Blog - Merino Productions Multilingual Solutions

05 Mar 202108 Mar 2021

DOCUMENT TRANSLATION: TIPS ON HOW TO PREPARE

In today’s media communications knowing how to prepare for document translation is important. Online user-friendly tools exist to create flyers, ads and presentations. Most of these free tools are considered as “time and money savers”, but they can also be deceiving depending on the use requirements.

Creation of ads, flyers and presentations that will need to be translated into other languages will benefit from early preparation. Organizations can save money and time in the early creation process by allocating a budget for the translation and desktop publishing process.

PREPARATION

When creating a document for translation there are some important steps that need to be considered previous to starting the process: font size, spacing, selection of graphic design platforms, free online design platforms vs selecting an experienced graphic designer; and source files that are adaptable to your selected images and graphics.

FONT SIZE AND SPACING

Once the English version of a document or a presentation is approved for translation, it is important to consider language extension or contraction in the spacing. Spanish is a language that requires more page space when translated. An option is to reduce the font size for the Spanish version; however, this may result in some difficulty for readers to follow. Other languages may contract in size, and others, as Chinese, Japanese or Korean require correct placing of text characters in a sentence line.

Graphic designers preparing document for translation

ON-LINE PLATFORMS VS. AN EXPERIENCED GRAPHIC DESIGNER

Many on-line platforms can be extremely useful and user-friendly for graphic design creations. Free platforms, such as CANVA, offer services and features such as 250,000+ free templates, 100+ designs, hundreds and thousands of photos and videos to select. What can go wrong?

Although these platforms offer great value in the source language creation process, to adapt these designs for translated material requires essential language specific planning. Example:

CANVA offers many user-friendly features with their free account, plus other features such as branding and up to five (5) users at their minimum price. We will now review the use of their free account and see what possible issues you may encounter.

*CANVA’s free account does not let the designer save the source file. You can create a document and export it to PDF. A nice, print ready PDF. What could be the problem? Once you have a final file it is time to send it to the translation team. A translator is capable of translating everything, but if the translator is not a graphic designer, he/she will only be able to complete the translation process in the actual PDF file.

To create a translated,” mirror image” of the source file, the best recommendation is to find a multilingual-multimedia agency, capable of producing a translation of the document that recreates the quality of the original English file. When an agency asks for the original source file in which the document was created, CANVA’s will not let you produce a source file, you can only export a PDF. This is important to take into consideration, because without a source file it is difficult to guarantee a mirror image of the target language document.

GRAPHIC DESIGNER

If your organization does not have an original source file but would still want the target language document to look exactly as the English file, it is important to select a graphic designer who can recreate the source file. The cost of a Graphic Designer is based on an hourly rate. The cost to design documents will vary according to the size and complexity of the design of the original source file.

Now the meaning of FREE is no longer a commodity, but rather a hassle. The time and money an organization tried to save will now be spent on the recreation of the file, an English source file that could have been created at the onset of the process with special attention to graphic design preparation for translation into other languages.

CANVA is actually a great tool! But if an organization’s goal is to translate their material into different languages in the future, we recommend using a Graphic Designer who can create a malleable file that can be adapted to different languages in the future. An added bonus is that updates and changes can be easily performed, avoiding the problem of having to recreate the file in CANVA, with savings in costs and time.

Merino Productions Translations recommends

MERINO MULTILINGUAL RECOMMENDATIONS

When in need to create material targeted to more than just the English-speaking community, best practice is to hire a professional Graphic Designer to create marketing or educational material. It is important that the designer works with the latest updated file with the industry standard Desktop Publishing software. We recommend Adobe In-Design. Selection of a translation agency that offers experienced Desktop Publishing services (not all translation agencies are capable of this). Select a multilingual multimedia agency that can produce a ready to translate, ready to print Desktop Publishing file, which is ready for future updates.

When creating a document for translation Merino Multilingual recommends you create a file in Microsoft Word in order to save your source file for future edits or for language translation. It also allows charts and image creation. When preparing to send your documents to a translation agency, it is recommended you save the images of the document in a separate folder, where they can be easily accessed, especially the source language images that have written content.

Note:

If you are planning on creating a document that will need translation, It is recommended to NOT use Publisher.
Consider font size, spacing and design methods when preparing the source file in order to prepare for a quality mirror image translated document.

Merino Productions, a unique agency West of Ventura County that provides Multilingual Solutions for multilingual multimedia: Video Productions, Voice-Over, Subtitles, Desktop Publishing and Document Translation.

Visit us at www.merinoproductions.com

in Translations

21 Nov 202022 Nov 2020

SQUANTO. The Interpreter who made the First Thanksgiving Possible

Tisquantum was one of the first interpreters to be recorded in the history of America. Most commonly known as Squanto, he helped to merge the language gap between the Pilgrims and the Native Americans playing an important role in the creation of a first Thanksgiving celebration.

Squanto translating for pilgrims

Squanto, was a member of the Patuxet tribe. He was kidnapped by the English explorer Thomas Hunt in 1614, and was taken to Europe where he learned to speak the English language. He eventually managed to escape and return back to North America in 1619.

In 1620 when the Mayflower arrived to the coast of Cape Cod Bay, Squanto played a key role to facilitate communication between the early settlers and the natives of this land. He also taught the pilgrims how to plant corn, how to fish and gather berries and nuts for their survival. Squanto’s sharing of this knowledge was integral to keep peace and help the early settlers in these early beginnings – establishing conditions that eventually led to a first Thanksgiving conscience in 1621. President Lincoln declared the first national Thanksgiving Holiday celebration in 1863.

Squanto died in 1622 of “Indian Fever”. William Bradford, the Governor of the Plymouth Colony at that time, stayed next to his deathbed and was deeply affected by this interpreter’s passing. He described it as a “great loss”.

Thanksgiving sign table

As we celebrate Thanksgiving in 2020, let’s remember to be Thankful for the small blessings we have received. Many families have suffered the loss of jobs, have had to adapt to routine changes, some children have felt bored and confused as to “why they can’t meet with their friends from school”, and many have lost dear family members and friends. But we have learnt to “adapt”. To adapt to new hobbies and businesses opportunities. Pending projects were concluded and the community learnt to develop new ways of living.

Americans and people across the globe have learnt about Zoom and virtual chats to communicate with family, friends and in business. This has helped our communities to learn to cherish the simple moments lived each day and to find all the positive side of daily happenings.

This new way of connecting is what we are Thankful for!

At Merino Productions Multilingual Solutions, we are thankful to connect with agencies, organizations and companies to help them reach non-English speaking audiences. Our passion to deliver the correct message mirrors what Squanto lived for: to translate, to guide and to help with the best linguistic communication.

Wishing You and Family a Safe, Healthy and Happy Thanksgiving time!

Thanksgiving Turkey

Visit us at www.merinoproductions.com

in Holidays

10 Aug 201802 Jan 2019

SELECTING A QUALIFIED LOCAL TRANSLATION AND VIDEO PRODUCTION PARTNER.

The importance of selecting the “right” Language Service Provider for your translation or multimedia production.

With the advances in technology many people and companies believe they can translate text into foreign language and/or produce their own videos to communicate their media messages.

It is important to understand that the managing of these two media tools require an educated training and experience to avoid the risks of falling into loopholes when trying to produce messages for intended language markets. Would you allow students to produce your financial reports?

An experienced set of skills are needed to correctly translate all text and titles for maximum impact on the selected audience and medium. Clumsy message mistakes turn your piece into unusable material for the intended target market.

High quality translated content should be “clearly and correctly understood” by the target language recipients.

Examples of bad translations:

Title: Pregnancy Disability Leave

Embarazo Dejar Discapacidad (Pregnancy Leave Your Disability)

Message in Facebook:

Unos grandes!!! Felicitaciones.

(Salutation referring to the people who achieved something in a picture, meaning “they are great”).

Translation: Some big!!! Congratulations.

The same idea of quality assurance applies to professionally produced videos. Enhanced presentation of audio and graphics benefit recipients with busy lives who prefer a faster than reading communication media.

When thinking of producing a video take into consideration the following questions:

Will my video be useful for what?
Will the audio, titles and subtitles describe the exact message conveyed in the original language version?

This is when organizations should consider the importance of using a qualified language service provider with its own recording studio facilities instead of working with marketing firms who will then outsource the translation and the video production phases of a project.

Your organization will benefit by selecting Merino Productions Multilingual Solutions for translation and video production projects. We provide both services combined with savings in management time and production costs.

Merino Productions Multilingual Solutions is a Ventura, California based agency providing Multilingual Video Productions, Voice-Overs and Subtitles, App and Web Localization, Desktop Publishing and Certified Document Translations. Specializing in Spanish, Chinese, Korean, Tagalog and Vietnamese, we proudly serve the Technology, Local Government, Healthcare, Human and Social Services, Education and Corporate Industries.

Visit us at www.merinoproductions.com

in Uncategorized