Colors
Different colors for each characters are annoying, but I think secondary color for background noise such as TV/phone etc is a nice alternative to italics.
I have experimented with using gray fonts (blue was original) for inner voice as an alternative for italics, but it was rejected by group's QC. I still think it looked nice though
Typesetting
This is necessary to understand what's going on in the story. Personally, I think TS should be applied if and only if it looks flawless, as in the viewer can't tell if it was added by the subbers or was there from the beginning (otherwise, they should be at the top or bottom as subs). In reality, people just place them on there even if it's distracting. Even "pro" subs do this.
Triple Liners
Not acceptable. It's a poor translation that ended up longer than necessary or poor line breaks. The readability of subs is important.
Notes
I like using them because it's not always possible to fully convey what's being said with subs alone.
Notes should never appear at the bottom though.
And no, these are not acceptable for prosubs. CR these days caved in due to their weeaboo audience, but this is a poor practice for professional translations. They should always be localized to make sense in the target language or just be left out in hope that the audience will understand or care enough to research on their own.
Pet Peeves
- Use of incompetent translators (this is slowly disappearing).
- Crappy timing
- Yellow fonts (this is retarded)
- Untranslated songs in anime (this is an extension of incompetent translators, pro film subs almost always have them)
- UK English. I see your urge to use British spelling (I'm actually from Canada too), but American English is the universal language in the internet, and also for majority of English-speaking audience for practically every foreign language entertainment. I've actually seen prosubs do this, and I think it's pretty ridiculous.