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Anime NYC 2023: Localize This! – Secrets of Localization Revealed!
🕑 Added 2023-12-01 03:34:13 +0000 UTCNote: Due to the time-sensitive nature of this article, it will be published to the main Anime Herald site on December 4. We apologize for the inconvenience.
Date: 11/19/2023
Panelists:
- Zack Davisson - Translator (Devilman, Space Battleship Yamato, Cutie Honey)
- Sara Linsley - Letterer (Sweat and Soap, Revolutionary Girl Utena: After the Revolution)
- Andrew Hodgson - Translator (Steins;Gate, Infinite Dendrogram)
- David Evelyn - Translator (Undead Unluck, Kaiju No. 8)
- Jan Mitsuko Cash - Translator and Line Editor (Choujin X, Fullmetal Alchemist: A New Beginning)
- Mari Morimoto - Translator and Interpreter (Naruto, InuYasha, The Rose of Versailles)
If there’s one thing that can be relied upon in the anime community, it’s the fact that shockingly few people know what goes into a good localization. Social media arguments break out pretty much daily about how much slang is too much, or whether certain terms and phrases should be translated at all in the final product. Over the past decade, Zack Davisson has been hosting the “Localize This!” panel at conventions across the country, to help dispel many of the myths that surround the field.
This year marked the event’s tenth anniversary. As an experiment, Davisson opted to make this year’s panel fully user-driven. The questions asked by the audience members would dictate the day’s discussions. "Think of questions,” Davisson implored, adding that “if nobody asks any questions, we'll just awkwardly sit here and stare at each other."
The panelists took a few moments to introduce themselves, discussing their biggest titles and their experiences within the industry. Notably, Mari Morimoto was celebrating her 30th year as a localization professional and was working as an interpreter at Anime NYC. Following the introductions, Davisson again invited people to step up to the microphone to ask their burning questions.
”How feasible is it to make a living in localization?”
Davisson responded first, stating that “working in localization is a very rewarding career, but not monetarily.” Rates differ sharply from company to company. Every so often, colleagues within the field host a roundtable with each other and ask their rates. He noted that every person quotes a different figure. Some work for agencies, and he’s been told that some work for as low as $1.50 per page.
Morimoto agreed and recalled a short anecdote about author Bill Flanagan, a Rhode Island native who moved to Pittsburgh. He was once asked how he makes a living off his writing, to which Flanagan stated, “Why do you think I live where I do?” Basically, making a living from localization requires a lot of questions and trade-offs. How hard does a person want to work, or what do they want to do? If a person has a rich spouse or works in an area with a low cost of living, it’s easy. Otherwise, it’s very hard.
Hodgson chimed in, noting that he “works in the countryside surrounded by cows.” He added that, if he started his career living in a city like New York, there’s a chance he never would have been able to make a living as a translator.
Morimoto pointed out that there are some fields that pay well, notably in medical, legal, and technical disciplines.
Evelyn replied that, "some people like that dry clerical work, some others want to be free spirits!"
Davisson added that, “If you want to be an upcoming translator, I'll say a standard rate is probably between $5-10 a page, or less. Some make less, some make more, but that seems to be the standard variance.” He noted that his lowest rate was $5.50 per page, while his highest was $30 per page, prompting Hodgson to cry “let’s kill him!” as laughter echoed through the room.
Cash recalled a story from the start of her career. As she was getting established in the industry, she was working two jobs, and working on manga on the side. Her first title paid $500 per volume. Most recently, she earns about $8.50 per page, some of which includes simul-pubs with 24-hour turnarounds.
Morimoto noted that the industry doesn’t offer royalties to translators, as it’s strictly work-for-hire. She’s never received royalties, which she admitted stings, given the caliber of the works she’s localized.
Davisson nodded in agreement before offering one final piece of advice. “If you can work for comic companies instead of manga companies, it’s much better, because they treat you as a comic employee and not a manga employee.”
How do you approach something that's been adapted to other formats? Do you use the existing material or translations, or start from scratch?
Cash was first to respond, explaining that “we like to keep the terminology the same across all the works, so we try to share term lists if it's possible to do so.” Localization professionals are generally not permitted to lift translations or phrases wholesale, though, as they’re typically copyrighted works. This creates complications and potential friction, as they may be owned by the licensor, or by the distributor.
Morimoto added that, with Viz titles, they typically own both the anime and the manga. So, while the process isn’t as smooth as it could be, there is talk between the anime and print divisions. She used Saint Seiya as an example. The series was originally pitched to Viz, who wasn’t interested until DiC acquired the anime. After Viz acquired the manga rights, they hired her to do the localization. She had to use the same name changes and attack names while the DiC show was running. After the anime was canceled, she had more leeway to change names and terms back to be more faithful to the original work.
For example, Silver Saint Moses of the Whale ended up being renamed to “Morris” by DiC, which Morimoto likened to the cat from the 9Lives cat food commercials. Meanwhile, there was a Gold Saint who was very male named “Aphrodite,” and they were fine with that.
Davisson noted that Discotek Media had hired him to write a Leiji Matsumoto bible to guide their work on the franchise, which includes titles like Galaxy Express 999 and Captain Harlock: Arcadia Of My Youth.
Hodgson remarked that, while he created a terminology bible for In Another World With My Smartphone and sent it to the licensor, he had no guarantees that it would be used in other adaptations.
Cash nodded in agreement before adding that sometimes, they receive term lists from publishers that aren’t always up-to-date, so bibles are appreciated. She proudly proclaimed that “I'm the person who forces people to make their term lists!"
Evelyn, meanwhile, pointed out that he had a term list for Undead Unluck for a while, which he sent to the licensor. The anime adaptation used “about 90% of it”, but the terms they didn’t use were “the obvious ones.” People asked him why this happened, to which he could only reply, “It was out of my control.”
Morimoto raised the point that, for older series, there may potentially be fan books that include official translations of character names that were released in Japan. For example, for The Rose of Versailles, there were 25th and 50th anniversary guides that included official romanizations.
"Do you ever ask for a pay bump when working on certain pages [...]? I heard the original localizer for Cypher Academy just quit. And there are really difficult ones like Akane-banashi where you have to break through the culture barrier?"
Cash led the discussion this round, explaining, “For some series, I receive a slightly higher pay rate, because the turnarounds are faster. If you’re lucky, you get them Thursday, but usually it comes in Friday, and you have until Sunday.” Generally, though, pay rates tend to be standardized, flat rates. While she doesn’t negotiate much, she recalled an instance where a chapter arrived, which featured fifty pages that contained text, which she translated and turned in. A day later, the editorial team made changes, which meant that she had to retranslate thirty of the pages she worked on, prompting her to ask for a pay bump on that specific chapter.
Evelyn agreed, explaining that, while pay is handled on a case-by-case basis, it’s typically a flat rate. Regarding Cypher Academy, he noted that the title was passed around to a number of translators and editors, and their choice was to duck out the window instead. He was asked to work on the series on several occasions, which he rejected every time.
Davisson noted that there were benefits to the flat rate pay scales, adding that “we don't get paid less for not-very-chatty characters." As such, his favorite line is “no text.”
Linsley remarked that, from a lettering context, one should always ask for more money, because “the worst they can say is ‘no’.”
What is the biggest difference in working on manga, light novels, video games, or fiction?
Davisson answered first, explaining that each requires a different translation style. Manga requires everything to fit into a small speech bubble, and everything needs to fit in the assigned pages. Anime, similarly, is limited by physical real estate for subtitles or lip flaps. For a novel, though, “you can always add pages.”
Hodgson agreed, adding that for Maglam Lord, he was working within extremely tight limits. “You have to look at the text and determine what’s more pertinent and valuable, and preserve that.” Most of the time, they’re not working with support from the Japanese team, and must instead decide on what gets retained on their own.
Davisson remarked that he recently did translation work on a game that had actual character limits in some cases.
Morimoto nodded, and noted that she has seen cases where rates were set based on the number of characters in the original Japanese work, rather than the adapted English script.
In a case like One Piece, some words remain untranslated, like "Nakama." How would you go about translating those words?
Davisson leaned into the microphone, clearly eager to answer this one. “Let me demystify the word ‘nakama’,” he began, before crying out that “it doesn't mean anything special! The word, itself, doesn't actually mean anything! It literally means 'the folks you know!’" Cases like this are his biggest pet peeve, as they’re blatant Orientalism. He snarkily referenced “Ikigai: The Japanese Art of Living,” the title of a book by Keira Miki.
Morimoto responded that “it goes both ways.” A person can have a sense of how long a sentence is in Japanese, where it can be super long or super short in English. It’s something she runs into often with Naruto and Boruto - should she translate the attack names, keep them the same as the original, or use some combination of the two? In early volumes, for example, when she had a split bubble, she’d use both. (“Katon - Fire Style”) Generally, though, she traes to begin with a literal translation, before branching off into a more adaptive localization.
Evelyn recalled his work MamaYuyu, which kept the Japanese title. Characters use sigil styles, and in some cases, he has to leave the names intact because the title is in that vein. For these, he used the Japanese name, followed by an alliteration that is separated by an em dash. For example, “Kirakira Boshi—Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.”
He added that, while everyone has this grandiose idea that every word said by a character has a special meaning, sometimes it really just means “the day off school where I have the next day off” (Editor’s note: this is commonly called a “day in lieu” in professional contexts).
Hodgson thought for a moment, before saying that you have to consider the story’s setting, as well as the target audience. There are some works where you want to retain the honorifics, but there are others where you don’t, because it’s a western-styled fantasy story. Then there are works like Robotics;Notes, which is set in Tanegashima, and therefore has unique dialogue quirks that he wanted to retain.
Morimoto agreed, adding that, "If I had all the money in the world and all the control, every book would have translator notes and glossaries." For example, character names, even in katakana, have specific meanings that she wishes she could make note of through either a translator note or an asterisk. While some publishers are cognizant of that, others feel that such an approach breaks flow.
Cash pushed back on the idea, saying that she prefers to not have translator’s notes as she doesn’t want it to seem like she’s putting words in the author’s mouth. Instead, she prefers to write things in a way that it would be, were the author fluent in English.
Davisson remarked that he would never translate food names, proclaiming that “I will never call an onigiri a ‘rice ball’!”
The discussion, he noted, shows that translators aren’t a monolith, and they have a spectrum of opinions on how to approach the art. “If I have to use a translator's note,” he added, “I feel that I've failed as a translator, because my job is to give you the same experience as the Japanese reader that they read in Japanese."
Evelyn argued that has seen a spectrum of works, and noted that he’s currently working on a project where a reader would have no feasible way to understand many of its obscure references, even if they were able to search in Japanese. As such, he asked his editor if he could include a glossary at the back of the book, to save the reader literal hours of searching online. He doesn’t view it as a failure, as the author meant the references to be hyper-obscure.
Davisson countered, asking, "Does the author want people to not know that?"
Evelyn responded with a firm “No,” explaining that they were literally obscure references for older audiences. The author also included margin notes, so adding explanations inline would make it an unreadable mess. “There’s always a creamy middle ground [...] We can do this in a sane way and not make it look like it came from Manga Planet in crispy 144p.”
Linsley agreed, adding that she enjoys working on translation notes, as they allow her to be creative. She pointed to her work on Natsumi Ando’s Something's Wrong with Us, in which she created an illustrated guide to Japanese pastries by photoshopping artwork of the treats found within the manga, and pairing them up with descriptions.
How Do You Go About Localizing Regional Dialects?
Morimoto reclined in her seat and joked, “That’s a whole different panel by itself, isn’t it?” A few members of the panel chuckled in response.
Davisson followed up, stating, “I don’t.” He elaborated, noting that, when someone does something like a Southern drawl for an Osakan accent, it’s incorrect, adding that “it’s urban, not Southern!” To him, assigning accents of that nature comes across as borderline racist, “like giving an Irish accent to an English person.” Instead, he prefers to avoid the issue entirely, adding, “[the term] lost in translation exists for a reason, and I prefer to use it for that."
Morimoto countered his sentiment, noting that she and her parents were from Osaka and that, in the early 20th century, the region was considered a backwater. She used this to springboard into an experience of her own, recalling when she translated Osamu Tezuka’s Ayako. Part of the story takes place in Tohoku, geographically, and she used a hayseed dialect for dialogue by characters from the region. She was sharply rebuked by the client, but was fortunate enough that her editor at the time went to bat for the translation. “The Tohoku accent Tezuka used, he made up, so whatever Mari came up with is fine!”
Evelyn agreed, stating that he learned Kansai-ben at the start of his education. He also had family members who were born and raised in the South, so he had a unique, personal source of knowledge to draw from. He added that he enjoys incorporating accents into manga because he feels that putting things into binaries limits the brain to base stereotypes.
Do you have any advice for a young person wanting to enter the industry?
Without hesitation, Hodgson leaned into the microphone and shouted “Run!”, prompting laughter throughout the room.
Davisson explained that, for folks who want to get into anime and manga, they need to go into the industry. If they want to go into technical and medical fields, especially, “those are careers.”
Morimoto encouraged those interested to take part in the JET program and teach students in Japan, as they typically send teachers to more rural areas, that force people to actually use the Japanese they’ve learned, in order to get by.
Do you have any input on the translations for English-acted performances and dubs?
Davisson responded, “those are totally out of our control.” Morimoto agreed, noting that a person can be a translator who only works on dub scripts, but the work typically relies on the editor’s discretion.
For a bubble with an interrobang, what's your stance on that, if the publisher doesn't have a hard rule?
Almost in unison, the entire panel confirmed that “they always have a hard rule.”
What are your opinions on fan translations?
For this question, the attendee specifically asked, “What are your opinions on fan translations of works that publishers will never pick up? I’m working on improving my skills through pirac- fan translations.”
The entire panel, who had been jovial and generally laid back to this point, grew deathly silent as their eyes, and those of the audience all trained on this person. There was a sense of disbelief that seemed to filter through. This person did not literally just admit that they’re engaging in literal piracy to a panel of career localization professionals, did he?
Davisson was the first to break the uncomfortable silence that had fallen upon the room. He sat straight up and bellowed “Fan translations are evil!” into the microphone. He added that he works directly with manga artists, and “it breaks their hearts.”
Morimoto chimed in, saying that fan translations directly harm authors, stating plainly that “if it's a fan translation, the author will never get royalties [for the release].” She added that “you don’t know that” a title will never be picked up, as many unlikely candidates have been picked up even years later.
Hodgson noted that they can actually discourage some translations as, once a work is on the internet, it’s basically there forever. Even if the original group takes something down, the countless pirate sites that dot the web don’t have the same scruples, and will continue to profit off of the same works until time immemorial.
“They don’t even have a say in it!” Davisson cried out, his anger palpable as he spoke, “They don’t get the chance to give permission or consent [to the translation]!”
Cash agreed, explaining that, sometimes, some authors don’t want their works translated. As the creators, it’s within their rights to refuse a translation, and they deserve the right to say “no.”
Davisson agreed, adding “They deserve that right to say no, and fan translations steal that!” His hand hit the table with a heavy thud as he closed off the question.
Time was running short, and there was time for a final, quick question. The person asked, “how can someone go about getting their first translation job?” Davisson immediately responded, snarking “through fan translation groups! Ask the guy who went before you all about it!” The room erupted in a loud cackle, as the panel thanked everyone for attending. A polite applause rang through the room, as folks began to make their way toward the exits.
Conclusion
At the beginning of the panel, Davisson mentioned that this year’s Localized This! panel was an experiment, after a decade of running it in a more standard format. With an open mic and open ears, his panel would answer any of the questions posed by attendees, within reason.
From this observer’s point of view, the new format was an unqualified success. The questions, for the most part, were genuinely interesting and touched on the entire localization process. The hosts, meanwhile, were candid, and kept the conversations breezy as they traded jokes, and shared stories of their own experiences as they offered advice and debated divisive topics within their field.
Regardless of where one stood on the topics that were discussed, though, as everyone filed out into the main concourse, there was an unspoken agreement that asking a panel of localization professionals their thoughts on fan translations was ill-advised on the very best of days.
