Talk:Central Anime

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Bot work

I'm now t sure how many instances there are to replace, but every instance of "CentralAnime" needs to be changed to "Central Anime." The latter being correct because the group's site name includes the space. I think the excluded space form of their name may be from their filenaming conventions? Canary 06:24, 16 August 2014 (UTC)

Ethics

Should this page have an external link to CA's website? Canary 06:24, 16 August 2014 (UTC)

Translation quality

The other day I wanted to see some of the episodes' Laser Disc versions again to write something about the version differences. It looks like the raw rips that were on NicoNico did get removed at some point, so I went with the subbed version from Central Anime. They did a second version, which is the DVD rip, but it appears "second version" pertains only to the improvement in video quality. The subtitles are exactly the same. At least the first episode's are.

In any case, I'll have to ask: are Central Anime's subs considered solid? As someone who doesn't really have to rely on translation, this was the first time I saw the anime subbed. And holy hotcakes, it's a total disaster. The person in charge was clearly in no way qualified to tackle this show. And I'm not talking differences in nuances or careless misses. It's chock-full of mistakes, lines that are out of character, make no sense or say something that in no way reflects what's actually being said in Japanese.

Judging from the end product, it looks as if they didn't comprehend half of the dialogue. I'm gonna go so far as to say I believe they even noticed half-way through, but kept "translating" lines they didn't understand into whatever they guessed was being said.

To provide an example, I've gone through the entire first episode. I'm translating as directly as possible to preserve the nuances. Good subs would have to be more concise.

In some cases I'll quote the (correctly translated) line preceding a mistranslation to give context.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Now follows a stretch where the subtitles are more or less acceptable and on point. Then we get to Phezzan.

The following subs aren't exactly spot on, but at least not wrong on content. Then:

This mutual teasing is why the two generals then turn their backs on each other. It's meant to be a scene of comic relief. The two are hoping for Lohengramm to lose, yet (or probably BECAUSE) they're rarely victorious themselves. They talk big about what it takes to win battles, then tease each other about their losses.

Here Kurt talks about how, due to the advances in technology (he shows his enhanced arm) people don't really die from wounds much. Then again, your ship getting blown up is going to mean sure death, so there's far less wounded.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++

I haven't seen any other episodes in full subbed, so I have no idea whether the translation improves, but man oh man. I guess something is better than nothing, but you'd think someone offering their services as translator should be able to better assess their own abilities and not use a property like this as a tool of study. In the credits of one episode they had "??????" for a whole bunch of voice actors, basically saying "Yeah, we can't read this one either". That's just not good enough.

It looks like the translator, a Sue Shambaugh, went on to translate a (several?) book(s) for Tokyopop... in 2006?? I don't even want to think about it.

You gotta wonder whether the translation is responsible for some bigger misunderstandings among English-speaking fans. Seeing these subs, I really hope that Sentai is gonna go through with a release. Gingaeiyu 13:37, 25 May 2016 (UTC)

The funny thing is, it was LoGH that actually inspired me to take up Japanese lessons, and once I had a better knowledge of the language nowadays (my proficiency is still haphazard though) and rewatched the Central Anime subs, I could actually spot the occasional mistakes here and there, so I can understand your frustration somehow. But I daresay the Central Anime team, whatever their faults, is to be commended at least for taking up the monumental task of translating all 165 episodes and movies during the 1990s and the 2000s when the internet was still in its infancy and referencing names was not as easy as it is today (that's where the question marks come in - those tend to belong to rather obscure voice actors which I would not be aware of if not for the Japanese Wikipedia). In any case though, I'd say the Central Anime subs did conveyed the gist of the plot more or less accurately, and we in Gineipaedia have our own standards in translating character names and positions that are independent of the Central Anime subs anyway. Glacierfairy 17:23, 25 May 2016 (UTC)
Oh, that's for sure. I probably wouldn't want to do it myself. Even if you understand the language, the politics and relationships between characters are confusing enough to warrant a rewatch or two. I'm still not sure if I can say I get everything a hundred percent. Gingaeiyu 20:01, 25 May 2016 (UTC)
I totally agree with you. I've rewatched the series for over four times and yet I can still learn new details every time I watch. Especially since LoGH also utilised lots of advanced language, many times I have to rewind certain scenes to make sure I can match the spoken dialogue with the subtitles. Glacierfairy 00:46, 26 May 2016 (UTC)
The second episode's translation seemed somewhat better, by the way. Then again I didn't pay all that much attention to the subs this time. I'm doing a rewatch with the LD rip and Blu-ray side by side to catch some of the smaller changes they made.
I posted something over at the forum. Thought I'd let you know since you guys probably don't check it much.Gingaeiyu 17:05, 26 May 2016 (UTC)
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