Working In The Movies Reading Answers: IELTS Reading Practice Test

Learn about IELTS General Reading. 

Working In The Movies Reading Passage 

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Subtitling is an intriguing element in the translation industry. Melanie Leyshon discusses the glitz and bustle with Virginie Verdier of the London translation company VSI.

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Virginie Verdier, a French translator, surely finds it enticing to answer enigmatically when people ask her what she does for a living by saying, "Oh, me? I participate in movies." Certainly true, but she plays the lead role behind the scenes. Nothing is more exciting or glamorous in terms of translation than subtitling movies. If you're truly fortunate, you might have the opportunity to work on brand-new blockbuster movies before they are released in theatres, and if you're just plain lucky, you might have the opportunity to work on blockbuster movies that will be issued on video or DVD.

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The procedure begins when you receive the original script and a recording. "We would usually start by interpreting and modifying the script." The next phase is what we refer to as "timing," which consists of syncing the speech and pictures well with subtitles. Discipline is needed for this work. The film is played, the voice is heard, and the captions are displayed on the screen, ready to be synchronized. Once the appropriate sentence begins, you add the subtitle and remove it when it has finished. The videotape is labeled with a time code in hours, minutes, seconds, and frames. Consider it to be a clock. The subtitle system includes an insert key that you can use to record the time code for the target position of the subtitle. The time code at which you want the subtitle to vanish is recorded once you click the delete key. Hence, every subtitle would constitute a particular feature of the translation industry.

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Melanie Leyshon discusses the glamour and hardship with Virginie Verdier of the London translation company VSI. Virginie is eager to emphasize that this requires the same level of accuracy as any translation task. You put in a lot of effort. As you translate, you will discover that it is not entertaining. You require the abilities of both a leading editor and a proficient translator. Unlike the usual translation tasks, you must be relatively brief and accurate.

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The exact time that a subtitle appears and disappears is represented by an "in" point and an "out" point. A manual evaluation of the process is then performed, with each subtitle being inspected individually. Time codes are therefore updated to improve synchronization and consider alterations. To ensure that the subtitles comply with the visual rhythm of the movie, this method involves playing the movie frame by frame. Different subtitlers employ different methods. I frequently watch the film once, translate it, and then go back to the beginning to finish the timings. But you could do it in sections, translating, maybe, 20 minutes of the film, then timing and translating the subsequent 20 minutes, and so on. It's merely a different technique." For multilingual assignments, timing is done first to develop a "spotting list," or subtitle template, which is a list of English subtitles that have been pre-timed and adjusted for translation. This is then translated, and, with the translator's assistance, the time is corrected to the target language for quality control.

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According to Virginie, the subtitling process, like any other translation endeavor, cannot be rushed. It is obvious that if subtitles are translated and organized in a hurry, the quality will suffer. The majority of mistakes are made by the translator misinterpreting the actual dialogue because they are not fluent in the source language. As part of our responsibilities, we also examine and rewrite subtitles when a translation is insufficient. However, there are other factors involved in the requirement to redo the subtitles in addition to poor translation. A new version of the movie could need the subtitles altered because of a potential change in the time code. It's possible that the movie was altered or that the subtitles were written for the cinema instead of the video. If subtitles were made for movies on 35mm, the timing would have to be reformated for video since they could be out of sync or go too quickly. Naturally, we would appreciate the original translator's effort if the translation is accurate.

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According to Virginie, on a more pragmatic level, there seem to be basic subtitling principles that must be followed. Subtitles should ideally be displayed in the center and at the bottom of the screen, she says, noting that different countries follow different standards and regulations. For instance, subtitles are typically left-justified in Scandinavian countries and Holland. To make them easier to read against a white or light background, characters are generally displayed in white with a thin black border. When subtitles are being provided for the hearing impaired, we could utilize different colors for different individuals. There should only be two lines in a subtitle, with a maximum of 32 to 39 characters for each line. The criteria for our firm are 37 characters (standards vary among different organizations and nations).

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It's common for translators to have a favourite category, whether it be corporate shows, comedies, musicals, war movies, or comedies (one of the trickiest owing to the variations in comedy across nations and its complexities). Each demands a particular tone and manner. Because many of the films we subtitle are American, the fact that VSI seeks American subtitlers is quite advantageous, explains Virginie. It would be hard for an English person to recognise the meaning of a typical American remark and vice-versa.