Forum: Subtitling
Topic: Duration / Spotting of subtitles
Poster: Noukita
Hello everyone,
I am new to ProZ though I have already a basic experience with translation/subtitling (mostly German>French).
But I would like to have a few "experts"-opinions about the 2 following problems I recently encountered.
1) When you have a documentary, where someone takes quite long for his sentence, how long do you display the subtitle? Sometimes I try to cut the sentence in two separate subtitles of one line each instead of the regular 2-lines-subtitle). This is possible when the person hesitates for example, and makes a silence inbetween. But sometimes it doesn't always make sense, for example if the person makes a mistake by pronouncing a word and correcting himself.
In this case, do you keep the same rhythm of displaying the subtitle like the other few sentences just before (but then the subtitle "disappears" already in the middle of the sentence, even if there certainly was enough time to read it). That is what I would tend to do, but I have doubts and ask myself if other persons might find it strange that the subtitle disappears while the person is still speaking (I am not talking of a difference about few images, but sometimes whole seconds).
2) The other problem I have (in a documentary too) is when the person begins to talk before a scene change ("off-voice", you don't see the person yet, just hear her talking a few seconds before she appears on screen in the interview situation).
I was taught not to put subtitles astride two scenes. In this case, may I derogate to this rule (what I would do if I can put more or less half of the the subtitle over the cut), or is it always better to start the subtitle only once you see the person (but then it might be quite "narrow" with the timing of the following subtitles, and it could be strange if the person talks and the subtitle takes long to first appear.
Thanks a lot in advance for your help and hints!
Noukita
Topic: Duration / Spotting of subtitles
Poster: Noukita
Hello everyone,
I am new to ProZ though I have already a basic experience with translation/subtitling (mostly German>French).
But I would like to have a few "experts"-opinions about the 2 following problems I recently encountered.
1) When you have a documentary, where someone takes quite long for his sentence, how long do you display the subtitle? Sometimes I try to cut the sentence in two separate subtitles of one line each instead of the regular 2-lines-subtitle). This is possible when the person hesitates for example, and makes a silence inbetween. But sometimes it doesn't always make sense, for example if the person makes a mistake by pronouncing a word and correcting himself.
In this case, do you keep the same rhythm of displaying the subtitle like the other few sentences just before (but then the subtitle "disappears" already in the middle of the sentence, even if there certainly was enough time to read it). That is what I would tend to do, but I have doubts and ask myself if other persons might find it strange that the subtitle disappears while the person is still speaking (I am not talking of a difference about few images, but sometimes whole seconds).
2) The other problem I have (in a documentary too) is when the person begins to talk before a scene change ("off-voice", you don't see the person yet, just hear her talking a few seconds before she appears on screen in the interview situation).
I was taught not to put subtitles astride two scenes. In this case, may I derogate to this rule (what I would do if I can put more or less half of the the subtitle over the cut), or is it always better to start the subtitle only once you see the person (but then it might be quite "narrow" with the timing of the following subtitles, and it could be strange if the person talks and the subtitle takes long to first appear.
Thanks a lot in advance for your help and hints!
Noukita