Yujacha
joined Nov 15, 2016
Hi there! First of all, I want to say thanks for translating these comics and bringing so much YohaMaru love to the community! :D
I've actually translated this already from the Korean version to English with permission from the original artist - here it is! As a fellow translator, I saw a few areas where you could improve on this comic:
- For some of the lines, I think they could've been reworded so that they fit the characters' voices better. For example, Maru's line "Look, we got you down. You good?" conveys how Maru speaks with an accent, but doesn't quite mesh with her polite style of speaking.
- On page 3, the "Th-Thump!" sfx might cause confusion, since "thump" can also be interpreted as something like "doki". In my version of the TL, I went with "BAAANG", but something like "bam!" would probably work as well. Just make sure you choose your sfx wisely to make their meaning clear to the audience.
- You did a great job in using different fonts and styles in the typesetting, but I think you could've gone a step further. Wild Words is a good font, but it's kind of a basic one. For something that's hand-drawn (such as yeonDoo's comics), it's fine to choose something non-standard that fits the feel of the comic more. There are plenty of cute, readable handwriting-style fonts out there that I think you could've used here. I'm also biased towards typesetting sfx as closely to the original font as possible. For example, take a look at how I did the typeset for the "squeeze" sfx on page 2. I tried to emulate how yeonDoo originally wrote it (in the Korean version), and even stretched out the word to convey that "squeezing/holding on very tightly" feeling that yeonDoo was trying to convey for that portion. The fonts you choose and how you typeset a comic can have a big impact on the charm and look of a comic, so it's something to keep in mind for the future.
I wasn't sure if you were working on more of yeonDoo's comics, so for reference, here are the works that I've translated and released with yeonDoo's permission:
- YohaMaru texting comic, one of the comics that yeonDoo released in both Korean and Japanese (my personal nickname for it is "when the bae texts you first", haha).
- YohaMaru airplane comic, which was released only in Korean in two parts.
I really appreciate the work that you've done, and I think it's cool that you've translated this from the JP version of the comic! I think it'd be nice if we kept in touch - maybe we could work together in the future? Feel free to contact me at my Tumblr (which you can find in the links I posted above)!
last edited at Nov 15, 2016 6:36AM