Here at Transcription City, we have been providing professional subtitling services for a number of years. We have built up a number of high profile clients for whom we write .srt, .ssa and .vtt files for on a regular basis. Since branching out further into translation services online, we are now able to offer our subtitle services for a wide range of global clients, covering translation and transcription in many different languages. But what is so specialist about writing subtitles and closed captions? Why is it so difficult, and what can go wrong? Let’s look at our subtitle translation services.
Subtitle Software for Perfect Subtitle Services
When carrying out our transcription services and translation services, we believe that people will always be able to provide a more accurate, reliable service than a machine. There are many programmes online that can be used to automate timings and convert transcripts into subtitles, but the results are often highly compromised and sub standard. We train our linguists and transcriptionists to write and accurately time high quality, professional and accurate foreign subtitles and closed captions, to ensure that the results will always be up to scratch. We use professional manual software to make sure formatting is absolutely perfect and can also burn on your subtitle translations to your online videos, DVDs or other video and audio based media.
Accurate Subtitling Services
Accuracy is paramount when writing and translating subtitles. The spelling needs to be absolutely impeccable and the timings accurate to within as little as 1/1000th of a second for a professional finish. This kind of accuracy takes time, skill and experience, something that we believe we can offer in our subtitle translation packages.
Subtitle Services to Provide Maximum Readability
Another issue that crops up when writing subtitles can be line length and the time frame in which text appears onscreen. Writing and timing subtitles and closed captions takes more than just a mechanical approach – common sense is also required. Your timings may be impeccable but if the lines are too long to fit onscreen, the writing will likely appear too small to read. Similarly, if lines are too short and appear onscreen for too little a time, you will not allow your audience time to read the subtitles you have transcribed.
Subtitle Translation Services
One of the main factors that comes up when translating subtitles is the issue of discrepancies between the structure of languages. Subtitle timings of a file that was originally English but now needs to be translated into German may on watching, appear not to sync well as sentence structure can leave some recognisable words in the target language not in line with your audio. This almost always happens to some degree when translating subtitles, but a good translation company (like Transcription City) will work with translators to make sure that your foreign subtitles sync as well as possible.
Subtitle Translation and Timings
Generally speaking, prices for subtitle and closed caption translations into foreign languages are quoted as followed – a price is agreed per minute for creating a subtitle (.srt) file out of the source language (for example, English), a transcriptionist uses a subtitle software package to write the subtitles. Next, the subtitle file is sent onto a translator to translate those subtitles into the target language (for example, French). This translation will be charged per word as a document translation but the rate may be slightly higher than that of standard document translation as timings will also need to be altered. Another time consuming element of subtitle translation is the variable length of foreign writing. English is known to be one of the more concise languages, but if you are translating your subtitles from English to German, lines are likely to be up to 1.5 times longer and timings will need to be edited to reflect this.
Subtitle Translation Turnaround Times
Turnaround times for subtitle translations start from 48 hours for very short files, or 72 hours plus for longer ones. The time frame is due to the proofreading element involved in checking and rechecking times not only on the source file but also on the completed subtitles in your target language.
If you are interested in subtitle translations, captioning or transcription services, please contact us today for a quote by email to info@transcriptioncity.co.uk or call us on 0208 816 8584.
