Jitsu wa Ore, Saikyou Deshita? - Vol. 3 Ch. 15 - Rest for a moment

Joined
Oct 9, 2018
Messages
100
In addition to what @alidan said, not only align the text to center but also center it in the word bubble/box itself.
AVOID COMIC SANS AT ALL COST!
A good free font to use for text is "Anime Ace" and any other font you use for action text be sure that it is in all Capital letters.
Also avoid translator notes and comments in the word bubbles. Keep them to the margins and spaces between the Panels as much as possible (text boxes are okay to an extent as long as there is sufficient room), labeling them with "T/N:" for Notes and "T/C: for Comments (please keep comments to a minimum and or have them in the credit pages at the end of Chapters).
DO NOT MEME!!!!
Also don't add things, speech and or slang, that wasn't in the original. While you may like it and think it's funny, not everyone else does and many see it as a disservice if not an insult to the Author.
Also go over the previous Chapters (if not of other series, especially of your more popular titles) or even the official releases, as an example of how you might want it to look. The more consistent and professional looking it is the less people are to complain.
 

ivv

Dex-chan lover
Joined
Apr 19, 2018
Messages
2,185
- Not so terrible that I couldn't read it at all
yep, a chapter that I can read without juggling my brain is a decent chapter to me.
raw mtl trauma intensifies~~~
 
Joined
Mar 25, 2019
Messages
20
This is great. Im laughing at everyone in the comments who thinks they're entitled to having perfect translations everytime. As long as it's readable, it's fine by me. And those TL notes were funny.
 
Active member
Joined
Jun 8, 2018
Messages
165
Holy crap people, you get to read this for free. Be fucking grateful and thank the person that used their own time and effort to provide you a free service
 
Fed-Kun's army
Joined
Mar 5, 2019
Messages
770
@SeamusDubh
Ill add to this
If for some reason there is a pop culture reference or some kind of meme, you have tow roads you can go down,
1) translate verbatim and give a note with context at the end of if its short enough, in margins,
2) change the reference to something someone could easily look up or possibly even know from a country that uses the language translated into.

professionals use to do 2, but most of the scanlation readers prefer 1

there is some exceptions, japans youtube has that scrolling text on screen and they will have just long strings of characters, most of the time there is an english equivalent, it's a judgement call on how you handle it because both are seen as ok.

I do recommend if something is changed, you make a note of it on a separate page.

something more common is a character having an accent. if you can translate it in a way that is easy to read while imparting the accent, go for it, but if you can't, just don't and make note of it. I think everyone has read some elizabethan esque dialogue, and sat there for far to long trying to parse it, it's better to just translate to a common in this case. you MAY want to use a different font for this, signify something is different, but don't pick something that is horrendously hard to read just because its fancy, even just italics can be sufficient.
 
Joined
Oct 9, 2018
Messages
100
@alidan
When it cones to Localization it's an iffy thing for me.
Changing dialogue/sayings/memes because it wouldn't/doesn't/can't make sense in English is fine as long as its explained/logical. But changing it because you are trying to appeal to a different (western) audience because you don't think they will understand it and or for social political reasons (which is common among "professional" publications as of late), I'm not a fan of. They seem to forget that most of are reading it because it's Japanese in origin and understand common sayings/slang. And changing it has tendency to affect the stony some.
A good example of this is the differences between the Fan and Professional translations of the OreGairu LN's.

As for accents I totally agree. And a good example of how it's done right is with the Uncle from the "Flying Witch" series.
 
Fed-Kun's army
Joined
Mar 5, 2019
Messages
770
@SeamusDubh
changing it for change sake, maid dragon is the worst offender of this, both the 'but your a girl' to 'but i'm straight' and inserting patriarchy... there is a reason I cant watch the english version of that show.

But there are other ones for a long time ago, where a pop star was referenced, where I guarantee no one in any western country would know the reference, hell, for a good while I more or less only consumed japanese 'culture' for 2 years with barely western influence but I barely even knew that person, but the western translation changed her to britney spears. I can't say if I like that or not, because this was also at a time where they didn't have large 'here are the references and explanation' pages.

I would say a direct translation of lets say.... jajajajajajaja which I believe is how they do a lolololololol would probably be just fine being changed, but changing a rice ball to doughnut is stupid. I get why they localize manga that way, but I don't like it much.
 
Supporter
Joined
Sep 18, 2019
Messages
756
I love that he fought her in a private place so no one knows what happened. But then left her with a very visible choker, like none of that hidden slave tattoo nonsense.
"My lady...are... are you still wearing that slave choker?"
"It's a fashion item, isn't it so fetch?"
"Queen. Stop trying to make slave-fashion happen. It's not going to happen."
 
Fed-Kun's army
Joined
Oct 26, 2018
Messages
325
Guys even if you hate the translation, at least we can understand it, and we should be thankful to the translators, because we can read the new chapter am I right?
Err, no, you have to realize that a bad translation is worse than none at all. It's a misrepresentation of the original work, it ruins everything and it ends up being a blockade for actually good translators who don't pick it up because it's "being translated" or at best the new translator just start at the newest released "translated" chapter if they take over the translation.

Then we're left with a story that will NEVER get a decent translation. I'd rather have no translation at all than one bad enough to make ruin the story. At least with no translation, it's far more likely that a decent group/translator will pick it up sooner or later. Ain't no one wasting time on a "translated" story or chapters that have already been "translated" after all, even if the quality is garbage.

This goes for all kinds of translations, I've run into it a lot for novels too, where it's arguably even worse to have a bad translator because at least with manga you have pictures that help a bit. So many gems buried because someone suddenly felt an urge to "translate" without proper grasp of english or even basic grasp of japanese nor the decency to get proofreaders/editors to make it into readable, coherent english, often even using MTL without double checking with a dictionary to make sure nothing seems too out of place before just copy-pasting it and roughly editing some parts. It makes me very sad when I run into a story I enjoy a lot that either has a good initial translation before another group takes over so you get a taste of how it should be or that is good enough to actually be decent even with a trash translation, yet it's never given the love it deserves because someone was playing pretend translator.

We should definitely NOT be thankful to "translators" who do a bad job. It's seriously just a bother. If we could be promised that we'd get a better translation later, that'd be another thing altogether, but I don't see how people ruining a story forever so that it never gets the chance to be appreciated properly unless you learn japanese/chinese/korean is a good thing?

Just think of it this way, imagine that you turn in a phone for repair to change the battery. When you get it back, you keep on getting popups about the battery not being supported and it turns off randomly under high load, but it works, right? At least they tried, so it's okay, right? I mean, they tried to replace the battery and kinda did, it does take a charge and work, but the output is low which makes the phone slow and unstable. Before turning it in, it just didn't last too long but at least it was stable and worked properly.

It's the same scenario. Doing a bad job is usually worse than doing none at all.
 

Users who are viewing this thread

Top