Monterey Language Services has had a strong partnership with Central Coast Community Energy for 5 years. During that time, we have helped to translate materials so that their customers can have a greater understanding of promotions, bills, and other notifications. Our great service and quality is why year after year, Central Coast Community Energy chooses to work with Monterey Language Services for its language needs.

“Dear Mei-Ling, Happy Holidays to you. We are grateful for our partnership and the important work we do together.” – Peter

“Happy Holidays Mei-Ling! Have a wonderful season” – Lena

“Dear Mei-Ling, Happy Holidays to you and your team! Thanks for all you do.” -Luke

This graphic novel project is part a type of new media, a pioneering effort by a handful of creators in search of a new medium for presenting art, story, voice, and music. A pool of talents was gathered for an old-fashioned romantic adventure with elements of Arabian Nights, Cinderella, and the Shangri-la myth. The story depicts a romantic adventure that spans modern-day New York City and the ancient, fictional country of Gao in China. In the midst of modern and old, fiction and non-fiction, West and East, English and Mandarin, romance and mystery, the graphic novel indeed is exotic to watch.

The work has been produced into ten video chapters. To give you a glimpse of our translation work, among what has been published: Chapter 3 has the most translation voices so far. The significant amount of Mandarin presented among English voices indeed makes the graphic novel stand out as a unique and interesting entertainment piece!

Monterey Language Services took extra time to polish the translations into Simplified Chinese to ensure not only accuracy, but an enjoyable and colloquial read for native speakers. Some of the challenges for this project were derived from cultural differences in how to translate certain phrases created specifically for the graphic novel.

For example, we have the “golden doom,” which refers to a specific event in the story. Because the event transports people similarly to the Christian idea of the rapture, our translation was “极乐升天,” which means “bliss ascension” in Chinese language.

One more example of the cultural challenge is rooted in English homonyms. The sentence: “They follow the standard of Lord Kang and swear on his eyes.” In this sentence, what does “standard” mean? If we suggested “average or normal requirement,” it actually would be incorrect! “Standard” in this instance means a battle flag—something ancient soldiers would follow on the battlefield.

Another difficulty was dealing with the ambiguity of written words. In spoken English, a person’s tone can very easily denote sincerity or sarcasm — consider the phrase “good job” being spoken sincerely and being spoken sarcastically, and their meanings become very different. While the context and illustrations in graphic novels can alleviate this confusion in text, sometimes the tone could be just missed. One such problem occurred in our initial translation of “What a stunt,” a line which our translator took be said in admiration, when in actuality, it was an insult. Through our editing/reviewing process we discovered the issue, and the translation was changed from “真是好身手” (really good) to “真有一套,” which has a similar meaning in a more sarcastic tone.

We are incredibly proud of the work we were able to provide for this project, and would like to add more viewing pleasure and excitement by sharing the above behind-the-scenes glimpses to our translation work. We wish all the success to the audience and contributors to the graphic novel. The chapters will be published in video format weekly on YouTube until the tenth and final one is uploaded.

This poem is a great reminder of why we should always, always proofread—and for language service providers, why we should do it even more than the average writer. In today’s blog post, we’ll go over the reasons why.

1. Proofread the source material

Oftentimes, language service providers are given source material documents that the parent company wants to distribute at the same time as their translations. Theoretically, these documents will have been proofread already. After all, the parent company will want their readers to focus on the message of the documents and keep up their reputation and good impressions.

However, before translation, it’s essential that the source material be proofread again to ensure that the translator understands the meaning of it. Grammatical or spelling errors can cause the translated document to lose lots of meaning, and potentially bring about lots of costs to fix these mistakes later down the pipeline.

Let’s look at a common English example of a grammar mistake: “Let’s eat, Grandma!” and “Let’s eat Grandma!” With just a forgotten comma, the entire meaning of the sentence changes into something out of a horror novel. An accurate translation of the second sentence’s meaning could spell disaster, if that sentence is a mistake.

2. Proofread the translation

People are only human—making mistakes is something everyone does, and there’s no shame in it. However, what’s important is how we monitor ourselves to make sure that we catch those mistakes and take responsibility for them.

Translators have the same ability to miss a comma or period, misspell a word, or accidentally misunderstand the meaning of a sentence in the source document. To be safe, it’s crucial to hire a separate translator to act as a proofreader for the translated documents.

3. Assure the quality of the final product before delivery

Even after a translation has been proofread, oftentimes, language service providers are tasked with putting the translation into a certain format—a pamphlet, a PowerPoint, a website, etc. Once the translation is in that format, it’s important to double-check the target document. You want to avoid crashing, missing or hidden text, text overflow, and a slew of other issues.

The need for proofreading all stems back to the need for a proper, professional, trustworthy identity between the parent company and the customer or reader. Glaring issues in the text, or visual problems in the final product, convey to the reader that the document was handled sloppily—and if the document was handled sloppily, why would the parent company treat the reader any differently?

Remember: we should always, always proofread.

Subtitle translation is a very useful way to relay information, as subtitles are shown alongside videos. Like all media, it can range from simple entertainment, to scientific, political, or anything. We’ve collected some best practices for subtitle translations below.

First, be mindful of the length of translations. You have to remember that subtitles only have a set amount of time and space to be displayed on screen. You should try to be as concise as possible while also staying as true to the speaking character as possible. If you think you need more space to say something, consider how long the character is talking for. Would it be possible to separate the sentence into two or more parts? Let’s say that a character is talking for ten seconds. You could possibly split a line into two five second segments. That should ensure that you get the viewer has enough time to read the entire line without being too distracted by the length of the line.

Furthermore, do not ever exceed two lines on the screen at a time. Standard practice is at most two lines, but any more than that and it becomes a huge distraction and an eyesore to the viewer. The aim of subtitling is to avoid being intrusive while providing viewers a way to comfortably enjoy the media.

Also be sure to use the right kind of software. There’s a lot of different programs out there that subtitlers use, and it really depends on how you’d like to go about it. For example, while not industry standard, many people enjoy using AegiSub for its easy use and features that aren’t too heavy on resources. Other people may use other programs such as Adobe Premiere or even MemoQ. It all really depends on how you work and if your employer has a preference.

Most subtitlers come across a dilemma between “soft” and “hard” subtitles. Soft subtitles are subtitles that aren’t hard coded to the video. The best way to think of it is to imagine a picture. If you try writing on it, the writing will be permanent, unable to be removed. With soft subtitles, however, imagine taping your text onto the picture. It’s not permanent, and you can remove it whenever you like. The advantage to soft subs is that you can give the user more freedom. If they want to turn off the subtitles, then they can. If they want to use a different language subtitle, they can easily swap them out.

Hard subtitles on the other hand are hardcoded to the video. Once you use hard subtitles, they are not coming off of that video unless you manually edit them out. The advantage to hard subtitles is that people won’t have to go through any extra steps to load subtitles. They can easily just use one file to and enjoy the subtitles. Of course, they will lose the freedom of being able to turn them off, but that’s what the tradeoff is.

The last thing to be mindful of is that subtitling is, in most cases, localization. You are not expected to do a 1:1 translation of what characters are saying. You are expected to give characters their voice in another language. That being said, you should be careful of over-localizing to the point that the character is completely different than what they sound like in the original version. This is where it’s useful to have editors and QAers to help review your subtitles and make sure that they’re good to go.

There’s a lot to keep in mind while subtitling, but one good way to keep in mind what best practices are is to review other websites’ guidelines. For instance, many people follow Netflix’s guidelines for subtitling when doing their own, even if they aren’t employed by them.

Subtitling is fun, but it takes time to become familiar with the process. The good news is once you get it down, it’ll be second nature.

We mentioned in our last post that gas prices have been soaring this year, and it doesn’t seem like they’ll be dropping any time soon. Luckily with the general trend toward remote work, many have the option to work from home and save on travel and gas in the tank. However, this doesn’t mean that translators, and interpreters especially, should just exclusively hole up in their homes. For instance, the gas price increase will affect low-income households terribly, especially those that don’t speak English, or speak limited English.

Similarly, the American baby formula shortage has left parents struggling with increased costs for formula—at least, the formula that they can find. We’re not expecting the issue, or the ramifications, to be resolved overnight. Once again, low-income families could easily be hit the hardest, with non-English speaking families having another barrier to entry concerning information from news outlets, supermarkets, and doctor recommendations. We suggest keeping a close eye on news concerning this event. Even if formula were magically restocked and prices dropped to normal tomorrow, there would still be long-lasting effects, especially concerning the health of children.

It would be best for translators and interpreters to be prepared to travel for assignments concerning low-income households and LEP (Limited English Proficiency/non-English families). These low-income households might not have easy access to the technology needed for remote translation or interpretation. Even access to email and cell phones might be limited or impossible. Given the tendency for low-income families to have a lower quality of health compared to medium-income households, they could very likely be in need of in-person interpretation at a clinic or hospital. In-person interpretation activities may gradually rise again.

Sadly, the Russian war with Ukraine is unlikely to end any time soon. Many Ukrainians have fled, looking for refuge, and numerous translators and interpreters have stepped up to the plate. Yet still, the need for translations and interpretations into and out of Cyrillic-based languages will likely only rise. We suggest that any translator or interpreter able to help do so.

Lastly, while there has been some return to “normalcy,” Covid-19 is still a danger to many and will likely stay that way going into the end of 2022. We hope you use lots of precautionary measures, and stay safe and healthy.

One way is automating it. Some of the simplest mistakes that translators make involve mixing up numbers, conversions, or names. The easiest way to make sure that you have correctly reflected every instance mentioned in the source in the translation is to use a text compare. Of course, your translation will be flagged as being vastly different from the source, but it will let you know if the numbers, company names, and other words or numbers that have to be the same in the target as they are in the source are the same or not. It also takes virtually no time too. All you have to do is copy and paste then press a button. It shouldn’t take you more than five minutes to go through everything depending on the length of your project.

Another way is to make it hard to make any mistakes from the very start. If you are translating into a new, blank document, instead try translating into the target document itself. You could even enter the strings into a machine translation so that you can see the translation and the source side by side. Doing this makes it much harder for you to make any typing errors when copying whatever needs to be the same in the target as in the source. If the document you have is not easily copied such as a pdf, you can use OCR to help make the text selectable and then copy it into a word document.

The next tip is the simplest and possibly the most obvious solution. Whenever you see something that has to stay the same between the source and target, just copy it from the source to the target. So for example, if you have a number like 1,000,231, then just copy it into the target. If you want to take this a step further, then you should highlight every instance of numbers or text that need to be the same between the two files and then you will be able to quickly identify the places that need to be checked before delivery.

Quality Assurance is a necessary part of the translation process but often not something that is effectively done due to time constraints or other factors. Hopefully with this post, you have learned a few tips about how you can make the process shorter, but without sacrificing any quality. If you are able to submit a translation that avoids minor mistakes can really help your reputation and make you stand out as a translator who can be relied on.

To keep an online presence. This might seem a little strange, but think about it this way: if you are looking to accept a car ride from someone, would you go with the person who has a five star rating, many customer reviews, a profile picture, and a little blurb about who they are? Or would you go with the person who has no profile picture, no rating, no reviews, and no profile picture? Obviously, you would go with the former. You would have many reservations about going with someone you have no information about. It’s the same thing with work. Having an online presence will help people who don’t even know you quickly get a feel for who you are and how you operate. Just make sure that you keep your presence online professional and active.

With a good online presence, you can also network. Networking is incredibly important for many reasons, but the most important one goes back to the previous example of a driver who you can easily read up about versus a complete stranger. When you submit your resume and cover letter to a company, especially a big company, they have to make a decision based off of the information you give them. If you don’t give them enough information, they will give the position to the person who they have a better picture of. Networking helps to get your foot in the door since you will have an opportunity to display who you are in a different, more informal setting. Networking will also help get your name into conversations making it easier for prospective clients or companies to identify you in the midst of other applicants.

You should be sure to start off small and get as much experience as you can under your belt. You would be surprised what an opportunity here or there will be able to get you in the future. Just be sure that when you do the work, you always treat it with as much care as possible. This means taking the time to ensure you have no errors, have translated everything perfectly and do not have any formatting issues. Just in case, you should have someone proofread your translation. Even if you are confident with the translation you have put out, it would be a good idea to have a pair of fresh eyes go over the work that you have done. They might have a new perspective or be able to point out some simple errors that you might have glossed over.

The last tip for this post is to set aside a specific time to do your translation. This might seem simple, but you do not want to be spending too much time or too little time on the translation. It is better to have a set time to work on the assignment than to just do it whenever you feel like it. With a schedule, you will be more committed to finishing the job, and will have clear boundaries where you can ensure you are not interrupted or distracted.

Starting out as a translator or interpreter is simultaneously exciting and frightening, but no matter where you start, you are sure to end in a good position if you persist. These tips are to provide a good starting point as well as a good base to build off of. We hope this helps anyone looking to break into the industry.

So what do you need to know about localization? Here are some of the highlights of what you need to be aware of when you begin localization. This will mainly focus on both the language aspect of the localization process as well as the marketing strategy of localization.

The first thing is that you know who you are marketing to. Not every product perfectly appeals to everyone in the same way. Some people will be much more interested in your product and some will not. You have to thus really know who you want to focus on. The language that you use to market your product to your potential customers is also very important, and you should thus make sure that any translation that is produced is reviewed by someone who is either a native of the country, or native currently living in the country. This will ensure that they are caught up with all current trends and know what can and cannot be included to avoid any unnaturalness or offensive language.

On the topic of using a native who is currently living in the target country, it is also important to note that they will be able to help to discern any cultural taboos such as design choices (i.e. colors, placement of letters, layout of advertisements, etc).  When they are reviewing the translation, they not only provide a fresh set of eyes with which to see the translation work, but they are basically acting as if they were a consumer seeing your product for the first time in the region you are trying to expand into. This will help to provide invaluable insight into what can be improved or fixed upon and help to develop strategies for the future.

Another thing that is important to take note of is making sure that the native speaker you ultimately choose is well vetted. Some companies might outsource this to other companies that have reviewers as to avoid some of the cost of vetting and hiring, but it is important to ultimately make sure that the reviewer who is chosen is not only proficient in the language that they speak, but also that they are able to understand the goal of your company as well as its culture so that it can properly be conveyed to the new market.

These are just a few of the things to know when starting localization of a product for a new region. Even for regions with similar cultures to your own, it is important to make sure that you have a native review whatever you have before releasing it. Doing so will save you a headache and possibly a fortune in potential legal fees or redesign fees.

To do this, reviewers are used. Reviewers can come in all shapes and sizes depending on the type of project or its size, but typically there is at least one reviewer involved in the translation process. Sending out a translation with a review is a sure way to ensure that the deliverables are in good order and shape. A reviewer is equally if not more important than a translator because they act as the final defense line against quality errors and even more importantly, they increase quality in discourse and presentation. There are reactive and proactive approaches to a translation process.

A reactive approach simply means that when the reviewer finds an error, they will correct it and submit it. Then the vendor (a translation company) might send it back to the translator to make sure that what the reviewer corrected was not a problem. Then if the translator finds an error in the review, they will correct it, which will prompt the vendor to send it back to the reviewer. This process could potentially go on for a long time if there are no measures in place for a more proactive approach.

This is why a more proactive approach is encouraged where there are set processes in place. Expectations are laid out beforehand, and everyone involved receives metrics to help translation and reviewing become more efficient. It also will help to eliminate any potential back and forth that might occur between different people involved. Of course though, the training involved is necessary to make sure that everyone is caught up and on the same page regarding their expectations.  A proactive approach in a translation process keeps projects in control. It’s especially valuable for large projects that involved many resources. A proactive process saves costs and headaches down the road.

Finally, client reviews, if those occurred, are looped back to the reactive and proactive approaches mentioned above. Usually a successful project is the end result of dedications from both the client side and the translation company side. Working closely together with the client is the most enjoyable part for us and that guarantees quality translations every time!