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Translators will develop their work in multimedia products before long

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12.02.2007

Before long, a good part of the products translators work with will be multimedia products, and not only those that we know, according to Professor Roberto Mayoral Asensio, of the department of Translation and Interpreting of the University of Granada (Universidad de Granada [http://www.ugr.es]), who published in the journal "Sendebar" the study "Procedimientos que persiguen la reducción o expansión del texto en la traducción audiovisual" (Methods to reduce or expand the text in audiovisual translation), in which he states that most products will have multimedia format in the near future.

According to Mayoral, shortly “even general translators will have to be able to use translation systems like subtitling, dubbing or voice-over and adjustment techniques.”

According to Mayoral, audiovisual tranlators cannot limit their activity to an only system but must be able to work with every kind of system (subtitling, dubbing and voice-over) since more and more products combine them and even use them simultaneously. Thus, according to the author: “Products to be translated change and update, professionals must have new abilities and every translator (student or professional) will have to combine new skills: in our opinion and in the near future, computing, publicity and audiovisual.”

In his work, Mayoral studies the adjustment in audiovisual translation from a point the view of the methods and considers the reduction, expansion and omission of the original as different aspects of the same technique: length alteration / length of the original dialogues. Likewise, the UGR [http://www.ugr.es] Professor describes different tools at the audiovisual translator´s disposal to alterate and methods to lessen its negative effects too. On the other hand, the study describes the different speeds which can serve the translator as a reference for the adjustment: the spectator´s mental reading and actors´ performance speeds, which usually do not match with those of the translator.

In Professor Mayoral´s words, “these translation techniques or methods become valuable in the case of audiovisual translation, since one of the distinctive elements of the audiovisual message is the conjunction of different signals which must be synchronized or adjusted to a greater or lesser extent; that is, its emission must be comprised within certain temporal, space or both limits”.

Antonio Marín Ruiz | Source: alphagalileo
Further information: www.ugr.es

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