Forum: Subtitling
Topic: Subtitling rates
Poster: Bernhard Sulzer
Post title: You mean well, do you?
[quote]Andreas Granzow wrote:
Hi Natalia,
I do a lot of subtitling myself and also give some to other freelancers I work with.
A rate of only USD 0.03 per minute of subtitling is absolutely crazy in my opinion.
YOu have to keep in mind, that on most videos, such as training material or the like, it takes more than a minute to do the subtitles for a minute of video. The fastest I have done was a 10 Minute video in 20 minutes. The time needed varies greatly. It depends on the way the person talks, how clearly (s)he speaks. Some are good, others are terrible.
However, even if you are extremely fast and can do one minute video in one minute of real time it wouldn't be worth the effort.
As for myself, I don't touch anything that doesn't even come close to:
1 Subtitling - EUR 1.50/m
2 Translation & subtitling - EUR 2.00/m
Anything else is not worth the effort, as the hourly rate would dip way too low. Remember, that isn't the hourly rate on video time, but on actual worked time. [/quote]
But I am afraid your rate might not be worth it either.
Judging from your rate suggestion (for agencies, not direct clients, right?) above, you would only charge 50 Cents per minute for translating? That would be $30.00 per hour. Not rock bottom, but not a very good deal.
A decent fee/rate for translating from English to German (just translating text) that you should charge agencies (professional agencies) would be 15 cents/source word. Yes, that's very decent for providing excellent work. But if you want, try the example with 12 cents.
So let's say your video is 1/2 hour long, and every minute contains at least 100 words (very low number), that would give you 100 x 30 = 3000 words. If this were a typed text, charged for at a rate of 15 Cents/source word, that would be 450 Euros, again, just for translating a text that you have in writing/typed form, in front of you.
If your video that you translated and subtitled so quickly only contained 50 words per video minute, that would be 500 words for 10 minutes. Translating that at a 15 Cents/source word (a decent per-word rate for translation) would be 75 Euros. Just for translating. But you did it for how much - translating only?
As you can see, it does very much depend on the volume of words in the video, but just as much on understanding the voices, and many other factors.
Just because certain agencies/clients are not willing to pay you a decent rate, doesn't mean you should do it for a pittance. Unless you enjoy getting taken advantage of. And there seem to be a lot of people enjoying that, particularly when it comes to translating and subtitling. Please note:
I am saying that as a general statement, not to you personally.
Topic: Subtitling rates
Poster: Bernhard Sulzer
Post title: You mean well, do you?
[quote]Andreas Granzow wrote:
Hi Natalia,
I do a lot of subtitling myself and also give some to other freelancers I work with.
A rate of only USD 0.03 per minute of subtitling is absolutely crazy in my opinion.
YOu have to keep in mind, that on most videos, such as training material or the like, it takes more than a minute to do the subtitles for a minute of video. The fastest I have done was a 10 Minute video in 20 minutes. The time needed varies greatly. It depends on the way the person talks, how clearly (s)he speaks. Some are good, others are terrible.
However, even if you are extremely fast and can do one minute video in one minute of real time it wouldn't be worth the effort.
As for myself, I don't touch anything that doesn't even come close to:
1 Subtitling - EUR 1.50/m
2 Translation & subtitling - EUR 2.00/m
Anything else is not worth the effort, as the hourly rate would dip way too low. Remember, that isn't the hourly rate on video time, but on actual worked time. [/quote]
But I am afraid your rate might not be worth it either.
Judging from your rate suggestion (for agencies, not direct clients, right?) above, you would only charge 50 Cents per minute for translating? That would be $30.00 per hour. Not rock bottom, but not a very good deal.
A decent fee/rate for translating from English to German (just translating text) that you should charge agencies (professional agencies) would be 15 cents/source word. Yes, that's very decent for providing excellent work. But if you want, try the example with 12 cents.
So let's say your video is 1/2 hour long, and every minute contains at least 100 words (very low number), that would give you 100 x 30 = 3000 words. If this were a typed text, charged for at a rate of 15 Cents/source word, that would be 450 Euros, again, just for translating a text that you have in writing/typed form, in front of you.
If your video that you translated and subtitled so quickly only contained 50 words per video minute, that would be 500 words for 10 minutes. Translating that at a 15 Cents/source word (a decent per-word rate for translation) would be 75 Euros. Just for translating. But you did it for how much - translating only?
As you can see, it does very much depend on the volume of words in the video, but just as much on understanding the voices, and many other factors.
Just because certain agencies/clients are not willing to pay you a decent rate, doesn't mean you should do it for a pittance. Unless you enjoy getting taken advantage of. And there seem to be a lot of people enjoying that, particularly when it comes to translating and subtitling. Please note:
I am saying that as a general statement, not to you personally.