Ask John: Are Fansubs Superior to Commercial Translations?

Question:
Lately it seems a lot of fansub watchers have [done] a lot of monolithic thinking on various issues — the big one of which is that the best fansubbers quality and accuracy of translations are always better than those of R1 localizing studios/production companies. What are your thoughts on this? Is there some grain of truth here or have they just started spreading false propaganda and people just believe whatever their peers on forums tell them?

Answer:
To a certain extent, I can approach this question from a position of familiarity with both sides of the argument. While I’ve never been involved in any unlicensed fan translations, I have watched plenty of them. And I have professionally worked on licensed commercial translations of anime, performing limited translations and exhaustive re-writing from literal translation to conversational English. The argument that fansubs are “better” than commercial translations is a vast overstatement, but the condemnation that unlicensed, amateur translations are inherently inferior to professional translations is also an overstatement. The truth is a compromise that depends heavily upon circumstances and the conditions that constitute “better.”

I can confirm from first-hand personal experience that professional, commercial translations often have access to resources that fan translations do not. I’ve personally compared fan translations of dialogue from Risky Safety and HarÉ Guu to video footage and actual recording scripts provided by Japanese licensors, so I can confirm with absolute certainty that the official American commercial subtitles for these two shows are more accurate and more literal than the earlier fan translations. While fan translations often rely entirely on the video footage alone, commercial translations usually have access to both the video footage and the printed shooting scripts. However, access to extensive translation materials don’t necessarily ensure a more accurate translation.

The primary difference between the literal accuracy of fan and commercial translations lies in their commercial nature. Fansubs frequently exhibit very literal translations of spoken dialogue because the purpose of a fan translation is specifically to provide a literal translation of the Japanese dialogue. Fansubs exist to make imported Japanese anime accessible and understandable to receptive English speaking viewers. The purpose of professionally produced subtitles is to provide a commercial product. From another perspective, the goal of fan translations is to provide a literal translation while the goal of a commercial translation is to provide a natural viewing experience.

Fansubs may include commonly known Japanese terms, honorifics, on-screen footnotes or explanations, and extensive dialogue translations. This extensive degree of comprehensiveness may make fansubs seem more accurate or thorough than commercial subtitles. But this degree of comprehensiveness can also be toilsome for viewers, and can alienate viewers unfamiliar with specific Japanese terms and linguistic peculiarities. On the other hand, commercial subtitles can and do sometimes gloss over nuances in spoken dialogue, or limit the amount of subtitles and text on screen to facilitate the viewing experience. One perspective on translation believes that literal Japanese honorifics are necessary in subtitles because they don’t always have a literal English equivalence. The opposing perspective holds that the need to retain Japanese honorifics and specific Japanese terms reveals a translator’s inability to translate successfully. Essentially, the philosophical approach of fansubs is often to create a literal translation of the spoken Japanese dialogue while the philosophical approach of a commercial translation is to accurate convey the meaning of the dialogue in a way that’s natural and easily comprehensible for viewers, without being overwhelming, confusing, or distracting. Fan translations are only concerned with providing a literal translation. Commercial translations have to provide comfortable, comprehensible viewing experience. Furthermore, while unlicensed fan translations have the ability to include thorough translation notes and explanations, commercial translations don’t always have that opportunity. I’ve personally been frustrated to be unable to provide the extensive translation notes and explanations I’ve wanted to include on commercial American DVD releases because of arbitrary and legal restrictions insisted upon by Japanese licensors that are afraid of legal accusations of copyright infringement or demands for royalty payments – just for mentioning proper names.

Please notice that I’ve largely avoided focusing heavily upon superficial appearances. The argument that fansubs offer stylized or colored fonts or karaoke style song lyrics is a straw man argument. Unofficial fan translations do sometimes feature stylized subtitle fonts and other visual enhancements that seem superior to the simple, efficient subtitles provided by commercial DVDs. But this difference is largely due to the fact that DVD technology simply doesn’t support the range of graphical text enhancements that computer video formats or permanent “hard subs” do. Furthermore, comparison between PC video formats and DVD video intended for television screens is not an equivalent comparison. Colorful, stylized fonts that look attractive to a viewer sitting a few inches away from a PC monitor may be totally illegible to a viewer sitting several feet away from a lower resolution television screen. In other words, graphic style differences between fansubs and commercial DVDs have nothing at all to do with the quality or accuracy of translations.

In summation, it’s not really possible to conclusively say that fan translations or commercial subtitles are consistently better or more accurate because both have compromises in different areas. Fan translations may include grammar and translation errors caused by the speed of their production and the limits of their resources. Fansubs often provide exhaustive literal translations but sacrifice ease of viewing. Commercial subtitles may get specific references and subtle nuances more accurate than fan translations, and may provide a more polished, professional viewing experience at the compromise of emphasizing meaning over literal word for word translation. The difference between fansubs and commercial subs isn’t so much a matter of accuracy or inaccuracy, but rather a difference between the preference and expectations of individual viewers.