Forum: Subtitling
Topic: Subtitling rates
Poster: José Henrique Lamensdorf
Post title: The bottom rate in subtitling is zero
There are crowds willing to do subtitling for free, just to gain some practice in order to qualify for the professional subtitling market. They are named "fansubbers", and their work can be easily found for download on the web.
The problem is that nobody gives them feedback, in order to enable them to improve. So their quality remains at the same level as their rates. When they are offered peanuts for their subtitling service, they grab it immediately! At last they are making some money, no matter how little. They [i]feel[/i] professional.
This is why we often see really bad subtitling on TV. The subtitling supply chain ravishes, as they are getting translation and spotting done for peanuts, and profits are mushrooming. The broadcasting network doesn't mind the quality, as the sponsor/subscriber is paying them anyway, regardless of the subtitling quality. There is no chance for the payer to check on subtitling quality before they commit to pay, and there is never any clause anywhere stipulating that they would be entitled to some penalty discount in case subtitling is bad.
This is why the subtitling rates AND quality are plummeting.
A few years ago, I had some time to spare between Xmas and the New Year, so I decided to carry out an experiment on [i]How much time and effort would it take to "fix" amateur subtitles? [/i]
This procedure is analogous to what some translation clients do... They hire an amateur to [u]translate[/u] at professional [u]proofreading rates[/u]. Then they trap a professional translator into "fixing" it at the same proofreading rates. Bottom line is that - if they succeed in their ploy - they'll have a top-notch translation for 2/3 of what it should cost. Plan B is PEMT, in which case success would be achieved for 1/3 of the cost.
The report on my experiment is available only in Brazilian Portuguese on [url= [url removed] ]this page[/url].
My general conclusion is that it takes a professional subtitler the same time and effort to fix amateur subtitles as it would to do them from scratch. Adding insult to injury, the outcome is quality-wise worse, since boredom leads to leniency, and 'barely passable' subs are often left unchanged.
For years I've specialized in corporate video (i.e. training, product launch, institutional) localization. These clients are not in the video industry, their videos have been outsourced via their PR or ad agency to a producer. So their subsidiaries want a turn-key video localization job, which I can do. The main point is that their image will be at stake on these videos; and poor translation may jeopardize it. So when they hire this kind of work, they want nothing but the best.
However if there is an agency in the supply chain, they'll want high profits on a comparatively expensive project, which means that they'll want acceptable quality from the cheapest translator money can buy.
I did some extensive translation work on feature films and TV series for a subtitling firm that was working directly for a major Hollywood studio. Pay was quite acceptable. Last news I had from them was that TV networks are now offering to pay less per minute for the entire subtitling job than they usually pay translators alone.
I'll refrain from delving into the Netflix paradigm beyond saying that the subtitling supply chain is getting longer and longer, on account of wider globalization (more languages) and consequently growing project complexity. As the video subtitling supply chain grows longer, it includes an increasing population of greedy in-betweens. IMHO this is what is driving video translation rates down.
Topic: Subtitling rates
Poster: José Henrique Lamensdorf
Post title: The bottom rate in subtitling is zero
There are crowds willing to do subtitling for free, just to gain some practice in order to qualify for the professional subtitling market. They are named "fansubbers", and their work can be easily found for download on the web.
The problem is that nobody gives them feedback, in order to enable them to improve. So their quality remains at the same level as their rates. When they are offered peanuts for their subtitling service, they grab it immediately! At last they are making some money, no matter how little. They [i]feel[/i] professional.
This is why we often see really bad subtitling on TV. The subtitling supply chain ravishes, as they are getting translation and spotting done for peanuts, and profits are mushrooming. The broadcasting network doesn't mind the quality, as the sponsor/subscriber is paying them anyway, regardless of the subtitling quality. There is no chance for the payer to check on subtitling quality before they commit to pay, and there is never any clause anywhere stipulating that they would be entitled to some penalty discount in case subtitling is bad.
This is why the subtitling rates AND quality are plummeting.
A few years ago, I had some time to spare between Xmas and the New Year, so I decided to carry out an experiment on [i]How much time and effort would it take to "fix" amateur subtitles? [/i]
This procedure is analogous to what some translation clients do... They hire an amateur to [u]translate[/u] at professional [u]proofreading rates[/u]. Then they trap a professional translator into "fixing" it at the same proofreading rates. Bottom line is that - if they succeed in their ploy - they'll have a top-notch translation for 2/3 of what it should cost. Plan B is PEMT, in which case success would be achieved for 1/3 of the cost.
The report on my experiment is available only in Brazilian Portuguese on [url= [url removed] ]this page[/url].
My general conclusion is that it takes a professional subtitler the same time and effort to fix amateur subtitles as it would to do them from scratch. Adding insult to injury, the outcome is quality-wise worse, since boredom leads to leniency, and 'barely passable' subs are often left unchanged.
For years I've specialized in corporate video (i.e. training, product launch, institutional) localization. These clients are not in the video industry, their videos have been outsourced via their PR or ad agency to a producer. So their subsidiaries want a turn-key video localization job, which I can do. The main point is that their image will be at stake on these videos; and poor translation may jeopardize it. So when they hire this kind of work, they want nothing but the best.
However if there is an agency in the supply chain, they'll want high profits on a comparatively expensive project, which means that they'll want acceptable quality from the cheapest translator money can buy.
I did some extensive translation work on feature films and TV series for a subtitling firm that was working directly for a major Hollywood studio. Pay was quite acceptable. Last news I had from them was that TV networks are now offering to pay less per minute for the entire subtitling job than they usually pay translators alone.
I'll refrain from delving into the Netflix paradigm beyond saying that the subtitling supply chain is getting longer and longer, on account of wider globalization (more languages) and consequently growing project complexity. As the video subtitling supply chain grows longer, it includes an increasing population of greedy in-betweens. IMHO this is what is driving video translation rates down.