[lmm]

Piracy has never been about cost as much as it has been about convenience. For a long time the fansubbers simply offered a better product; shows from now rather than five years ago, with better-quality translations, and often better-quality video. Fans wanted to support the industry - I know more than one person with a shelf full of official English DVDs, still in their shrinkwrap - but the quality wasn't there.

Even today, as someone who takes the underground to work, a streaming service is no substitute for the incredibly well-oiled machine of fansubbing.

[digi_owl]

One example of impressive fansubbing i have seen was where the subs were color matched to the speakers hair, and contained cultural/historic/contextual info.

[james-skemp]

This makes me want to try to find the Ghost in the Shell 1 and 2 fansubs I downloaded years ago. I think one of them included explanations of the context of quotes and cultural references. But I might have trashed the CDs or DVDs once I was able to buy legal copies.

Related to the article, is unfortunate that Netflix has lost some of it's foreign film diversity on streaming. But as they move more and more toward appealing to the masses to lower costs, it's inevitable.

[lmm]

Matching the speakers' hair is useful, but too often notes end up as showing off. A good translation is supposed to replicate the experience of watching something in its original language, not explain every reference.

[tinco]

Perhaps, but sometimes a show is just that much more impressive if you understand more of what's going on. The show 'Ergo Proxy' comes to mind. It's got a mysterious plot and some throw off episodes that will really mess you up, but aside from that it's also got loads of references to history and philosophy that I would just not understand because I haven't studied either. The fansub group had small blobs of explanation pop up every once in a while to explain something, it really aided to the feeling you were watching something awesome. The text would only be up for a second, so you'd have to pause to read it. I think my Ghost in the Shell S.A.C subs had something similar.

There's one instance I remember of the fansubbers breaking the 4-th wall unexpectedly. The line the character said as a cliff hanger came from absolutely nowhere and was so staggering that the subber added something along the lines of "We assure you this is no translation mistake", if they hadn't added that I'd think it was so they were right to. (The anime in question is Elfen Lied, I don't suggest you watch it if you're not already deep into J-culture.. and maybe just not at all)

[zyx321]

Elfen Lied was one of the first fansubs I watched, and it was a good example of translators going too far. The version I watched used different text colors for the alien characters depending on whether their human (mostly sane) or alien(instinct-driven, homicidal) personality was in control. If you remember, there's a character later on who spent most of her life locked up in the basement under a government facility, so more than once I found myself disagreeing with the translator's assessment of whether or not she was supposed to be "sane" in any given scene.

And then there's the notorious scene in Code Geass where two characters are playing chess, and over 50% of the screen is filled with translator's notes about how that's not actually a valid move (when it's clearly an error on the animator's end of things).

Many, many fansub groups are just plain unprofessional in every sense of the word.

[tinco]

It's a bit like open source software in that regard. Often times the work is not professional, but it's a whole lot better than 'professional' commercial offerings.

The greatest fansub group there ever was in my opinion was dattebayo, mostly famous for their Naruto releases. Their public attitude was as unprofessional as you could get. They would often make fun of their viewers in announcements, and if you'd miss an announcement of a skipped episode due to Japanese holidays of studio co-ops or whatever you'd unsuspectingly download a troll episode. If episodes were filler or had a cheesy storyline they'd make fun of it in the sub of the title frame. But even though their public attitude was unprofessional, their actual subbing was the most professional operation I've ever seen in a sub group. They were always among the fastest, never missing a deadline. Their translations were always top notch, better than Crunchyroll, unlike other speedsubbers that would have frequent imperfections.

They basically held the entire Naruto community hostage with their high quality releases, while making fun of them for being the kinds of person who enjoy Naruto (which wasn't very highly regarded in the community at the time). When they had to quit because crunchyroll took over Naruto it really was a great loss for the community in my opinion.

[knodi123]

> dattebayo, mostly famous for their Naruto releases. Their public attitude was as unprofessional as you could get.

I'll never forget the time I tried to download a Naruto movie from Dattebayo, and instead got a film called "Gay Niggers From Outer Space".

Wikipedia says the leader of dattebayo is also the president of the GNAA, which is actually listed as a cyberterrorist organization.

Looking back on my childhood, using the internet from '95-'05 really felt like a crazy fantasia on the wild west.

[Vaskivo]

> A good translation is supposed to replicate the experience of watching something in its original language.

I disagree. I prefer to have the literal translation and then have the reference explained. I want the purest, most literall translation possible.

Imagine this situation. A character says "He is like a modern Nobunaga". I want the translation to say exactly that and, is the translator feel the need to, have a quick note explaining who Nobunaga was[0]. It would be unnaceptable to have it 'translated' to "He is like a modern Napoleon".

And I believe most of the hardcore anime fans would prefer it like this.

This fenomenon is called Culturalization[1]. It is as disrespectul for the hardcore fans as it is for the anime's creators.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oda_Nobunaga [1] Page 4 - https://c.ymcdn.com/sites/www.igda.org/resource/collection/6...

[emodendroket]

I can see what you mean in that case, but what about wordplay and puns? A running gag in Dragonball is Goku keeps calling Fortuneteller Baba (Uranai Baba) "old broad that nobody wants" (urenai baabaa). Do you want to read an explanation that takes up half the screen every time they do that joke? Would you even find it funny if you had to have it explained to you?

[Vaskivo]

In fansubs it expected that the viewer sees all episodes in order (and why wouldn't he?), so the joke would be explained once.

In commercial subs you can't make that assumption so, yeah, you explain it every time. But you could get creative with it. Instead ov explaining every single time you can only explain once per episode. And you can use the Intro or the Bumpers to give some context on the joke.

In dubs that gets complicated but, well... Don't watch dubs :)

[emodendroket]

I think it's important to think about the audience a bit. In an academic translation, sure, go nuts with long footnotes. But I think in the case of something intended primarily to entertain people you should make some concessions to practicality. Even many fansubs just swap in some English pun to go for the same effect (which leads to kind of funny results like fans who watched the fansubs complaining the dub "changed the original dialogue" from something that was also not the original dialogue).

[learnstats2]

> A good translation is supposed to replicate the experience of watching something in its original language

It's my feeling that this should include what would be automatically understood by natives.

I have never found this to go too far - I have always wanted more local context.

[kanche]

> I have never found this to go too far - I have always wanted more local context.

I really dig for those fansubs that explain the context. Some even go extra mile by adding text frames in the video explaining why the speaker said that and what this line actually means.

We tend to miss a lot if we only have a literal translation of what the speaker have said - like a joke hidden in plain words. I remember one anime where the hero's name if written in another way meant pervert - I would have never understood why other characters used to get horrified(in a comic way) upon hearing his name for the first time if the sub had not explained it.

[gerjomarty]

My opinion on this has changed over the years. I now tend to look at any translation which needs to include translation notes on-screen as having failed, usually because they explain something that isn't absolutely necessary to know, which isn't a good enough reason in my book to distract from the dialogue.

If you can't explain what you need to in the translation itself, just don't. Or include a TLNote.txt if you really must.

[polymatter]

what made you change your opinion? I love it when there are translation notes on screen. It feel inclusive to explain to me what's going on.

I can't speak Japanese, am not embedded within current popular Japanese culture and did not go to a Japanese high school and therefore there are references which I will not understand. These include jokes that rely on wordplay such as puns and malapropisms, and historical notes about Japanese history, geography and society which I am mostly ignorant of.

Without those translation notes, you exclude me from understanding anything but the surface of what's going on.

[gerjomarty]

Many fansubbers didn't know where to draw the line, or didn't have very good editors, so sometimes you got the situation where there were so many TL notes they were stacking on top of each other.

Others have noted the most egregious TL notes ("Keikaku means plan" and so on) but there are some other bad examples, including "This is a reference to..." (not even everyone in Japan is going to get references either) and even a few explaining what the English words they used meant.

There are many fewer these days, thankfully.

>jokes that rely on wordplay such as puns and malapropisms

While many disagree, I like translations that attempt to localise these. You can never get literal accuracy this way, but you can make a fun, entertaining and engrossing script. You might say it's not the job of the fansubbers to write the script, but it is their job to translate the one they have, and the best translations in my view are ones that take intended audience into account.

I watch anime comedies to laugh, not to read an explanation of what the joke is and why it's funny.

[Vaskivo]

Some actually do that. Either have a note saying that they'll explain the reference later during the credits(like the "[0]" we do here) or preemptly give context in the intro or bumper[0]

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bumper_%28broadcasting%29

[lmm]

I found the infamous *TL note: Yuki means Snow very offputting. (It came in the middle of a very deliberately sparse, emotional scene - simple scenery (mostly snow IIRC) and very little dialogue).

[bitwize]

There's a pun in Azumanga Daioh about a cat's tongue. In Japan the expression "cat's tongue" means one dislikes spicy food; the joke would not have been translatable without some flavor text explaining the expression.

A lot of anime is like this: full of dualogue that should be translated as-is to capture the immediacy of a joke or expression, but that has context that doesn't make sense to a non-Japanese without explanation.

[krapp]

At about :50 (but I suggest watching the whole thing) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lFBZBAbbKt8

Also completely off topic, but here is the voice actress for Chiyo-chan, Tomoko Kaneda, being pranked in a taxi: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTUYNaNK9ns

I wish there were more English subs of shows like this. I watch them now and then on Youtube but I can only get the most obvious physical humor because I don't speak or read Japanese.

[bitwize]

That's exactly what I was thinking of.

Story about that clip: I was in Osaka getting wasted in a tiny bar. The bartender and some of the patrons were pretty into anime and games -- but the ones we tend to think of as "quintessentially Japanese" aren't universally known there. My compadres for the evening were big fans of ONE PIECE (which was the hotness in Japan at the time) but none of them had heard of Azumanga Daioh or even Katamari Damacy.

So when I said that my poor, drunken Japanese must sound like the cat thing from Azumanga Daioh, I showed them that clip on my cellphone by way of an example. Laughter all around. Those Japanese folks found the "American Sailor Moon" (a.k.a. Saban Moon) pretty funny as well: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xS027mYtRu8

The atmosphere in that bar was so friendly that a few days later I endeavored to return. It took me like an hour to find it using my GPS and photos I'd taken from the first time around but eventually I did, and announced my triumphant return to the patrons with a hearty "HALLO EBRY-NYAN. HOW AH YOU. FINE SANKYU." Again, laughter, as they seemed to get the reference.

I haven't been to Japan since and the bar has closed down. The owner, I believe, decided to open a sports bar elsewhere in Osaka. More's the pity.

[masklinn]

> A good translation is supposed to replicate the experience of watching something in its original language

That's a difficult line to walk, you can do lighter adaption but require more cultural context (which translates into notes to explain said context to those unaware of it) or heavier adaptation removing the cultural context. Depending on the show, the latter may not make any sense, or require significantly more investment to get an acceptable result, and it divorces the translation from the original to a much higher degree.

[Sephiroth87]

*Translator's note: Keikaku Means "Plan"

[emodendroket]

I agree with you, but in general the fansubbers' audience demands the style that's being used and will go nuts if they don't see one of the handful of Japanese words they know somehow reflected in the subs directly.

[__z]

The fansubbing community way back in the day (which is what this article is talking about) was never about convenience, it was about being able to watch anime that wasn't otherwise available. It was the only way. It was actually quite inconvenient. We are talking about the day of trading grainy 3rd-5th generation VHS tapes through snail-mail. Before P2P downloading. Before widespread access to high-speed internet - that's what we are talking about here.

[Fuxy]

The fan-subbing scene is booming and although i do have a Crunchyroll subscription i do end up on fan subbing sites looking for anime releases that were not offered by crunchyroll or that i wanted to watch on the tube where streaming is not a option.

Fan-subbing is not as underground as this article would have yo think and it's way more convenient sometime.