Forum › Cycling Under a Starlit Sky discussion

pkChinensis Uploader
Lililicious
joined Jan 9, 2011

Lililicious did not forget about or skip this story--our scanlation of it is in editing. The editor had some IRL stuff come up but still wants to finish the project, so we will still be releasing it, though I can't give a concrete date.

Yuri Girl 1001 Uploader
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Fly by Yuri
joined Mar 29, 2013

The revised version has been emailed. Hopefully, it will be uploaded shortly.

I apologize to Lililicious for stepping on their project. I was careless, but I did not do it on purpose.

MrEngenious Admin
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Dynasty Scans
joined Oct 8, 2010

Updated.

230px-ray_the_animation
joined Feb 2, 2013

i'd like to see more literal traslations,
what's the problem in have to think more about the sentences?

since i'm bad with english i had always to think a lot to understand either good and bad traslation

MrEngenious Admin
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Dynasty Scans
joined Oct 8, 2010

You're more likely to interpret a sentence incorrectly by making it literal, as counter productive as that may be.
Making the character sound stiff and weird (to a fluent or native speaker of the language) is detrimental to the actual understanding of the character, especially if they have weird quirks or mannerisms that isn't being brought out because everything's been linearly translated.
The key point in more liberal translations (I'm not rooting for burgers and hotdogs, mind you) is that it's more understandable to the reader. A side effect is that it seems "simpler" because it's easier to make the connections because what's been translated makes more sense.
I can sort of see where those who aren't fluent in the translated language (in most cases it's English) are coming from when they want literal translations, but it's definitely not going to help you if you're aiming to be better at the language. Literally translated things are stiff and isn't how non-Japanese people talk since it's a different grammatical format (some languages have similar format to the Japanese language though, but not English). The source is Japanese and understandably some things have to be left as "it's how it is in Japan", the average reader does not understand Japanese and so that has to be accounted for.

last edited at Apr 7, 2013 4:46PM

Whome2
joined Apr 2, 2013

Oh, this thing is still getting some comments? Well, I guess I'll toss some more of my thoughts in.

First of all, good job on you, Yuri girl, for coming back and applying what you've learned. Unfortunately, as with all learning processes, you took some steps forward and some steps back. I don't know if it bothered anyone else as much as me, but I didn't like your choice for the font face. The dialogue font was passable, but for the "small talk" (the text outside of bubbles that characters say that are just sorta like side remarks) it was a bit hard to read. I really do like how you changed the size of the font, though. I noticed that and it looks much better. However you ran into the problem where your words would be cut off in the middle leading to some awkward reading. Something like that is inevitable, so don't worry too much but be mindful of where words cut off. Like in page 64, the word "disadvantage" is split into "disad-vantage". If there's going to be a cut off, you should try to make it split into something like "dis-advantage". If it doesn't naturally fall like that, then you're going to have to manually do it by pressing space/enter before the word or somewhere else in the text.

But the big thing that bothers me is that I don't understand why you kept some of the original Japanese words when it would've been easy for you to just erase them, especially in some of the pages you do in fact redraw over them. Maybe you passed over them to save time? You did mention you were going to skim over some parts in the re-release so it wouldn't take as long. Not to criticize you or come off sounding "Wow you did everything wrong and this is how you should do it" but ideally, this is what your page should've looked like: http://i.imgur.com/eh2vQON.jpg. The lower left panel and the upper right as easy to redraw as well. Just clearing up even a little makes the page less "busy". I am just a little befuddled as you didn't at least white out some of the big easy ones. You're not bad at redrawing over the textures as evidenced by your later pages (e.g page 66).

Again, I don't want to come off rude and I apologize if I do. I've been told that I can come off naturally condescending when I really don't intend to at all.

Whome2
joined Apr 2, 2013

Oh yeah, I also wanted to throw in my $0.02 about this as well:

i'd like to see more literal traslations,
what's the problem in have to think more about the sentences?

since i'm bad with english i had always to think a lot to understand either good and bad traslation

pretty much Mr. Engenious got it right. It can be really confusing if a sentence is translated literally. I don't quite think you're thinking of "literal translation" in the same vein as some of the others are. I would love to show you some examples of where literal translations just completely confuse the heck out of the reader but I have no idea on what the rules are on linking to other gallery sites. One translator I have in mind right now actually gives me headaches because I'm sitting there trying to decipher his "translation".

There's this unspoken rule when it comes to editing: be unnoticeable. Which is to say, do such a good job that no one notices that the page was altered in any way. Redraw that hand so well no one would have known that there was this giant Japanese word on there or slap that texture back on that tree so that people would never be the wiser. I have no idea if this carries over to translating, but the most important thing is that the reading process has to be natural to the viewer. Literal translations don't' do this. It's not having to think more about a sentence that ruffles everyone's feathers about literal translations, it's the fact that you have to sit there and actually try to decipher what that sentence is saying. I'm all for sitting in a circle and trying to pick apart a very profound sentence or giggling at the witty double entendre that had me stumped for a second, but I am not of fan of having to try to understand a sentence in a language I'm fluent in because the translation was of bad quality. Quality. Quality is everything.

One last thing:

...The translation world is so tough than i thought.
At any rate, cheer up, Fly by Yuri. New translator makes Yuri fans happy always.

Nah, not really :P You put out as much as you're willing to put in. Editing is pretty easy. White out text, type in text. Good job, ready to export it. Translating is as tough as translating normally is. Editing is a lot of mechanical hands-on, learn as you go kind of work. I make it sound a lot tougher than it really is.

MrEngenious Admin
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Dynasty Scans
joined Oct 8, 2010

Preferably links to mangafox and mangahere and those kinds of sites are not to be displayed, lest we feed them more money. However you can take screenshots or upload the pages themselves somewhere else and plaster them here.

230px-ray_the_animation
joined Feb 2, 2013

You're more likely to interpret a sentence incorrectly by making it literal, as counter productive as that may be.
Making the character sound stiff and weird

this is the cause because i can't read manga sold in italy (i'm italian), the traslations are for a childish target,

as a reader i want to adapt the sentences in my mind, as long as i know the choice of words and the writing-style of the author,
but i understand that a traslator has pride in what he does, and want to do a professional work

@ Yoori
sorry, my post was very naive and semplicistic

last edited at Apr 8, 2013 3:10AM

Whome2
joined Apr 2, 2013

@ Yoori
sorry, my post was very naive and semplicistic

Wah? Nah, don't feel that way. It was a really good question and you got me thinking of the difference between "literal" translations and "bad translations". You bring up a good argument that just because a translation is literal it doesn't necessarily make it bad. It made me realize that just saying "it's too literal" isn't really a good enough answer. We weren't harping on Yuri girl's translation because it was bad, it was just because the people who do recognize the signs of a bad translation were making sure it never walked down that path.

Here, 3 examples of a truly bad literal translation and why no one likes it: http://imgbox.com/acmTyVZ2 (herp derp nsfw ads. Never noticed because of Adblock,my bad)

Those sentences just do NOT make any sense.

Preferably links to mangafox and mangahere and those kinds of sites are not to be displayed, lest we feed them more money. However you can take screenshots or upload the pages themselves somewhere else and plaster them here.

Thanks for letting me know. If it makes you feel any better, I don't use those sites :D

Okay, it's high time I stop hijacking and spamming this thread. I think like 95% of the comments are mine. I have a current translation project that I keep procrastinating on, so off I go to work on it @.@

last edited at Apr 9, 2013 11:58AM

Yuri Girl 1001 Uploader
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Fly by Yuri
joined Mar 29, 2013

But the big thing that bothers me is that I don't understand why you kept some of the original Japanese words when it would've been easy for you to just erase them, especially in some of the pages you do in fact redraw over them.

Actually, page 66 was an easy redraw, just copy the fence and texture over the text. It could have been done with Paint, a true bottom of the line program. I'll try to explain my thinking, for good or bad.

My personal preference on sound effects is to leave the Japanese intact and place English text next to it. That is what I did unless there wasn't space, then I placed the text over the Japanese. I mistakenly violated this standard on pages 73 through 75. I noticed just now.

For spoken text outside the bubbles, I erased the Japanese and replaced it with English. There were two exceptions. On page 64, I put a giant English "yes" on top of the giant Japanese "hai" rather than redraw it, and for minor characters talking in the background, I put the English on top of the Japanese. Perhaps I should have redrawn it instead. And one mistake on page 61 where I treated "Geez" and "Whee" like sound effects and forgot to remove the Japanese. (Or maybe they SHOULD be considered sound effects?)

So it's not quite consistent, and I agree the font choice for spoken asides needs improvement. But that will have to be for my next project, because this one is not going into a second revision. Speaking of that, no promises, but I hope to have the first chapter of that (out of four) out this weekend.

last edited at Apr 9, 2013 7:31AM

Whome2
joined Apr 2, 2013

I'll try to explain my thinking, for good or bad.

No, definitely for good. I appreciate that you explained your reasoning. I respect your decision. The sfx are completely optional and I've seen anything between editing every single sfx, and editing none at all. You're also definitely not the first person I've come across who leaves the original Japanese. I would recommend not leaving them, BUT I'm a completely different person and you do what you want to do. Developing your editing skills is always a work in progress. One can never stop improving. Heck, I didn't get to be where I'm at right now without butchering numerous doujins with my messy editing. So I completely respect your decisions, and good luck on your future stuff.

Cheers.

%e5%b0%8f%e8%88%94
joined May 22, 2013

Bicycle. Safety helmet. Stars. Heroine with black short hair. Those all remind me of the Denpa Onna. You get what I'm saying?

969153_636130159747876_1489078614_n
joined Apr 10, 2013

The only thing missing is a futon roll where the filling is a human...

joined Jun 5, 2013

I'm pretty sure this was translated already? Oh well.

Yurinsijdisjdijs
joined Oct 15, 2011

The sweetness!

Hbjnk
joined May 7, 2011

This chapter is already up and has been for a long, long time... (personally, I prefer this translation, though)

last edited at Sep 19, 2013 7:39PM

1204
Lililicious
joined Jul 7, 2011

To end the confusion to why this story has been uploaded twice:

Lililicious did not forget about or skip this story--our scanlation of it is in editing. The editor had some IRL stuff come up but still wants to finish the project, so we will still be releasing it, though I can't give a concrete date.

Yuri Girl 1001 Uploader
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Fly by Yuri
joined Mar 29, 2013

I think I prefer the Lililicious version too. Since it was my first effort, it had a lot of faults, even after revision.

Question: Should I take the Fly by Yuri version down, or leave them both up?

Edit: Ah, never mind. Somebody already took that down. It's less confusing that way. (I hadn't checked since I notice the new release yesterday.)

last edited at Sep 20, 2013 2:20PM

Ro-3c732
joined Sep 21, 2013

It was neat reading about the work behind scanlations :)
I actually love it when editors leave the original sfx beside the translated sounds because I just like seeing how they were originally. It's delightful being able to see the origin of the raws.

Reading this now, I realized that I'd read it before, although I can't remember what I felt the first time except for that both then and now, I found the story adorable :D

Hinageshi_icon
joined Jul 20, 2013

Well this was just so cute :3

FlameHazeKatsu
Img_1342
joined Feb 5, 2013

heh, sure is cute

Yuri%20ultimate
joined Feb 5, 2015

Cute, though I don't think it's worth a reread. This one-shot seems to be missing from the author's page though..

HopeFromYuri
5b3c524e-e066-4eaf-8e5f-ae4e37b5edda
joined Jan 18, 2016

Suck it up
Best.line.ever.
Seriously.

joined Jul 31, 2013

Cute, though I don't think it's worth a reread. This one-shot seems to be missing from the author's page though..

I very much disagree with the conclusion of your first sentence

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