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roxybudgy · 2013-06-01, 19:20

I've only worked on two episodes in regards to fansubs. My start in translating began with first a failed attempt to fansub, developing my skills through scanlations, venturing into visual novel translations, then lending a friend a hand with two episodes of Sumomo Mo Momo Mo.

I decided to try my hand a fan-translations during my first year at uni. Prior to that, I had studied Japanese as an elective subject in high school and the last two years of primary school. Feeling over confident because I could understand a few lines of what was being said in anime, I initially offered my services to fansubbers because I loved the work they do and wished to also contribute. But my first assigned task was to translate the OP/ED for Tsubasa Chronicles for Live-Evil, I realised that it was beyond my skill level, so I gave up on fansubs.

So I decided to try something a little easier, I offered my services to scanlators. Again, I bit off more than I can chew by agreeing to translate for 5 different groups at the same time (therefore 5 different manga). Fan-translating is done because you love something and want to share it, but out of those many projects I took up, only one of them I found interesting: Rabuyan (Love-yan). But I was still out of my depth, so I decided to drop project that I didn't find interesting and projects that were too difficult for me.

Eventually I joined the scanalation group Kawaii-Heavens. They wanted someone to translate the manga for Shuffle! for which I enjoyed the anime, so I jumped on the chance. My task was to translate from chapter 1. I thought it would be a piece of cake because the first two chapters had already been done by KnK so I could refer to them if I got stuck. However, I found that there were several translation errors in the KnK scanlation. I ended up working on several projects for Kawaii-Heavens, coincidently we also worked on manga for Fate Stay Night, Utawarerumono (my personal favourite) and Happiness! We unknowingly became the scanlators for manga adaptations of anime adaptation of eroge. I had a lot of fun working with the team at Kawaii Heavens, but because we were all 18+, real life took up more and more of our time until we just had no more time to scanlate.

After translating many chapters for Kawaii Heavens, out of great love for Utawarerumono, myself and other like-minded individuals decided to try to translate the UtaMono PC game under the Soylations banner. While it wasn't really out of my depth, it was taking me a long time to translate the game, so I took on other tasks while someone else whom what much more fluent in Japanese took over the translation.

Some of the friends I met and worked with at Soylations decided to make their own fansub group translating anime to German, starting with Sumomo Mo Momo Mo. The first 24 episodes had already been fansubbed to English, so they just translated from English to German and asked me to translate a few signs that were left out, which was easy enough for me. However, the OVAs episodes 25 and 26 were not yet translated in English. I was very hesitant and tried to refuse because translating anime is still beyond my ability. Eventually I did agree to help and gave it my best. But at I said before, anime is beyond my ability, so I was left with many lines that I just could not make out. I asked for help on this very forum, and I do apologise for not remembering the name of the person who helped me fill in the blanks, but it was very much appreciated.

I probably never will attempt to translate anime again as I simply don't have the ear for it. Heck, I can barely understand what the lyrics are in many English songs. I would love to get back into translating manga again, finish off Shuffle! and Utawarerumono, but sadly I just don't have the time for that anymore.

TL: DR I got into fan-translations because I love anime and manga and wanted to share and contribute to the community that fuelled my obsession.

2013-06-01, 19:20	Link #14
roxybudgy Senior Member Scanlator Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: Western Australia Age: 37	I've only worked on two episodes in regards to fansubs. My start in translating began with first a failed attempt to fansub, developing my skills through scanlations, venturing into visual novel translations, then lending a friend a hand with two episodes of Sumomo Mo Momo Mo. I decided to try my hand a fan-translations during my first year at uni. Prior to that, I had studied Japanese as an elective subject in high school and the last two years of primary school. Feeling over confident because I could understand a few lines of what was being said in anime, I initially offered my services to fansubbers because I loved the work they do and wished to also contribute. But my first assigned task was to translate the OP/ED for Tsubasa Chronicles for Live-Evil, I realised that it was beyond my skill level, so I gave up on fansubs. So I decided to try something a little easier, I offered my services to scanlators. Again, I bit off more than I can chew by agreeing to translate for 5 different groups at the same time (therefore 5 different manga). Fan-translating is done because you love something and want to share it, but out of those many projects I took up, only one of them I found interesting: Rabuyan (Love-yan). But I was still out of my depth, so I decided to drop project that I didn't find interesting and projects that were too difficult for me. Eventually I joined the scanalation group Kawaii-Heavens. They wanted someone to translate the manga for Shuffle! for which I enjoyed the anime, so I jumped on the chance. My task was to translate from chapter 1. I thought it would be a piece of cake because the first two chapters had already been done by KnK so I could refer to them if I got stuck. However, I found that there were several translation errors in the KnK scanlation. I ended up working on several projects for Kawaii-Heavens, coincidently we also worked on manga for Fate Stay Night, Utawarerumono (my personal favourite) and Happiness! We unknowingly became the scanlators for manga adaptations of anime adaptation of eroge. I had a lot of fun working with the team at Kawaii Heavens, but because we were all 18+, real life took up more and more of our time until we just had no more time to scanlate. After translating many chapters for Kawaii Heavens, out of great love for Utawarerumono, myself and other like-minded individuals decided to try to translate the UtaMono PC game under the Soylations banner. While it wasn't really out of my depth, it was taking me a long time to translate the game, so I took on other tasks while someone else whom what much more fluent in Japanese took over the translation. Some of the friends I met and worked with at Soylations decided to make their own fansub group translating anime to German, starting with Sumomo Mo Momo Mo. The first 24 episodes had already been fansubbed to English, so they just translated from English to German and asked me to translate a few signs that were left out, which was easy enough for me. However, the OVAs episodes 25 and 26 were not yet translated in English. I was very hesitant and tried to refuse because translating anime is still beyond my ability. Eventually I did agree to help and gave it my best. But at I said before, anime is beyond my ability, so I was left with many lines that I just could not make out. I asked for help on this very forum, and I do apologise for not remembering the name of the person who helped me fill in the blanks, but it was very much appreciated. I probably never will attempt to translate anime again as I simply don't have the ear for it. Heck, I can barely understand what the lyrics are in many English songs. I would love to get back into translating manga again, finish off Shuffle! and Utawarerumono, but sadly I just don't have the time for that anymore. TL: DR I got into fan-translations because I love anime and manga and wanted to share and contribute to the community that fuelled my obsession.