The Freelance Translators

[bayoab]

Didn't someone else try this recently (in the past 3 years or so)? (not FLF) I'm sure this is not the first time this has been attempted. And I also seem to remember that these don't last very long (a seasonish) for various reasons.

Originally Posted by TheFluff

If fansubbing is to survive at all, it must be rationalized. Less waste of human resources, less burnout-inducing redundant work, less ego trips and more pooling of resources. This is a step in the right direction.

Rationalized?

[Emess]

@DmonHiro: You do know that I'm in SS right? We definitely don't have speed, just like Eclipse is an average speedsub group that is incredibly overrated. I don't mean to insult Mentar and the rest of them but they can hardly be classified as a high-quality group, just higher than most. I've yet to see any really decent groups have anything resembling speed.

@TGEN: if only you didn't tell me in IRC you were gonna troll :3

@sangofe: I didn't mean to hurt your feelings. I know you and FD put a lot of effort into Saizen's fastest ep ever.

The thing is, consolidating resources doesn't help when the people contributing don't necessarily have the skills to do so. All this is doing is making every group into crunchyroll with a better encode, and one or two insanely slow quality groups (hi asunder) that are going to stick it out and release their own work eventually. That's not really benefiting anyone, just making crapsubs more prolific. Fansubbing doesn't need this to survive, it needs to be more efficient with which shows are done by who. There is absolutely no reason for a few relatively good shows to go without any good subs yet other shows get 15-20 crapsubs and if they're lucky, a single decent release.

E~

[False Dawn]

What you're suggesting, Emess, is that the whole "standard" of fansubbing needs to be raised. This, I think you'll find, is largely impossible.

[Schneizel]

How can a member of Static possibly be proud to say, "I am from Static" then take a cheap shot at Eclipse?

[TheFluff]

Originally Posted by bayoab

Rationalized?

Sorry, a swenglish-ism. I meant something along the lines of "reorganized and made more efficient".

Originally Posted by Emess

@DmonHiro: You do know that I'm in SS right? We definitely don't have speed, just like Eclipse is an average speedsub group that is incredibly overrated. I don't mean to insult Mentar and the rest of them but they can hardly be classified as a high-quality group, just higher than most. I've yet to see any really decent groups have anything resembling speed.

The difference between a speedsub group and a quality group is hardly as big as you make it out to be. These days most "quality" groups spend a lot of man hours fixing trivial errors nobody really cares about (minor typos etc), reencoding the same episode five or six times (because they're using full RC's and hardsub things), typesetting every single unreadable background sign, making karaoke effects/group logos and worrying about consistency issues nobody will ever notice.

The actual difference in translation quality (which is what matters) chiefly depends on the translator, and his job usually takes a fraction of the time a "quality" group spends on an episode.

Originally Posted by Emess

The thing is, consolidating resources doesn't help when the people contributing don't necessarily have the skills to do so. All this is doing is making every group into crunchyroll with a better encode, and one or two insanely slow quality groups (hi asunder) that are going to stick it out and release their own work eventually. That's not really benefiting anyone, just making crapsubs more prolific. Fansubbing doesn't need this to survive, it needs to be more efficient with which shows are done by who. There is absolutely no reason for a few relatively good shows to go without any good subs yet other shows get 15-20 crapsubs and if they're lucky, a single decent release.

This entire paragraph is pretty dumb. If you count the number of active (defined as making weekly non-cruncyroll-rip, non-rerelease-with-another-raw releases) English fansub groups today, I doubt you'd get over 30 TOTAL. The most oversubbed show of this season (Angel Beats) has like five groups on it, and not a single one of them is so bad that it's unwatchable. The AnimeJunkies-style subs of old hardly exist anymore except as googletranslated trolls or /a/ shenanigans.

[False Dawn]

Originally Posted by TheFluff

If you count the number of active (defined as making weekly non-cruncyroll-rip, non-rerelease-with-another-raw releases) English fansub groups today, I doubt you'd get over 30 TOTAL.

And you say fansubbing is dead? That still sounds pretty healthy to me.

[TheFluff]

Originally Posted by False Dawn

And you say fansubbing is dead? That still sounds pretty healthy to me.

It's not much when you consider that an oversubbed show in 2005 could have 10, 15 or even more groups on it, and that those groups actually had very little member overlap.

[False Dawn]

Originally Posted by TheFluff

It's not much when you consider that an oversubbed show in 2005 could have 10, 15 or even more groups on it, and that those groups actually had very little member overlap.

And for some reason you're suggesting that was a good thing... maybe it's my lack of imagination to be able to see why this is ever going to help anything, but I don't see what's wrong with the way things are now. In a sense, fansubbing has become more streamlined in that it's weeded out the individuals who were only interested purely for the stature fansubbing gave them, and instead you've now just got the guys who have been doing it for years and who enjoy it. Why should fansubbing be anything else? How does that make it dead?

[Schneizel]

Originally Posted by TheFluff

If you count the number of active (defined as making weekly non-cruncyroll-rip, non-rerelease-with-another-raw releases) English fansub groups today, I doubt you'd get over 30 TOTAL.

If you count the # of unique groups in the Ji-Hi comparisons for Spring 2010, you get 29. :V

Spoiler for expand:

Mazui
Tortoise
UTW
Aleph Naught
Generation NeXt
Static Subs
Nutbladder
Formula
Kesenai
CoalGuys
Doki
FFFpeeps
ANBU
Umai
Megami
Aoi Anime
Dattebayo
Phantom Subs
Frostii
SHiN-gx
Chihiro
Eclipse
Ryuumaru
Nuke
Mochi
m33w
Central Anime
Saizen
Yuurisans

Off the top of my head, this list is missing "people who have released Night Raid 1" (KnKF, Conclave, Rumbel, Animanda) and Huzzah (subbing SD Gundam RT3k) which brings us to 34.

And then there's the list of anime this season that "isn't a kids anime" and "is a full length anime/not 5mins long". It's 22 entries long.

Spoiler for expand:

Ikkitosen
Koihime 3
Heroman
B Gata H Kei
Big Windup 2
Maid
Dai Mao
Angel Beats
Major S6
Hakuoki
Giant Killing
RT3K
Working!!
Arakawa
Kiss x Sis
Night Raid
Stray Cats
Rainbow
K-On!!
UraBoku
Five Leaves
Tatami Galaxy

Now let's remove the simulcasted shows from that. That leaves us with 16.

Spoiler for expand:

Ikkitosen
B Gata H Kei
Big Windup 2
Maid
Angel Beats
Major S6
Hakuoki
Giant Killing
RT3K
Working!!
Arakawa
Kiss x Sis
Night Raid
Stray Cats
Rainbow
K-On!!

Enough to have a minimum of 2 groups per each show.

[TheFluff]

Originally Posted by False Dawn

And for some reason you're suggesting that was a good thing... maybe it's my lack of imagination to be able to see why this is ever going to help anything, but I don't see what's wrong with the way things are now. In a sense, fansubbing has become more streamlined in that it's weeded out the individuals who were only interested purely for the stature fansubbing gave them, and instead you've now just got the guys who have been doing it for years and who enjoy it. Why should fansubbing be anything else? How does that make it dead?

Fansubbing is already dead, it just doesn't know it yet. A single translator quitting used to be something only a single group worried about. Now, a single translator quitting can put four or five groups in trouble, and that's a lot when there only are 30-35 groups total. The influx of new people is pretty much zero as well.

[Access]

Originally Posted by TheFluff

It's not much when you consider that an oversubbed show in 2005 could have 10, 15 or even more groups on it, and that those groups actually had very little member overlap.

But judging the 'health' of fansubbing by the amount of oversubbing, does that make sense?

To me what is important is the variety and sheer number of shows available at any given time. From there one could look at it two ways, what portion of the current shows are available and what portion of all past shows are available. Either way, post-BT I can't remember a bad time. The only time I was disappointed with this was at the very beginning (ie. love hina, vandread, etc.) If scarywater does go down for real, that could hurt the second number b'cos a lot of those older groups are inactive.

As for 'death', pundits have been predicting that for the last 6-7 years. BT was going to mean the end of fansubbing. Then streaming subs or crunchyroll was going to be the end. C&D letters sent by BayTSP or Japanese companies, so-and-so cable company trying to block BT, mass or over-licensing / over-extension by the commercial companies, etc. Never changed anything.

The 'already dead' argument doesn't make much sense either, I can see what you are getting at (with all the interdependency and shared translators that happens now) but with that vision, what you miss, is the people who could / would step up to replace that person if they did leave. There are pleanty of capable people who are, right now, not active b'cos they just don't need to be active. They're already getting everything they want. But you start to take away that 'everything they want', and those people will step up and replace another person who left. This factors into the lessening of speedsubbing also.

[DmonHiro]

Originally Posted by TheFluff

The influx of new people is pretty much zero as well.

This is a major problem right now. It's really hard to get new good translators. There's also another catch. Even if you are a translator, some groups won't even give you a chance unless you have "experience", and you can't get any if no groups want to work with you, except the shitty ones. It's like the USA workforce problem .

But seriously, I wouldn't say fansubing is "dead". Maybe it's got cancer, but it's not terminal yet. The chemo might still work and bring it back from the brink of death. Problem is...I have no idea what that "chemo" is.

[pablo212]

Originally Posted by DmonHiro

This is a major problem right now. It's really hard to get new good translators. There's also another catch. Even if you are a translator, some groups won't even give you a chance unless you have "experience", and you can't get any if no groups want to work with you, except the shitty ones. It's like the USA workforce problem .

But seriously, I wouldn't say fansubing is "dead". Maybe it's got cancer, but it's not terminal yet. The chemo might still work and bring it back from the brink of death. Problem is...I have no idea what that "chemo" is.

I actually consider fansubbing dead, but we still get a lot of applications, and blakbunnie can attest to some of them being pretty good, since he tests them himself, but what TheFluff is saying is also spot on, in circa 2008, every show had at least 1-2 good sub groups on it, but now a days... it is hard to manage finding a single good group on any given show. But, here's hoping to a change soon!

[K!R4]

Originally Posted by Emess

@DmonHiro: You do know that I'm in SS right? We definitely don't have speed, just like Eclipse is an average speedsub group that is incredibly overrated. I don't mean to insult Mentar and the rest of them but they can hardly be classified as a high-quality group, just higher than most. I've yet to see any really decent groups have anything resembling speed.

wtf.. emess in ss? i cant believe that ss' staff let this noob encoder join the group. no wonder why ss' encodes have become shit. i cant blame them if they let this one slip because they lack encoder for some reason. anyway, ill keep this note though.

[sangofe]

Originally Posted by Emess

@DmonHiro: You do know that I'm in SS right? We definitely don't have speed, just like Eclipse is an average speedsub group that is incredibly overrated. I don't mean to insult Mentar and the rest of them but they can hardly be classified as a high-quality group, just higher than most. I've yet to see any really decent groups have anything resembling speed.

@TGEN: if only you didn't tell me in IRC you were gonna troll :3

@sangofe: I didn't mean to hurt your feelings. I know you and FD put a lot of effort into Saizen's fastest ep ever.

The thing is, consolidating resources doesn't help when the people contributing don't necessarily have the skills to do so. All this is doing is making every group into crunchyroll with a better encode, and one or two insanely slow quality groups (hi asunder) that are going to stick it out and release their own work eventually. That's not really benefiting anyone, just making crapsubs more prolific. Fansubbing doesn't need this to survive, it needs to be more efficient with which shows are done by who. There is absolutely no reason for a few relatively good shows to go without any good subs yet other shows get 15-20 crapsubs and if they're lucky, a single decent release.

E~

You never hurt my feelings, Emess, but I was more mortified about the fact that you're right; most staff seem to not see the rush on doing things at a good speed when it comes to series like Ashita no joe, even though there's been expections, but they are rare, and need a really motivated project leader.

[Emess]

Originally Posted by K!R4

wtf.. emess in ss? i cant believe that ss' staff let this noob encoder join the group. no wonder why ss' encodes have become shit. i cant blame them if they let this one slip because they lack encoder for some reason. anyway, ill keep this note though.

It's not like I actually do anything there besides for a single OVA. What do you call noob though, I've been around since the end of 2004. They lack encoders because people had real life to deal with. I'm sick, Yumi had an accommodation problem, TheRyuu is too busy with schoolwork, that doesn't really leave anyone.

Originally Posted by False Dawn

And for some reason you're suggesting that was a good thing... maybe it's my lack of imagination to be able to see why this is ever going to help anything, but I don't see what's wrong with the way things are now. In a sense, fansubbing has become more streamlined in that it's weeded out the individuals who were only interested purely for the stature fansubbing gave them, and instead you've now just got the guys who have been doing it for years and who enjoy it. Why should fansubbing be anything else? How does that make it dead?

Those guys, and the legions of crappy re-encoders and CR rippers and speedsubs. I actually prefer softsubs like what the speedsub groups put out, I just can't stand their insanely shitty scripts. There isn't really something you can point out as a specific even, they're just globally awkward to read, or obviously edited to be "funnier" by whichever trolling idiot.

Originally Posted by TheFluff

The actual difference in translation quality (which is what matters) chiefly depends on the translator, and his job usually takes a fraction of the time a "quality" group spends on an episode.

This entire paragraph is pretty dumb. If you count the number of active (defined as making weekly non-cruncyroll-rip, non-rerelease-with-another-raw releases) English fansub groups today, I doubt you'd get over 30 TOTAL. The most oversubbed show of this season (Angel Beats) has like five groups on it, and not a single one of them is so bad that it's unwatchable. The AnimeJunkies-style subs of old hardly exist anymore except as googletranslated trolls or /a/ shenanigans.

I'd say the difference is mostly in the quality of editing. Sure, there are bad translators but nobody cares about groups like Yuurisan anyway. The groups with less great but still decent translators have TLC's, or at least get the point across well enough when the editor talks with the TL about their decisions. Maybe I just have a problem with the general troll mentality the community seems to have now. It puts me off from watching most subs. There are probably no more than 5 active groups I would consistently watch stuff from. I'm not sure this paragraph makes sense.

Originally Posted by Schneizel

How can a member of Static possibly be proud to say, "I am from Static" then take a cheap shot at Eclipse?

Because they are not the same group, and I would crit a group I'm in as much as any other?

E~

[yuurisan]

Originally Posted by Emess

I'd say the difference is mostly in the quality of editing. Sure, there are bad translators but nobody cares about groups like Yuurisan anyway. The groups with less great but still decent translators have TLC's, or at least get the point across well enough when the editor talks with the TL about their decisions. Maybe I just have a problem with the general troll mentality the community seems to have now. It puts me off from watching most subs. There are probably no more than 5 active groups I would consistently watch stuff from. I'm not sure this paragraph makes sense.

No, your paragraph doesn't make any sense
Anyway, blakbunnie27 I think it's a good idea! But many respectable groups that care about fansubbing will keep their reliable translators and continue to release.

[dj_tjerk]

I doubt I would stay motivated that way if "fansubbing were to change"/"fansubbing needs to be rationalized". I can't be arsed to do any work for/with people I don't know or care about. The only thing I like and care about in fansubbing is the working-together part and so far that's been great.

Also, looking back at the old days; things used to be a lot more "inefficient" back then, and there were a lot of slow releases. Maybe back then a lot of people still though "hey, i can do this too" and started their own group. But DB/Eclipse/gg changed all that (together with the crazy amount of other speedsubbers) and demands for more fansubbers who can do their job fast and would be available to do their job every week at a certain time, raised the bar for people wanting to enter the fansubbing world. Almost no groups were left that took it easy and were doing things at their own pace (basically the training ground for new people i guess).

Either way, I have no idea what will happen to fansubs in the future. It's not like I really care anyway; I'll just do whatever I feel like doing.

[cyth]

Well, TheFluff, you complain about the low influx of new people, which is a potential problem, sure, but have you ever stopped to think why that is?

Originally Posted by Eclipse

Can I join Eclipse?
You can't join the group itself unless you were invited. Which you weren't.
(Since some people don't seem to get it: YES, this means we are not recruiting. Let me put it this way, about three fourths of the group can be considered “founding members”. If you had any chance of getting in, you'd know about it.)

Originally Posted by gg

“Hi my job is [x], I want to join your group”
We’re not recruiting. And even if we were recruiting, we’d be looking for people who can do multiple jobs and/or have referrals from people already in.

Anyone can see why someone would say something like that: abundance of resources, lack of patience for recruiting and/or training new people, closed circles kick ass.

This is what big and popular groups did in the past: they had a recruitment process where they tested your talent, then they gave you all the necessary tools and lessons and gave you some low-profile work for starters. The mentality behind "quality" groups such as the ones you're in doesn't allow such mechanisms, you guys want fully trained people, which sadly applies to new translators as well. In my time, we've had translators who produced really shitty scripts in the beginning but with time turned out to be great. This was before CCs were the norm.

Another problem which ties to this one is negative attitude toward members of farm groups--you know, groups that actually train newbie fansubbers.

One other potential problem is the state of anime popularity in western hemisphere. We haven't had a new anime boom since Pokemon, Academy Awards have no love for anime features anymore. Very dedicated fansubbers emerged from those mainstream masses, but this supply line is drying up. Access mentioned that some people are now inactive because they see no need to be active. This is true, however they are old people.

Despite all these points, I believe in fan spirit and that someone's gonna do at least a halfass job on a show if noone else is gonna pick it up (I mean, even I can translate from CCs, lol), which will in turn stimulate inactive people to do a better job and so on and so on...

[TGEN]

Originally Posted by Schneizel

If you count the # of unique groups in the Ji-Hi comparisons for Spring 2010, you get 29. :V

Off the top of my head, this list is missing "people who have released Night Raid 1" (KnKF, Conclave, Rumbel, Animanda) and Huzzah (subbing SD Gundam RT3k) which brings us to 34.

There are of course more groups than just those which sub shows from the current season. Some of those are on life support, but others still have life in them, e.g. doing old shows, being slow, or doing stuff not a lot of people seem to care about.

Originally Posted by cyth

The mentality behind "quality" groups such as the ones you're in doesn't allow such mechanisms, you guys want fully trained people, which sadly applies to new translators as well.

He's not claiming gg and Eclipse are "quality" groups, is he?