Translation

[Anonymous No.]

I just finished translating a short doujin, about 50 pages of actual text/dialogue. It was on my own volition, definitely not with permission of the original author, and as such I most certainly didn't get paid for it. I'm not saying what it was, mostly because I'm sure most everyone here isn't interested in the basic theme.

I felt ecstatic when I originally finished it. It was the first real "full" translation I've done of anything since nearly 10 years ago when I first started learning how to read "moonspeak." I know that makes me sound amateur at best, but I'd probably boarder between JPLT 1-2kyu if I ever actually took the test; my skill as a translator is really the only thing I hold in question.

Which, leads me to my dilemma. Did I create something? I certainly feel like I did. I spent hours pouring over dialogue, trying to feel what it really meant and then regurgitate it in my own language, rereading what I wrote and tweaking it into what I believe the author would have intended.

But did I? Create something, that is. People not so blessed probably look at translation as nothing more than word swapping. If it were so easy we'd just feed everything through babelfish... But even if it's hard? Does that mean it's still not creation? I laugh at the irony thinking of Japan as a nation of imitators, and then think of myself as doing nothing but the same.

What I do know is those words didn't exist in such phrases before I wrote them. However, I also know they would never have existed without the original. And so, I'm torn. Is this just something a translator has to deal with? Is there any solace?

In return, Gunkanjima. Not related. Or is it? A photographer takes different angles of something beautiful, and yet they're still just copies of something that already was. Yeah, probably not related, but I'm trying to dig deep here...

[五角场！ No.]

Not sure if copypasta, but if not, post a link, then i'll comment about your situation.

[Anonymous No.]

Take your pills

[Necrobrotent No.]

You did good, as long as it wasn't amputee porn then you're going to hell.

Also you created a chance for a whole new demographic to enjoy an authors work. Good enough right?

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792284
Nothing wrong with amputee porn. If your waifu lost a limb or four, you'd still care for her, right?

[Necrobrotent No.]

>>3792289
It was a joke.

[Anonymous No.]

Hey OP, I understand what you mean. As a scanlator/translator myself, I feel a certain satisfaction when I find the right words in my own language. But I most definitely do not feel that I have created something; rather I have traveled deep into the rabbit hole of a different culture, forging a precious object, which if not as fully pristine as the original, carries within it the same deep truths.

[Anonymous No.]

I'm not a translator or anything, but I'm frequently do photoshop alterations for clients and products.

There'll always be the unsatisfying feeling that you did not "create" it, even though you spent hours and hours on it. It's something we have to get use to I suppose.

[Anonymous No.]

Well, you just find out the dilemmas about translation. People have been arguing about this since forever.
You just try to do your best, but the "perfect translation" doesn't exist. There a saying in my country that goes along the lines of "translator is traitor".

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792321
This makes a lot of sense, thanks.

It's something like self-satisfaction combined with (or caused by) creating something that is somehow ingrained in me, I guess erroneously. I'm just looking if anyone else has gone through this in any kind of similar situation. (most applicably translation)

[Anonymous No.]

It's not about creating. It's about passing a message toward others. It's like bringing torch to an otherwise bare, cold place; the fire comes from somewhere, but someone still have to bring it over by porting (from console to PCs, PCs to console), adapting (cross medium like VN > Anime), and translating to other language.

Whether those who received the flame feels grateful for it is what matters in the end. That's how I justify myself.

[Anonymous No.]

If you translated it to the best of your ability, even if you don't necessarily feel as if you've 'created' something, keep in mind that without your hard work people who don't know the language would not be able to enjoy the work fully.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792279
As a translator that remains anonymous and has done probably over 175,000 words of translations I'd have to say what you've done is worth nothing, is nothing, nor is anything that could even be worth mentioning.

Neither has anything I've done amounted to anything more than bullshit. Doujinshi, Manga, Anime, even Visual Novels amount to nothing created.

The times have changed, and the work done can be fulfilled by anyone able to plug in words and guess at context.

The JLPT is a joke. Allowing yourself to be marked by how comparable you are to a Highschool kid is quite sad honestly. If you want to prove anything the JKAT is how you show you've learned anything.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792338
This is it, exactly, I guess. I've spent a lot of time and yet feel unsatisfied. Not at the work I've done, I'm proud of it. Just the fact that I'm ultimately left confused over what to feel proud about.

I imagine things change when you're professional and get paid for it and you really don't care either way. Then again, maybe this isn't even the case?

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792350
Before that 175k you're only nothing, who translated small amount of stuff like what OP is in atm.

Everyone have to begin from nothing to something. Even if Visual Novels is pounded by rushed, QUALITY translation with unplayable releases (Symphonic Rain) it doesn't stop Amaterasu from doing serious heavy reediting to their current project.

There are times when comparing yourself to others is a hindrance.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792363
Or you can tl VNs. Our audience is small atm and so it's satisfying to watch people's reaction, comment, experience and trolling toward the releases directly. Also LN translation.

Manga and anime subbing is too impersonal due to numbers.

[Anonymous No.]

not seeing any links here

[None !w4lolitaKs No.]

Hatsukoi translation project needs people like you!

See >>3785845 for more information.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792350
It's true that the barrier to entry is much lower. What I look for is a translation that has some spark, some resonance, some flavor of the original. Unfortunately that's rare, even if you expand the pool to pro translations.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792380
In VN translation scene, Moogy put emphasis on localization and smooth reading; hence so many quotable Sharin lines got unquotable since they're too smooth.

Moogy criticizes Ixrec on trying to upheld the original writer's writing and presentation style in Inganock. The script is full of repetition, disjointed lines, manual linebreaking etc. There you go with some flavor of original.

No translation method is ever perfect and ideal. Literal, localization etc. But different approach works for different cases. There's a plan from Ammy on translating Shikkoku no Sharnoth to British English due to the setting; is such method flavorful, ideal, bubbly sparkly? Who knows.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792362
Way to read one sentence then ignore everything else.

[Anonymous No.]

I became a translator mainly because I wanted to share, to say, hey guys, this is cool, why don't we look at it together?

One look at /jp/ and /a/ and I quit 3 months ago. Faggots don't deserve anything.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792279
Now that you mention it, translation is a bit like skilled photography, especially professional photography where you're fairly boxed in. Of course, translation has a much sharper cliff of creative freedom where the final product loses all value.

Anyway yes you created something, absolutely in a technical sense, you applied effort and produced something that didn't previously exist. In a more creative sense, you did too, but you don't own that part of it as much, and someone else doing the same task might create something extremely similar. Maybe it's more like building a chair.

[Necrobrotent No.]

>>3792422
;_;

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792362
Way to think a randomly released beta patch will be representative to what the final version will be.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792389
Sharin's translation was horrible. Even if it's mostly accurate that kind of writing makes it sound like a rewrite or something.

I also hate how everything that couldn't be simply translated to English was replaced with something roughly equal when they could have just added a simple TL note. I mean surely the people playing VNs wouldn't want to try to understand the Japanese references/idioms/etc., right?

The mood of their translation was also often totally different from the actual situations. Though those memes would break any kind of mood anyway. It's like it was translated/edited/butchered by someone from /b/.

Localizations like that make me want to learn Japanese MORE than the fact that I could play VNs that don't have a translation at all, for fuck's sake.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792423
In a more creative sense, you did too, but you don't own that part of it as much, and someone else doing the same task might create something extremely similar.
>Maybe it's more like building a chair.

You, sir, are awesome. This analogy was so profound it made me want to cry.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792423
>In a more creative sense, you did too, but you don't own that part of it as much, and someone else doing the same task might create something extremely similar.
>Maybe it's more like building a chair.

You, sir, are awesome. This analogy was so profound it made me want to cry.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792275
please stop spamming Ａｎｏｎ Ｔａｌｋ .com thanks

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792481
/thread

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792275
please stop spamming Ａｎｏｎ Ｔａｌｋ .com thanks

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792275
please stop spamming Ａｎｏｎ Ｔａｌｋ .com thanks

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792434
Konban ha! I may start translating Katahane to omou. You sound like a translation expert, so please tell me if my translation of the first line is more to your satisfaction desu. (´･ω･)

「－－Watakushi ni ha, tenshi no kago de aru」
(TL Note: Watakushi is a polite first person pronoun.)
(TL Note: Tenshi means angel.)
(TL Note: Kago means divine protection.)
(TL Note: De aru means desu.)

Arigatou gozaimashita!

[Anonymous No.]

Dear translators: Stop using TL notes. If you really suck that much at English, translate it literally and get an editor.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792434
Here's a good model of someone not to listen to if you want to make a good translation

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792554
Moogy Defense Squad Go!

[Anonymous No.]

...
this thread seems to be quickly going to hell, so I'd like to thank everyone who replied seriously, even the cynic.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792540
Well, it gets my seal of approval. Go get them, tiger.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792564
Happens from time to time.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792563
Common sense for what makes a good translation squad, Go!

fixed

[Derek No.]

>>3792540
Thanks OP. Translation is genuine, there are no viruses.
(:

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792540
Just tell us what ni ha means, and you got yourself an excellent Japanese course going on here.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792389
>There's a plan from Ammy on translating Shikkoku no Sharnoth to British English due to the setting; is such method flavorful, ideal, bubbly sparkly? Who knows.
Haha, oh wow. It might be interesting, though I can't see it turning out to be anything other than faux-aristocratic rittlings unless they've actually got a well-learned Englishman on the team.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792600
One of the staff is a Briton, can do British English very well and able to research various potential locutions to be used in-game. That's how the idea becomes plausible from the beginning.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792667
TYRES
PETROL
CRISPS
CHIPS
FUCK YOU HAELETH

[Anonymous No.]

>>I mean surely the people playing VNs wouldn't want to try to understand the Japanese references/idioms/etc., right?
i sure as hell wouldn't. i don't give a shit about that.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792714
and this is why I hate footnotes
not only do they look ugly for the people who read them
but the people who don't read them don't even give a shit

it's so much easier just swapping it out with something similar that serves the same purpose

[Anonymous No.]

OP take some time browsing /a/, /jp/, MAL, sankakucomplex, etc, and take a good hard look at the people who will likely be enjoying your translations.

If 50% of your work isn't orgasmic moans you're doing it wrong. Whatever you have done may seem like an epic undertaking to you, but I doubt it's even good fap fodder for five minutes.

[Anonymous No.]

It'd be nice if we had a designated thread for what-the-fuck-did-I-just-read VN/manga questions. With 1kyuu people explaining slang and finer grammar points.

Yeah, right.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792434
I've been getting the exact same feeling as this anon. It feels horribly over-localized. "Is Kenichi gonna have to smack a bitch?" despite having essentially the same meaning as the Japanese line was unforgivably mood altering. It lost all of the Japanese feel and appeal I usually get from reading Visual Novels, and that's just one example I can think of off the top of my head.
While the story is still interesting and I'm going to finish reading it, the localization was a disaster in my eyes.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3793117
>It lost all of the Japanese feel and appeal I usually get from reading Visual Novels
Learn Japanese if you want the "Japanese feel". I like to read English when I'm reading English.

[Sakurada !Jun.1bGALk No.]

Anyone who "localizes" should be exiled from the translation community.

Go watch a little bit of Cardcaptors (Cardcaptor Sakura localization) or play the North American release of Revelations: Persona for a single quick example which proves my point.

[Anonymous No.]

Mood altering? WTF does that even mean. The original line was an uncharacteristic outburst done for the sake of humor, it's like the the same exact thing.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3793148
I'll take "Is Kenichi gonna have to smack a bitch" over TRANSLATOR'S NOTE: KAWAII MEANS CUTE

[Anonymous No.]

Is Kenichi gonna have to smack a bitch!?: Omg what a terrible translation it ruins my glorious nipponese feelings

How's my **** taste like: omg what a hilarious side-story thanks Nasu

[Sakurada !Jun.1bGALk No.]

>>3793162
Then go fuck yourself, mindless conservative prick.

[Roa !x6MuOu/vOw No.]

>>3793180
Translator's note: Mindless conservative prick means Gaijin

[Sakurada !Jun.1bGALk No.]

>>3793196
To be honest, he's taking up too many sugoi Nihonjin qualities, if anything.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3793162
What the hell does that have to do with anything. Way to straw man. I never advocated leaving in raw romanized Japanese, and as said, the "smack a bitch" line is most certainly not the only example, it's just the only one I took a screenshot of. I'd collect more, and go over them in elaborate detail, but lol internet debating, and it's not going to change the minds of the guys at tlwiki so what's the point? I'm just going to stick to fixing the numerous outright mistakes in the script like "cum all over my chest..." when the word for face was clearly used, mistyped ellipses, numerous instances of the editor not knowing how to use the present perfect tense, etc.

[Anonymous No.]

The last few replies show why people like >>3792422 abandoned doing translations, and I can sort of agree with anon translator-kun.

[Anonymous No.]

um, sorry I'm new around here, but what the fuck is a "visual novel"? from pics I've seen in this thread I'd say it's just a fancy word for ero-ge. is there some difference?

[Anonymous No.]

>>3794711
Visual novels don't always have ero.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3794711
A visual novel (ビジュアルノベル, bijuaru noberu?) is an interactive fiction game featuring mostly static graphics, usually with anime-style art. As the name might suggest, they resemble mixed-media novels or tableau vivant stage plays. Visual novels are commonly called dating sims in English[by whom?], a misnomer as visual novels are classified as a sub-genre of adventure games and not simulation games. This has led to confusion with the other genre known as dating sims, which often shares a similar visual format with visual novels, but has gameplay based on statistics.

In Japanese, a distinction is often made between visual novels proper (abbreviated NVL) and adventure games (abbreviated AVG or ADV). This distinction is normally lost in the West, since both are streamlined compared to Western adventure games. Visual novels and ADVs are especially prevalent in Japan, where they make up nearly 70% of PC games released.[1] They are rarely produced for video game consoles, but the more popular games are sometimes ported to systems such as the Sega Dreamcast or the PlayStation 2. The market for visual novels outside of Japan, however, is small.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792422
I have to agree with this. Not that I let it get to me, but yeah, you fags can be ungrateful bastards.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3794711
> um, sorry I'm new around here, but what the fuck is a "visual novel"? from pics I've seen in this thread I'd say it's just a fancy word for ero-ge. is there some difference?
Yeah, that's correct, there is no difference.

[Anonymous No.]

A visual novel? What's that? Ah-- did you perchance mean BIJUARU NOBERU?

[Anonymous No.]

Nothing is ever really created. Everything is made by recombining pre-existing raw materials. Physical inventions, stories, babies, everything.

Originality (like most things) is a matter of degrees, it's not an absolute either/or.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3794818
Deep, man.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3794818
what about a cure for cancer

[Sakurada !Jun.1bGALk No.]

>>3794818
>>3794824
Also dead wrong, as it happens.

As I'm sure we are all aware, many things we take for granted now did not exist at all in any form at some point in the past. Language is a good example. Since language exists now and is extremely complex, we can say with certainty that some processes go beyond merely recombining old parts, creating entirely new things.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3794847
Language was formed over a long period of time from the manipulation of sounds that the body could already make. It didn't just "happen", it phased in.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3794847
Language is made from symbols and concepts. Raw materials for these symbols are shapes and noises we can find nature, in the animal kingdom, in rocks, trees. Lines, curves, dots.

As for the concepts, it gets a bit more complicated. Unless you're a Platonist, then you concede that they're eternally unoriginal. Concepts are formed by abstracting from what we observe in reality. e.g. "Tree" - a label for all the tall wood-leaf things. Then you've got your higher level concepts, made from abstracting lower level concepts.

Try to name a completely original concept, if you will.

[Sakurada !Jun.1bGALk No.]

>>3794896
>It didn't just "happen"
Irrelevant. Whether it comes about over millions of years or in half a second, what's new is new.

Also, the implication that we always had a body capable of making these sounds shows just how little thought you've put into your idea.

Nothing you see today has always existed. Whether you want to admit it or not, the universe is capable of generating originality.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3794928
I think it's a matter of perspective, actually.

Take, say, the appearance of the consciousness in living things.

From the perspective focussing on consciousness vs non-consciousness, it's clearly a truly revolutionary development.

But from another perspective, that's concentrating on survival adaptations in a wider sense, consciousness could be seen as just another evolved survival mechanism. A bit like automatic reflexes that plants have, but faster, sexier.

Although consciousness has the peculiar property of being indefinable.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3794928
Actually there very good arguments (ie, from Wittgenstein, Kripke) about how language was always part of our nature (rather than out of nuture) - that that which came to be was not out less a coincidence and more an inevitability

[Anonymous No.]

>>3794962
>language was always part of our nature
Depends where you draw the line that separates 'our' nature and pre-human nature. And that line will always be an arbitrary divider.

And whichever way you slice that, humans haven't been around forever so...!

[Anonymous No.]

>>3794962
saying what happened was inevitable just makes me want to stab you in the eye

if you knew a thing about evolution, you'd know the primates we originate from have much larger tongues, as well as a variety of other biological differences in the throat, nasal passage, and basically everything that creates sound, rendering very articulate speech simply impossible. We didn't start speaking because we were designed for it. We evolved the proper parts because we started speaking.

[Derek No.]

One of tlwiki translator's principe: "IMMA AWESOME GAHAHAHA". More translators should think like this

[Anonymous No.]

I don't know which came first, but language as we know it is impossible without a human consciousness.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Prehistory-Mind-Origins-Religion-Science/dp/075380204X

This book explains it very understandably. Humans are different from other animal because we are able to use symbols. We can use something to stand in for something else. The letters you're reading have no inherent meaning. They are symbols that your mind puts into concepts and meaning.

Language, both written and spoken, requires this congnative ability.

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792350
i don't mean this in a sarcastic way at all. its just that you sound very jaded with what you do.

[Anonymous No.]

Trolls trolling trolls

[Anonymous No.]

>>3792279

You know that you can get a Master of Fine Arts in Translation? Academically, it's treated just like getting an MFA in Creative Writing except you also have to be proficient in more than one language (reading and writing.)

Translation of creative works, when done correctly, is more than just changing the words to ones other people can understand. It's doing so while capturing the same FEEL as the original work. Proper translation is as much an art form as writing something to begin with; it's just a different KIND of art form. The photography analogy is probably a good one. You're taking something that's already there and making it beautiful in another way. Nothing wrong with that.