Video Translation at Power of Babel

Translation, dubbing and voiceover production services: experience counts

Translating and dubbing your video content will be “seamless, painless, and worry-free” – that’s the bold promise we make on our home page.

What does that mean, exactly? How does Power of Babel deliver better results?

We get the right people for the job. There are lots of great translators out there. You may have one in house, or work with a translation agency that does great work on text documents. But a script requires different skills and a different approach. A script has to be easy to speak, and more importantly, easy on the ears. It has to sound natural, like human speech. We hire translators who are either trained in audiovisual translation, or professional broadcasters, filmmakers, playwrights, etc. – people who know how to write for the ear.
We are language geeks, and we recruit other language geeks to work with us. Our approach from the start has been to build a team of trusted consultants and language supervisors who know their stuff in their own language. We check and double-check. And we don’t leave accurate translations and recordings to chance.
We are constantly on the lookout for new voice talent, both locally and around the world. Our French roster in Toronto is good enough that we can dub documentaries and children’s series for broadcast in Quebec and Europe – something that’s not often done in Ontario. And for hard-to-find languages, we have contacts all around the world.
Our sound engineer is accustomed to recording and mixing even the toughest languages for a native English-speaker to hear and understand. Here, as in everything else, experience counts.

Most importantly, we take great care to understand your project and your needs, and to deliver exactly what you ask for. Between these two points, our goal is never to let you see how hard we actually work.

Create subtitles the right way: adapt and condense

We did some subtitling work recently for PhillyCAM, a public-access network in Philadelphia, PA.

This excellent community organization is producing a series of videos to inform the city’s many immigrant communities about this year’s U.S. census. We took their 3-minute multilingual video, and added subtitles in seven languages, plus English.

This got me thinking about the right way and the wrong way to create subtitles.

Many corporate and educational videos are subtitled or captioned – it’s the least expensive way to create multilingual content. But it’s often done carelessly: a transcript is sent to a translation agency, which simply translates it word for word, as it would any text, and then the new language is copy-and-pasted into the video as subtitles, roughly timed to the original dialogue.

There’s one big problem with that: reading takes more time than hearing. Viewers can’t absorb as much from subtitles as they can by simply listening to the original language. In addition, many languages – for example French, Spanish and German – take up to 25% more words than English to say the same thing. So if your subtitles are just a translated transcript, the screen ends up full of words that a) obscure the picture, and b) don’t actually get absorbed by the viewer.

The right way to create subtitles, whether for a feature film or for a training video, is to adapt and condense. Working in professional subtitling software (such as EZTitles, SubtitleNEXT or Annotation Edit), the subtitler finds a way to capture the essence of the dialogue while following widely accepted international subtitling standards:

- A maximum of 43 characters per line and two lines per subtitle (that maximum is 42 characters for Netflix, and fewer for theatrical feature films
- A reading speed (measured in characters per second) that gives the reader enough time to read the text while also taking in the picture.
- Logical segmentation – breaking up the text into lines in a way that allows the viewer to absorb the subtitles quickly and accurately.

The result is a more accessible, easily understood video. Your audience will thank you.

To talk to us about subtitling your video, drop us a line.

French Dubbing and the Ontario Film and Television Tax Credit

Dubbing locally means higher tax credits

You’re an Ontario producer working on a documentary, factual series or children’s show. You’ve pre-sold it in Quebec, and have to deliver in French. How do you make that happen? And how do you maximize your Ontario Film and Television Tax Credit?

Dubbed audiovisual content is the most effective way to communicate across cultures.

For everything from Hollywood movies to the humble training video, shooting in one language and delivering in many is a necessity.

But how do you make sure you get it right?

Step #1: Decide which type of dubbing is right for your project and your budget. There are three types of dubbing, and each has its appropriate uses.

UN Style, AKA Voiceover Dubbing

With UN-style dubbing, you hear a second or two of the original speaker, then the volume drops and the dubbed voice comes in over top. You’re always aware that another language is being spoken, but at the same time you get a sense of the original speaker’s voice and tone. UN-style dubbing is used most often for documentaries, factual/non-scripted TV shows, and interview-based videos.

UN-style dubbing is not so good for dramatized scenes, where you need to believe the actors are actually speaking their lines. It can be distracting and confusing, especially when the lines of dialogue are short.

Timed Sync, AKA Dialogue Replacement

Timed-sync dubbing matches the rhythm of the original. The dubbed voice precisely follows the original speaker, speaking when she speaks, pausing when she pauses. It looks more natural, and it’s less noticeable that the video has been dubbed, but you lose any sense of the original voice. That’s why it’s particularly effective for dramatized dialogue, as in training videos, and also for discussions with rapid-fire conversation.

For timed sync, the adaptation process is highly specialized and precise. You can’t just count on your voice performer to adjust their speed. In order to match the translation to the original perfectly, you have to count every syllable, and think of myriad alternative ways of saying something in the new language. It also takes twice as much time in the studio to make sure the voices match up. But for many videos, it’s essential.

Lip-Sync Dubbing

Lip-sync dubbing is the gold standard for everything from feature films to TV commercials. It’s the most precise type of dubbing of all: the translated script matches not only the rhythm and number of syllables in the original, but the mouth movements as well. In other words, the translation tries to match the occurrence of sounds such as M/B/P, N/D/T, O, A, etc. Actors skilled in this type of dubbing can have long and lucrative careers as, for example, the German voice of Bruce Willis.

At Power of Babel, we use VoiceQ digital voice synchronization software for lip-sync dubbing, which helps our voice actors deliver their best performance in the shortest time possible.

Depending on the type of video you’re dubbing, your target audience and your budget, there is a method that’s right for you. Give us a shout, and let’s discuss.