Writing For Translation

When writing something that you know will be translated, there are often things you can do to make the translator's job easier and reduce the chances of error. Here are some writing strategies that will help prevent your ideas from being "lost in translation."

1) Use simple, clear sentence structures to avoid misunderstandings.

2) Stay away from unnecessary colloquialisms and slang. They can be difficult to translate, and there is a high potential for confusion. If you say that a woman is a "fox" in the U.S., this means that the woman is attractive. But if you say that a woman is a fox -- "zorra" -- in Spain, it is a strong insult.

3) If you are translating small fragments of text (for example, for website buttons), make sure that the translator has enough context information. Let's say you are translating a website from English to Spanish and the English button text says "Open." The translator needs to know if the word is being used as a verb or an adjective. If it is an adjective, the correct translation will also depend on whether the noun it describes is singular or plural, masculine, or feminine. Just the word "Open" is not enough information!

4) If you use acronyms or abbreviations, include an explanatory note for the translator. For example, the acronym ROR can stand for "Rate of Return," "Return on Relationships," or "Rules of the Road," among other possibilities. Don't assume that the translator will be able to guess the meaning you intended.

5) Avoid puns and word-play, such as saying that a cat is a "purr-fect" pet. Such puns can be almost impossible to translate. And if the translator is not a native of your language, he or she might not even notice that a pun is intended!

6) Avoid unnecessary local references that might not be recognized in the target culture, including references to:

- celebrities, politicians

- TV shows

- local sports

- local holidays, customs

- local products, brands

An American knows what it means if someone talks about "kicking off" a meeting or says that something was a "home run," but these expressions may be meaningless in another country.

7) Be very careful to avoid accidentally offending with references to religion, politics, or other sensitive topics that might be seen differently in another culture.

8) Be aware that humor doesn't always translate well. Different things are funny in different cultures. Even if the translator finds the right words to express a joke in a new language, it might not amuse.

9) Proofread, proofread, proofread. A misspelled word can confuse your translator, who may not know what word you actually meant to write. Similarly, if you forget to punctuate or end a sentence, copy and paste something incorrectly, or make other writing mistakes, this is going to be a problem for the translator, who is responsible for staying true to the original text, but who cannot read your mind.

More ways you can help your translator:

- Send as much information as possible about how the translation will be used (Is it for a marketing brochure? An instruction manual? An informal e-mail?)

- If you have similar translations in the same language that have been completed in the past, provide these as a terminology reference.

- Do you know of specific websites or other information sources about the topic of your translation? It is always helpful to provide links and materials to the translator as background.

Think of your translator as a partner, whose goal is to provide the most accurate and appropriate possible translation of your text. Help your translator help you.

Sylvia Wagner is a marketing assistant at TranslationAdvisor.com, the professional translation services guide, with translator price comparison information and free translation help. Check out Translation Advisor's free English to Italian translation resources - Copyright: You may republish this article provided that the text, author credit, active links and this notice remain intact.

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How To Make Music Starting From Score Writing Up To Publishing At Site

All of my music is written by using a notation PC software named Score Writer, bought from Genie Soft. Every sound you heard is came from the score note instead of recording done through microphone.

First version of Score Writer was published by Cake Walk. But this version is not supporting VST instruments. The version bought from Genie Soft is in version 4 which supporting VST instruments which stands for Virtual Studio Technology. To make Score Writer to be able to use VST instruments, SynthFont VST from VSTSynFont( V1.003 ) was downloaded free into Score Write VST Plug in folder. Chaos 8Mb soundfont is also downloaded as well. The combination of SynthFont VST and Chaos 8MB soundfont is making the sound given by the musical instruments really near to the sound produced by actual musical instruments. One good example is the flute. When a note is blew for quite a long period, we may heard the sound generated is "real" like blew by human. The sound heard for the one same note is not the flat same sound for the whole period. This kind of effect could not be produced by Score Writer version 1 which is not supporting VST.

Score Writer is having the feature of panning. It is the positioning of every musical instruments in the hall. We may put the piano at left side of the hall and cello at another side of the hall. The panning is ranging from negative 64 to positive 63 and zero is representing the centre of the hall.

To make the music with reverberation, Classic Reverb is imported into Score Writer VST Plug in folder as well. Classic Reverb was downloaded free. Room size could be set in Classic Reverb which makes the produced sound like the music is really played in the hall.

Music written through score note, all musical instruments are played exactly on the beat which is impossible to be achieved by human. This could be the main problem of music which written by score notes. To resolve this, humanization on the music needs to be done. That is, some musical sound need to be played a little bit late or early compare with others. A suitable instrument is selected and the whole track of its music will be made a little bit slower compared with others( slower by a Demisemiquaver - 1/32 notes for the tempo of 110 Crotchets per minute ). When the music is having one note which played by all instruments in loud( orchestra hit ), some instruments sound will be made a little bit slower. These are my two common practices in music humanization.

After completion of the notes writing, the music then is converted into music format WAV by Score Writer's "Record to File" function. To burn the music onto CD, music in file format WAV is required. Nero is used for this purpose by just selecting the WAV file into Nero.

But music file in WAV format is taking up a huge memory space( about 30Mb to 60Mb for one music with length of 4 minutes ) which is not popular for on-line. The music is converted into format of MP3 where the size usually goes down to 1/10. To do this converting, Audio MID Recorder is used.

Before using Audio MID recorder to do the converting, the required format needs to be setup. The file format of the music which needs to be converted is not the concern of the recorder. This music could be in any format. It is also means that we may convert WAV file frequency 44100 in 16 bits to WAV file frequency 32000 in 8 bits. Or converting MP3 192Kbps to MP3 128Kbps. The recorder is just recording whatever heard into the required format. This is also one option to increase the volume of the music.

To do the converting, after pressing "Record" button at Audio MID Recorder, play the music by whatever player. What we heard will be recorded into the required format. To mix any special effect into the music, just play the special effect together with the music, after recording started at Audio MID Recorder. Since the special effect is played together with music, so the special effect and music need to be played by different players. After completed the recording the required music format file will be generated into the specified folder set before the recording.

Even though MP3 is usually sold at site instead of WAV, for the conveniences of the site visitor, http://www.doublemelodies.com is also selling WAV. This article is published at http://www.doublemelodies.com/HowToMakeMusic.html

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