Quality’s Enemy in Subtitling: Peripheral Errors by Deborah Wexler When audiovisual translators receive suggestions from the reviewer, files with track-changes, template changes, etc., they need to review the subtitle in context before making or accepting changes. If they don’t, the odds of introducing mistakes into the files grow dramatically. An example from a Tagalog to […]
Looking back on NOLA @ ATA59: An Audiovisual Perspective
by Ana Salotti This year at ATA has been particularly special for audiovisual professionals. For the first time in decades of a booming audiovisual industry, we finally have a specialized Division for those who work in the audiovisual field, a true milestone in the United States and abroad. However, by the time the brand new […]
Traveling the Globe to Go More Global
by Graciela Cuello Two major events on audiovisual translation were held last October. Planning a trip that involves academic activities raises the question: is it worth the effort and stamina it takes? One of them was Languages & The Media, in Berlin, and the other was CITA, in Madrid. In my opinion, a professional should […]
October Should Be Declared Audiovisual Translation Conference Month
by Gabriela Ortiz October is a perfect month to travel to Europe: the weather is mild, days are still not too short… AND two quite interesting conferences on AVT are held every two years. This year, I was lucky enough to attend both. 1) 12th International Conference on Language Transfer in Audiovisual Media – Languages […]
New Technologies in AVT and Why Translators Need to Adapt to Survive
by Mara Campbell Not so many years ago, we were able to successfully manage life and work with only landlines, snail mail, and fax machines. But today, our world is dominated by a myriad of accessible and affordable technologies, and we can all agree there are benefits. Technology in everyday life helps us save time, […]
Teaching an Online Language-Neutral AVT Course: Mission Impossible?
By Ana Lis Salotti Photo: Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal license. I have been teaching translation courses in American universities for the last four years, both online and in person. During my teaching career, I have learned a great deal, possibly more than my students. One such instance of remarkable learning for me was when […]
How Hybrid Technologies Will Make Media Translation Professionals More Competitive in the Era of Media Globalization
By Ivanka Vassileva The era of media globalization has brought about a strain on the content delivery supply chain. On one hand, filmmakers and media content creators are faced with a challenge. They have to quickly make their content available globally, translated in many different languages at the same time, in a fast, accurate, and […]
Automatic Speech Recognition Softwares: Will they replace audiovisual translators in the near future? (Part 1)
By Mara Campbell Let me start with a straight answer to the titular question so that you can continue reading with a light heart: No! Now that we can all breathe easily, I will elaborate. You might be familiar with the concept of Speech Recognition Software (SRS) if you use Siri, Alexa, or Google Now. […]
Time to Slow Down
by Aanand Dika “Quality means doing it right when no one is looking” – Henry Ford * Well, in our case then not only is the audience “looking”, they are indeed reading all that is translated on screen in the form of subtitles. So, for translators there can be no compromise in quality. But quality […]
Professional Development Program: Preview and Trailers
by Fernanda Brandao-Galea The Professional Development Program of the Audiovisual Division is a career-building opportunity for translators who want to know more about this branch of translation. If you want to build the skills required to enter the audiovisual field, this program might be for you. We plan to help audiovisual translators broaden their knowledge […]
Software Series 2: OOONA Toolkit Review
by Ana Salotti This is the second installment of AVD technology column. You will notice a different format, a review instead of an interview. We think this makes for an easier, more thorough read. For this issue, I’ll review Ooona Toolkit, by Ooona Tools (https://ooona.ooonatools.tv). Ooona Toolkit is an easy-to-use, web-based software for the creation, […]
Automatic Speech Recognition Softwares: Will they replace audiovisual translators in the near future? (Part 2)
by Mara Campbell Since writing the first part of my article, I have been busy testing new automatic speech recognition (ASR) tools and comparing results. I have to admit that some softwares are quite impressive and could be considered a very helpful tool for subtitlers and captioners. Again, my test clip was from the comedy […]
Pivot Language Templates in Audiovisual Translation: Friends or Foes?
by Vanesa Álvarez Ortiz In these globalized and competitive times, some big players in the AVT industry rely heavily upon pivot language templates to make English the source language of all translation, eliminating less common combinations. The use of these timed master subtitles has as many advantages as disadvantages both for subtitle vendors and translators. […]
On Subtitling, or Ignore the Plane and Truck and We’ll All Be Fine
by Alexander C Totz By this point in time, the entire T&I field can be epitomized by the iconic, climactic scene from Alfred Hitchcock’s North by Northwest. In this scene, Cary Grant is hunted down in broad daylight in a field by an airplane and nearly dies. And then the truck, but I’m getting ahead […]