| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z6K-FOK_MrY&disable_polymer=1 For everyone who's too lazy to watch the video, I'll bullet the important bits: - Translators are paid exceedingly low wages, averaging $80/episode, and don't receive a regular salary or benefits; overall, Crunchyroll simulcasts pay less than 1/3 of their competitor's rates - The work is highly irregular; the difficulty and length of time spent will depend on what type of show you're given, however the pay you're given won't change; this is important because translating a highly complicated and technical show like Monogatari will pay exactly the same as translating a 20 minute fight scene from DBZ where 90% of the dialogue is screaming; this leads to situations where translators place very little value on their work and do a poorer job because of it - Not only do translators rarely receive credit for their work, they are actively encouraged not to seek credit; Steiner, a well known J→E translator, recently said on Twitter that while it isn't illegal or DMCA-able for TLs to come out and say "I TLed this and that", companies will then start simply not hire those people, or sometimes even the whole team that worked on that project anymore - Before Crunchyroll transitioned from fansubbing community to official licencing company, they were supported by translators who did most of their work for free; when the company began to take off, Crunchyroll emotionally blackmailed their translators into working for less, reasoning that because they had so much passion for their work they wouldn't mind doing it for less money - Crunchyroll subsidiaries in other countries, such as Russia and Italy, fare no better when it comes to working conditions and pay As many current and former translators have mentioned in the comments, freelancer jobs like translating leave people vulnerable to exploitation or unreasonable expectations. The video also details how the time constrains on a translation project can get, offering it as one reason why translations can feel "off" or "rushed". The production team in Japan sends the episodes to broadcasters in advance, with streaming platforms receiving it early. They'll often receive other materials before this to get a head-start, but translators prefer to use the final footage for the sake of accuracy. But when the production is running late, these deliveries can leave translators with very little time to work. I'm sure we're all aware that the anime industry as a whole operates on extremely thin profit margins, both inside and outside of Japan. This doesn't just mean dubs, but subs are affected as well. I don't want to immediately blame Japan for this, because Crunchyroll obviously bears a significant portion of the blame, but it's becoming obvious that the terrible working conditions of anime production teams has an effect on the quality of translator work in the West. There's too little money moving around in the industry, and too little coming from the fans anime is created for, who more often than not choose to watch anime illegally (due in no small part to Crunchyroll's garbage business practices). The main problem I see is that when you cater your entertainment medium towards a population of loser NEETs with no jobs and no future prospects, who is there to pay back into the industry? Anime fans aren't exactly known for being flush with cash, so how can companies expect to get any money back from their investment? It's looking more and more like anime needs to go mainstream to ensure its survival.........which of course brings its own share of problems that are a topic for another thread. |
MadHobbit2Jul 17, 2020 3:35 PM
| 90% of the the internet's problems come from people treating fictional people like they're real and real people like they're fictional. |
| Seems like you have to stick with netflix and hulu |
| 한 번만 살지만 제대로 하면 한 번이면 충분해요 |
BallistikJuice said: I've tried watching Anime with Eng sub/dubs they are horrible, Eng dubbers sound cringy and annoying. Also, the way they translate humor into English is also weird and not funny. @_cotillion, you are not gonna fool anybody here, with that stomach, we all know that! Someone clearly didn't watch the video/read the post. This isn't about dubs at all, it's about subtitling and translators. |
| 90% of the the internet's problems come from people treating fictional people like they're real and real people like they're fictional. |
| A lot of translators do it as a hobby on the side. Such willingness to do that makes the work worth less than it would be otherwise. I imagine a the same could be said for manga creators and people who create anime sadly. |
 |
| This is the exact reason why I, as someone who wants to be a professional translator when I finish my degree, will only do subtitling as a last resort (and it's why I rant about Crunchyroll at any opportunity lol). It's SO MUCH WORK, and as you said, relatively little pay. We had to do it as a final project once and doing 20 minutes of subtitling (while also having a good, relatively technical translation) took around 16 hours between actually coming up with a good translation and doing the formatting. I can't even imagine having to translate an OP on top of that. |
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