) may be found in Ezio Greggio's movie "Svitati/Screw Loose", when Niki Lauda drives a taxicab... as if it were a F-1 car.
Regarding specific rates, sorry to disappoint you, but it's a "you name it" thing.
The video market is too large, there are just too many players in it, so everything is massive. A large studio/producer/whatever must keep control of the costs, so they'll set a standard rate for translation for all translators. If they start getting substandard work, they'll raise it across the board, until quality is acceptable.
Each video firm will be operating at a different level. They'll find translators accepting jobs at every price level you can think of. Their mission:impossible is to find and sustainably balance a translation cost level that will provide them with acceptable quality.
Your mission - as a translator - is to ascertain your market value in terms of currency, and try to establish it as your accept/reject job offers threshold.
That's why I'm off the grid. Most of my 'corporate video' clients are not in the video business, so I state my rates. Of course, I make sure that they are worth what I deliver. Now and then I get reports that a corporate client of mine tried a cheaper option; I get reassurance that my price is right when they tell me "Never again!".
Okay, this could convince you to go for corporate video only. Don't, unless you know what you are getting into!
I spent some 20 years with about 3/4 of my income based on corporate video translation... for ONE client! While I didn't live like a king, a viceroy would not be an unfair comparison. When a paradigm shifted, and that client went south-southeast (not straightforward south), it took me some 8-10 years to rebuild an equivalent client base. I'd say I have 4-6 corporate video jobs per month, and most - if not all - of them nowadays are short, in the 10-30 minutes range. Fortunately, I do many other things in translation.
On the other hand, there are many colleagues who eke out a good lifestyle from exclusively translating feature films and TV series all the time, non-stop.
| | | | Max Deryagin
Russia
Local time: 21:21
Da Inglese a Russo
AVVIO ARGOMENTO
Thank you for the great post, Jose 
| | | | Frank Schwar (X)
Germania
Local time: 17:21
Da Francese a Tedesco
+ ...
... anyone tell me what would be a decent rate per minute of video (with script and time code) in
Germany. Just an approximate value.
regards
Frank
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Max Deryagin
Russia
Local time: 21:21
Da Inglese a Russo
AVVIO ARGOMENTO
Frank Schwarz wrote:
... anyone tell me what would be a decent rate per minute of video (with script and time code) in
Germany. Just an approximate value.
regards
Frank
Hi Frank,
Around €12 to €15 per minute of video material.
| | | | Frank Schwar (X)
Germania
Local time: 17:21
Da Francese a Tedesco
+ ...
| | Question about subtitling | Apr 4, 2016 |
For those of us who have a background in translation and would like to get into subtitling, which is the best online course you can take to become certified? I saw you mentioned SWw and I have even heard about one called GoSub. Does it matter a lot which certification you get? Is it a good way to get your foot in the door and demonstrate your competence when applying for subtitling jobs?
| | | | Max Deryagin
Russia
Local time: 21:21
Da Inglese a Russo
AVVIO ARGOMENTO
Simona Micutari wrote:
For those of us who have a background in translation and would like to get into subtitling, which is the best online course you can take to become certified? I saw you mentioned SWw and I have even heard about one called GoSub. Does it matter a lot which certification you get? Is it a good way to get your foot in the door and demonstrate your competence when applying for subtitling jobs?
Hi Simona,
You do not become certified by taking a course, especially an online one — you just receive a certificate upon its completion. Huge difference. The course you take can be great or terrible, regardless of the price tag, and the person in charge of sifting through all the applications for a particular project has no way to tell if you fit the bill by simply glancing at your certificate.
It is not the certificate that helps you win the project at hand, it is the application itself. But the thing is, the more you learn about the subtitling process, terminology used in the field and AVT theory, the more enticing cover letter you are able to write. After taking a good subtitling course, you will use the lingo that will communicate to the project manager that you know exactly what you're talking about and that you know the ropes in subtitling. And this is why it does matter which course you take and why you should take one. I recommend SWw.
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dianasantos21
Portogallo
Local time: 16:21
Da Inglese a Portoghese
+ ...
Hello,
I am really interested in becoming a subtitler in the future. I am taking a Translation course at University and I would like to know if my qualifications as a translator are enticing to those who are looking for and hiring subtitlers? And how can I get experience on this wonderful field?
| | | | Max Deryagin
Russia
Local time: 21:21
Da Inglese a Russo
AVVIO ARGOMENTO | Alexia Klein
Stati Uniti
Local time: 11:21
Membro (2020)
Da Inglese a Portoghese
| Foot pedal compatibility | Apr 28, 2016 |
Thanks for this thread, Max!
I am not sure if someone has already asked this question, but here it goes:
Are any of the free softwares compatible with foot pedals? I am really interested in trying Aegisub, but I didn't find that information on their website.
Thank you!
| | | | Max Deryagin
Russia
Local time: 21:21
Da Inglese a Russo
AVVIO ARGOMENTO
Alexia Klein wrote:
Thanks for this thread, Max!
I am not sure if someone has already asked this question, but here it goes:
Are any of the free softwares compatible with foot pedals? I am really interested in trying Aegisub, but I didn't find that information on their website.
Thank you!
Hi Alexia,
Not that I know of, no. Aegisub is not foot pedal-compatible, and neither is any other free subtitling tool I have used in the past.
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Monica Paolillo
Italia
Local time: 17:21
Membro (2005)
Da Inglese a Italiano
+ ...
| That's an interesting one | May 1, 2016 |
Annotation Edit does seem to support foot pedals... but as I've never used any, I'm now wondering… what would you use a foot pedal for exactly and would that actually improve productivity?
Thanks!
Max Deryagin wrote:
Alexia Klein wrote:
Thanks for this thread, Max!
I am not sure if someone has already asked this question, but here it goes:
Are any of the free softwares compatible with foot pedals? I am really interested in trying Aegisub, but I didn't find that information on their website.
Thank you!
Hi Alexia,
Not that I know of, no. Aegisub is not foot pedal-compatible, and neither is any other free subtitling tool I have used in the past.
| | | | | For transcribing/translating only | May 1, 2016 |
Monica Paolillo wrote:
Annotation Edit does seem to support foot pedals... but as I've never used any, I'm now wondering… what would you use a foot pedal for exactly and would that actually improve productivity?
Express Scribe (AV player for transcription/translation) managed to digitally replace conventional dictaphones, which used pedals. At first, I still had a good such pedal from an Agavox dictaphone pedal not shown), so I rewired it for a computer serial port.
A pedal is good when someone can pound the keyboard like hell (not my case ), often as fast as it is spoken. Some people like to translate video and spot lines directly on a subtitling program, and there are those who timespot it at the same time. With practice, they say productivity booms; my take is that quality drops sharply.
I guess they draw the paradigm from a restaurant cook... quite often the food tastes better when they are overloaded. The problem is that food has to simmer, while a video is there to be subtitled, and there is only so much anyone can do at the same time.
Before Express Scribe, I used to transfer the audio track from video to open-reel tape recorders, to translate or transcribe. My first one was lever-operated, so I got used to moving my hand from the keyboard to it for every play/stop cycle, and back. My second one had electric control, so it was just a matter of hitting a button. It had a remote control, but its keys were too small, and required pressing them hard. A much better remote control, also from Akai, came up later; it would be neat (if I ever had it) to place it alongside the rear of my keyboard. Yet Express Scribe uses the F-keys which are already there, even closer, so what's the point of a foot control?
I am also concerned about my driving, if I use my feet for 'other' pedals. Many years ago I read the story of a commercial pilot who landed a B-737 on Congonhas airport here in Sao Paulo. He retrieved his VW Beetle from the parking lot, and drove home. On the way, upon reaching the top of a hill, he suddenly realized that the entire traffic ahead had stopped. Instead of stepping on the brake pedal, he pulled the steering wheel towards his chest... to no avail! He smashed his car into the one in front of him.
| | | | Monica Paolillo
Italia
Local time: 17:21
Membro (2005)
Da Inglese a Italiano
+ ...
| Good point about the pilot... | May 2, 2016 |
But my question was practical... meaning what feature exactly would you do with a foot pedal that you're now doing with a keyboard? I'm not sure I can picture the process...
quote]José Henrique Lamensdorf wrote:
Monica Paolillo wrote:
Annotation Edit does seem to support foot pedals... but as I've never used any, I'm now wondering… what would you use a foot pedal for exactly and would that actually improve productivity?
Express Scribe (AV player for transcription/translation) managed to digitally replace conventional dictaphones, which used pedals. At first, I still had a good such pedal from an Agavox dictaphone pedal not shown), so I rewired it for a computer serial port.
A pedal is good when someone can pound the keyboard like hell (not my case ), often as fast as it is spoken. Some people like to translate video and spot lines directly on a subtitling program, and there are those who timespot it at the same time. With practice, they say productivity booms; my take is that quality drops sharply.
I guess they draw the paradigm from a restaurant cook... quite often the food tastes better when they are overloaded. The problem is that food has to simmer, while a video is there to be subtitled, and there is only so much anyone can do at the same time.
Before Express Scribe, I used to transfer the audio track from video to open-reel tape recorders, to translate or transcribe. My first one was lever-operated, so I got used to moving my hand from the keyboard to it for every play/stop cycle, and back. My second one had electric control, so it was just a matter of hitting a button. It had a remote control, but its keys were too small, and required pressing them hard. A much better remote control, also from Akai, came up later; it would be neat (if I ever had it) to place it alongside the rear of my keyboard. Yet Express Scribe uses the F-keys which are already there, even closer, so what's the point of a foot control?
I am also concerned about my driving, if I use my feet for 'other' pedals. Many years ago I read the story of a commercial pilot who landed a B-737 on Congonhas airport here in Sao Paulo. He retrieved his VW Beetle from the parking lot, and drove home. On the way, upon reaching the top of a hill, he suddenly realized that the entire traffic ahead had stopped. Instead of stepping on the brake pedal, he pulled the steering wheel towards his chest... to no avail! He smashed his car into the one in front of him. [/quote]
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