Audiovisual translation – what is it?

Audiovisual translation is a type of translation that includes both sound and image in order to fully express the content conveyed. It covers all translations including films, TV shows and series or games.

The beginnings of audiovisual translation

The beginnings of audiovisual translation are considered to be related to the creation of silent cinema. The film plot, often very expressive with live music, was not always understandable to the viewers. This is how the idea came about to hire actors-interpreters in cinemas, who read or played live dialogues to scenes appearing on the screen. Today they are considered to be the first audiovisual translators.

Along with the creation of cinema with sound in the USA, there were also the first attempts to translate films into other languages. To avoid the high cost of producing one film in several language versions, the focus was placed on recording films in English.

The above was associated with another problem, namely the illiteracy of some of the audience. This situation was resolved by creating the first dubbing to the film entitled “Rio Rita” in 1929.

It may sound hard to believe, but for nearly 100 years, audiovisual translation has still been a great need for the audience market around the world. Along with civilization changes and technical progress, translation techniques have undergone a number of changes.

Recently, there has been a rapid increase in audiovisual translation: advertisements, films, TV shows and series, corporate videos, training videos, documentaries, video games, interviews, conferences, etc.

Characteristics of audiovisual translation

The specific approach to audiovisual translation is that in order to translate a given material, it is necessary to take into account the cultural features that appear in texts and recordings. They are translated for the purpose of their interpretation and keeping their original tone while adapting them to the target culture. This means that the audiovisual translator, besides knowledge of a given language (grammar, vocabulary), must have a thorough knowledge of the colloquial language and the jargon of a given language. A typical example is the audiovisual translation of films, TV shows and series or other fictional materials in which translators must be able to translate ironic remarks, jokes and even profanity, etc. We understand the huge complexity of this work along with the constraints imposed by the complicated structured format, due to the fact that the content must be conveyed through the mouths of people that speak a different language in the dozen or so words that appear in the subtitles.

Currently, there are three audiovisual translation techniques that are used:

● voiceover – actors’ dialogs are read by a voiceover reader;

● dubbing – translation consisting in removing the actors’ original statements and replacing them with voices speaking dialogues in the target language, characteristic of animated films.

● subtitles – the translation appears as text, usually at the bottom of the screen.

Subtitles displayed in a foreign-language film

messages displayed in their own language. Viewers can therefore hear the voice of the original character while reading the translated subtitles to understand the message being conveyed. In order to obtain a high-quality result, it is necessary to thoroughly learn the culture of both languages, so that the translation perfectly reflects the language expressions and phrases of the original messages. It’s also important to note that the translator has to adjust the length of the sentences in order to allow the viewers to have time to read them.

Types of subtitles:

● In the language of the film.

● In another language.

● Subtitles for people with a hearing impairment.

● Live subtitles used for real-time events.

Since the creation of subtitles means transferring verbal expressions into written expressions, the style must be compact but without telegraphy and subject to severe restrictions on legibility.

Stages of creating subtitles

1. Tracking, technical step, text localisation and transcription of dialogues with the accuracy of the image displayed on the screen, prepared on professional software, (start and end points) and thus the duration of each caption. This time will depend on the length of the text contained in the subtitle.

2. Translation, the author’s work. A translator receives a video, a script showing the subtitling structure, and a computer file containing the identification. Then he/she can start translating the work.

3. Simulation, necessary control. After the translation is completed, the Translator displays the subtitles on the screen with the assistance of the technician or the author. While guaranteeing a professional result, this step is crucial as it allows you to fine-tune the adaptation. In addition, this is the last opportunity to correct any typos.

Dubbing

Dubbing involves the replacement of voices and sound effects of an audiovisual product with other voices and sounds that are recorded in a language that is usually different from the original. An audiovisual translator specialising in dubbed translation needs to complete a detailed training course in this regard, which takes into account such aspects as lip synchronization, and being prepared to work in a multidisciplinary team of translators, editors, dubbing actors, etc. Additionally, there are also peculiarities among different dubbing categories. For example, in the case of voiceover, unlike dubbing of films, TV shows and series, lip syncing is unnecessary.

The intention of dubbing is to create an illusion because the dialogues replace the words spoken by the actors in the original version of the film, series or cartoon, the dubbing translator must maintain the spirit, register, and tone of the original version. If he/she has to respect the synchronisation limit, he/she should equally respect acting and the naturalness of language spoken by the actors.

Dubbing steps:

1. Detection, a technical step. Detection of information necessary for the dubbing author’s work on the master tape or professional software: original dialogues, changes of shots, traces of detection (lip movements, mouth movement, breathing), etc.

2. Adaptation, the dubbing author’s work.

3. Verification, necessary control. The author goes to a dubbing studio to present his/her adaptation to the director of the set, who is responsible for supervising the voice recording process. Since dubbing covers extensive areas such as animated films, documentaries, reality shows, etc., the translator must use certain skills, e.g. a serious tone in documentary materials, strict rules of terminology, restoring the coherence and effectiveness of the discourse.

Localization of video games

The process of localizing a video game involves modifying and adapting the original game so that the resulting product can be marketed in another country. The demand for this type of translation has been increasing along with the development of the video game sector, which is completely globalized, whose works can be marketed in any country in the world. Localizing video games is a complex process and its difficulty varies depending on the type of the video game subject to localization.

There are a few things to consider when planning to introduce your video game to the international market:

*Menu and interface: this is the element that connects the player to the game itself and allows them to interact.

*Dialogues: this is certainly the part for which localization is really important as it is necessary to adapt expressions which very often do not make it possible to apply a literal translation.

*Name of game elements: it is also necessary to localize the name of the elements, such as character names or game terminology.

*Graphic elements.

Transcription

Language transcription is the reproduction of texts of a video or audio recording in a written format. There are two main types: direct transcription (audio-to-text recordings, all sounds heard are written down in a document, including unfinished, repeated words, cross-talk, pronunciation errors) and natural transcription.

Properties of a good audiovisual translator

*Excellent knowledge of the source language and related culture. The translator must be able to grasp all the subtleties of the language, but also understand regional expressions, slangs and accents.

*Knowledge of the history, culture, everyday life of the country of origin of the content in order to understand humour or cultural references, etc.

*Excellent knowledge of the target language. In his/her native language, the Translator can use all the subtleties necessary to convey the message of the dialogue. Some people are fluent in many languages; but in writing it is very rarely possible to master two of them perfectly. Usually, only one of the languages is at a professional level, which is why very often translations are made only into the native language of the translator.

*High level of versatility. Whether it’s a documentary about nature, a film about yakuza, a science-fiction series, a horror film, or a reality TV show, each genre has conventions, vocabulary, codes, and tone to be respected otherwise your target audience will be disappointed.

Challenges in working on audiovisual translation

Each type of audiovisual translation involves specific difficulties.

1. Changing the target content.

Keep in mind that this type of translation is definitely different from traditional translation, where the role of the translator is limited only to precise translation of the content in the source language into the language of the recipient. Any departures from the original text or extrapolation of the content are unwelcome, as well as any work that would worsen the final outcome of the translation when compared to the source text.

The case is completely different when it comes to audiovisual translation. This is because audiovisual translation is prepared differently for comedy and documentary purposes, for instance. In the case of feature films, the translator has some freedom, provided that the meaning of the message is not distorted.

Translated content is especially important in the case of subtitles or dubbing created for a documentary. All details, names, technical concepts, phenomena or facts must be retained in order not to mislead the viewers.

2. Adjusting the length of the translation to the quickly changing images on the screen.

Keep in mind that people are able to perceive an audio record significantly faster than they read. Excessively long subtitles will make the recipient unable to keep up with the changes of scenes and dialogues. To avoid the risk of completely disrupting the reception of a film, subtitles should be composed of a maximum of two lines containing 35-37 characters. They should be adjusted to the actor’s speed of speech and the movement of the image. The combination of these elements is a real challenge for audiovisual translators.

3. The use of language abbreviation techniques.

As can be seen from the above example, it is necessary to use specific translation techniques that cover omitting, shortening or condensing specific fragments. What elements can be omitted?

* repetitions

* elements irrelevant to the course of action (different for each type of film, depending on its genre)

At the same time, the translator must be extremely careful not to omit the elements necessary to convey the meaning of a given statement as a result of applying the above-mentioned measures.

4. The ability to divide sections of text

It is assumed that the subtitles should be no more than 2 lines of text and should not exceed 38 characters. For this purpose, it is necessary to choose the right font and put the subtitles in the right place on the screen.

Increasing the number of characters, trying to fit more than 40 in a line, reduces the legibility of the subtitles as the font size is also inevitably reduced. The translator has to follow the above rules, but sometimes this will happen at the cost of the message conveyed to the target audience. When a film goes through multiple shot changes, the translator must take into account the spatial constraints as well as the speed of the images. Often in action and horror films, or in scenes where there are fierce arguments, the camera can only capture a given element for a moment. It is also possible that with such quick changes, the speaker does not even finish a sentence, which shortens the reading time of the subtitles.

5. Translating colloquial and coarse language

The translator must have the ability to precisely match the used vocabulary to the context, age and origin, depending on the group of recipients.

6. Cultural fit, localization

The famous failure of the English translation of the French film “La Haine” (for the American audience) shows the dangers of what is known in the area of translation studies as the “targeting” strategy, or simply naturalization. The latter can be defined as follows: deleting references, values, etc. of the original text so that the text is assimilated to the target culture and meets its standards.

For this purpose, verbal localisms are introduced and defined, i.e. “culture-specific extra-linguistic references”, which are lexical elements, including proper nouns and nouns, denoting phenomena specific to the culture in which they work. The translator can choose from several categories: literal translation, specification, generalization, omission and replacement. Replacement can take place in the following forms: replacement of a foreign element unknown to the public by a foreign element recognizable by the same audience (e.g. for the American public, replacement of Pyrenées National Park by Yellowstone National Park); replacement by a so-called international element, known to all interested cultures (dumplings substitutes for ravioli); substitution with an element in the target culture where there is a similar equivalent (Danish New Years Eve replaces the American holiday of July 4).

It should be remembered that each country has different habits and expectations regarding audiovisual translations. They must be taken into account.

7. Synchronization

In the case of dubbing and voiceover, it is important to synchronize the spoken text with the situation happening in a given scene, with the actors’ mouth movements and their gestures.

Audiovisual translation stages (according to Zohr Lepeigneu)

1. Getting to know the document. Start by watching the film you want to translate. Get to know all the elements that it consists of: the topic discussed, different speakers and their point of view, the audience. Make sure you understand all the elements to be translated, following the principle that the most important thing is not what the audience hears, but rather what it will understand in a given context. Creating subtitles involves the skill of being a good viewer and analysing every gesture and words of the actors taking into account all the details.

2. Transcription. It is not always necessary to transcribe the text of a video, film or documentary to obtain the subtitles. Sometimes you will be able to find a script if it has not already been provided to you. Either way, you should always be sure to re-read this script carefully while listening to the audio track to be translated to check that no item has been omitted or incorrectly rewritten. It’s a good idea to have a video script before starting the translation process. This will allow you to peek into the text without constantly listening to the passage you are working on.

3. Research. This is an intermediate stage of preparing for translation. It does not differ from the usual terminological research when working on a specialised translation, although it may involve localization or transcreation of some elements. Make a list of the cultural elements of the source language that cannot be translated directly and adapt them so that the target audience understands the essence. The purpose of this activity is to adapt the translation to the customs and culture of the target audience. Sometimes all that needs to be done is to find an equivalent (for example, “príncipe azul” will not be translated as “the blue prince” but “prince charming”). This is called localization. Sometimes it will be necessary to come up with a cultural correspondence (for example “Cloudy with a chance of meatballs” is translated as “Falling falafels” in Israel) and this is, in turn, is called transcreation.

4. Translation: The process of translating the text using a text editor. Translating using transcription and without an audio track makes it possible to visualize the work as a whole in order to better understand it. However, using a text editor makes it easier to focus on the quality of the translation (content) rather than the size of the subtitles (form). When translating directly in any subtitling software, translators often face the need to reduce the length of a sentence. As it is imperative to respect the maximum caption size, number of characters per caption, display time, etc., the translator needs to reformulate ideas and have them translated before identifying the essence of the message. This way, the translation step is performed with its primary purpose which is simply to translate. Not mixing the two steps together can be very helpful when starting work on subtitles.

5. Formatting. The time code which involves determining where captions will be placed according to the interactions. To make subtitles a film, you will have to refer to the standards regarding the parameters of subtitles: maximum character number and lines per caption and the display time between them. These elements are often specified by the client, the film production company, or more broadly, by the standards applicable to audiovisual translation. Generally, each caption should be separated by two seconds. The caption can contain two lines of text which 30-42 characters each (including spaces). You will have to make sure that each caption is displayed on the screen for sufficiently long so that the audience can manage to ready it.

It is not wise to include additional interjections and onomatopoeias that are unnecessary for understanding. Avoid anything superfluous like “Well, it’s not that serious” to “It’s not that serious.” To follow the rules of the duration and size parameters, try to reduce sentences as much as possible. This will make cutting easier. For example, “I’m not sure that was the item” might be, “I don’t think that’s it.” The subtitling standards for punctuation vary according to the type of speech to be translated and will always adapt to each situation. For example, for some dialogues with multiple participants, you will need to use dashes.

Quotation marks are only used in speeches. Depending on the type of subtitles, for example for people with a sight or hearing impairment, you will need to insert style markers for the colour codes, among other things.

6. Simulation. The final step is to play the subtitles with the film/video to check that everything is articulated correctly. This is the point where you can make the final adjustment.

Audiovisual translation software

Depending on your needs and budget, there are many professional captioning tools available.

Subtitle Workshop

Subtitle Workshop is user-friendly and easy to download from the Internet. This software makes it possible to work on an audiovisual file and its subtitles simultaneously. You can also use it to adjust the time of subtitle input and output (tracking), add a translation (adaptation) and display the result (adaptation) at the same time. When it comes to the adaptive part of a text, several basic criteria must be respected: the text must be written naturally, with the same punctuation and grammar rules and the same structure as everyday language; it cannot be abbreviated or synthesized to limit the number of characters: the adaptation must appear natural and correct. Here are the main criteria: Splitting the subtitle and calibrating the two lines should not distort the meaning of the sentence. A noun cannot be separated from its adjective or verb: the division must be done to obtain a natural typeface. A short dash (-) is used in a dialogue to indicate that there are two people talking. Each intervention is performed on a new subtitle line starting with a hyphen. Italicized text is used for narration, songs, and sounds from a camera or electronic devices. Subheadings use quotation marks (“ and ”), common abbreviations and numbers, but you should avoid capitalization whenever possible and only use them in headings, posters, or other written content that appears on the screen. The ideal end result would be captions that are in sync with the audiovisual content so that they play smoothly and naturally without the viewer realizing they are reading as they integrate three elements: picture, sound and text.

Subtitle Edit

Subtitle editing is very effective in creating, adjusting, synchronizing and translating caption lines. With this free software, you can re-adjust the subtitles if they are out of sync and create new subtitles based on timeline, waveform or spectrogram. This masterpiece can work in over 170 subtitle formats and is available in almost 30 languages.

Jubler

This is an open source subtitling software. You can use it to create subtitles as well as convert, modify or correct existing subtitle files. It supports the most popular subtitle file formats (.ass, .srt, .sub, .text, etc.). Jubler includes a spell checker as well as a preview of the subtitles as you design them and apply them in real time. It also makes it possible to edit the subtitle styles and translation modes. Developed in Java 5.0, Jubler runs on Mac, Windows, and Linux. It supports all Java-supported encodings and updates automatically. Getting to know this software for audiovisual translation, which is easy to use and offers great performance, takes 30 minutes. Jubler requires you to download Mplayer to be able to display subtitles as well as ASpell plugin for spell checking. The simple, ergonomic and efficient Jubler is a tool tailored to the requirements of translation service providers, namely OS X, Windows or Linux operating systems.

Time Adjuster

Time Adjuster is a free Windows-only application that enables synchronisation of subtitles in a film or video, with the graphics they correspond to. It is especially used in audiovisual translation when there is a delay between the subtitles and the picture. The simple and powerful Time Adjuster accepts most of the subtitle formats (.srt, .sub, .ssa, .ass and .txt., etc.) and makes it possible to cut or combine subtitles, and also fix them in .txt format and download files that have been corrupted in binary mode. The option enables conversion of subtitles to other formats. However, the number of supported codecs remains limited. Additionally, this application does not support Unicode. That’s why Time Adjuster is more dedicated to the specific needs of amateur filmmakers than professional translators or translation agencies using Windows operating systems.

DVDSubEdit

DVDSubEdit is a free software that runs on Windows and authorizes the processing of .vob or .sub files. It makes it possible to view and modify the subtitles directly in the subtitle files. This enables to avoid the de-multiplexing and re-multiplexing of files, i.e. removal of audiovisual files containing subtitles and an audiovisual document for their re-application after modification. The process is almost instantaneous and leads to fast document processing, especially for translations of subtitles. DVDSubEdit has many subtitle editing tools. It enables to change the position of the subtitles horizontally or vertically, modify their colour and transparency, hide them, re-synchronize with the audiovisual document and remove them. It also includes an option that makes it possible to edit the subtitles with an external bitmap (point-by-point) editing software such as Photoshop, Gimp, or Paint. This software can be useful for translation providers that specialize in audiovisual translation as it includes optical character recognition that applies an algorithm to the subtitles, thus making it possible to search, modify and export them in .srt or .sup format.

Sublight

Sublight is a free subtitle search software that works with the Internet. It makes it possible to find subtitles for a film by searching for them in the subtitle database, which is referenced by the subtitles-on.net website. Just enter the film title in the search bar to get the relevant subtitles, then filter your search by language. This allows you to access various translations of videos. Sublight can therefore be useful in some audiovisual translation processes. It runs on Windows and is compatible with the following players: VLC, BS.Player, Media Player Classic, KMPlayer and GOM Player. It also makes it possible to watch a film with the desired subtitle file without the need for complicated adjustments, just select Sublight as your default media player.

Aegisub

Aegisub is a free desktop utility that runs on Windows, OS X, Linux, and FreeBSD. It is an open source cross-platform software that makes it possible to generate and modify subtitles. It is simple and fast and authorizes subtitle editing, especially at the level of formatting, as well as their synchronization, and has an interface for automatic subtitle translation. Useful for translating films and videos, its real-time preview system allows direct preview when creating and editing subtitles, and is guided by time tracking. Aegisub has automatic spell checking that requires an import of the digital dictionary of the desired language. Some dictionaries are available from the Aegisub download page. Subtitles are provided in .ass format. There is a portable version of this software for Windows that makes it possible to process audiovisual translation projects anywhere. Aegisub also offers subtitle processing specifically for karaoke.

Publishing suggestions

Audiovisual translations make it possible to understand the world of the characters of our favourite films, cartoons and TV series. A perfect translation is one that will allow us to understand not only what the actors are saying, but also one that will evoke specific feelings and impressions in us. Each part of it must be thoroughly analysed and modified so that the reception of the final production is easy and pleasant.

Following this principle, feel free to read the following reliable publishing suggestions, which are a valuable source of knowledge and experience:

• Audiovisual translation in the foreign language classroom, Author Jennifer Lertola
• Voice-over Translation, Author Eliana Franco, Anna Matamala, Pilar Orero
• Audiovisual Translation in Close-Up, Author Adriana Serban, Anna Matamala, Jean-Marc Lavaur
• Translation and Localisation in Video Games: Making Entertainment Software, Author Miguel A. Bernal-Merino
• Audiovisual Translation, Author Jorge Diaz Cintas, G. Anderman
• Subtitling: Concepts and Practices, Author Jorge Díaz Cintas Aline Remael