JBI Studios' Blog on Voice-Over, Dubbing, and Multimedia Localization.

Have a corporate video that you want to show to a wide audience, from local employees to the general public around the world? Captioning & subtitling are great, cost effective ways to use the same video to reach a local and global audience.

Text combined with video makes sure that your message comes across clearly and is understood by others. In this blog we'll go over why captioning & subtitling improves your corporate videos, the difference between burned-in and text-based captions/subtitles, and how to prepare your text and video for captioning & subtitling.

Russia and Russian-speaking countries are growing markets that you should consider in your localization plan. It's estimated that Russian is the native language for approximately 153 million people in the world, making it eighth among the languages with the highest numbers of native speakers.

Video localization consists of taking an original video and adapting it for a target audience in a particular region or country. This could encompass dubbing it in a different language, adding subtitles, adapting cultural references, and formatting units of measurement. Localization gives a video cultural context and familiarity so that its message translates to a target audience.

Videos that are great for localization include (but are not limited to): corporate announcements, employee training, e-learning, commercials, product training, and much more.

In this blog we will share how video localization increases engagement, improves search engine optimization (SEO), expands your market reach, and other key benefits.

Video is king when it comes to online marketing. It's estimated that 72% of customers prefer video content over text content and that videos improve organic traffic by 300%. These are just some of the statistics that show why videos are the best way to improve brand awareness and sales. To expand that awareness to a global market, add video localization to your production process.

In this blog we will go over the benefits of video marketing and how video localization is essential in reaching international target audiences.

[Average read time: 4 minutes]

Translating from one language to another is a complex art, one that artificial intelligence is still trying to catch up to. Translation takes much more than spoken fluency in a language, it requires specific knowledge, skills, and guidelines. Also, if one is writing English text to be translated, there are ways to write to avoid translation mistakes or ambiguity. In this blog, we will discuss the main skills a translator should have to be successful and tips for writing text for translations.

[Average read time: 3 minutes]

Background audio, whether it be narration, music, or any other elements, is something that every editor should pay attention to. How audio is used can either make or break a localized video, so knowing how to properly add these elements is crucial. The following tips cover best-practices and if you take the time to implement them in your projects you will undoubtedly see a world of difference going forward.

[Average read time: 3 minutes]

1. Use Your Cuts

In today’s fast-paced world, people want all the information presented efficiently and succinctly. Written articles tend to gravitate towards bite-sized pieces of information, with many consumers tossing out written articles altogether in favor of video media. One need only look to YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and other social media sites to confirm this trend. According to Cisco, online videos will make up a grand total of over 80% of all IP internet traffic by the year 2020, which isn’t all that surprising.

[Average read time: 2 minutes]

Globalization has helped to bring us all together in myriad ways, connecting people around the world almost instantaneously. Keeping a proper focus, however, has become increasingly more difficult. As such, localization is a crucial tool when trying to grow a business both locally and globally, with businesses that know how to capitalize on current trends putting themselves in the best possible position. 

[Average read time: 2 minutes]

Media Localization is big business now that everything’s becoming more interconnected. Many companies are now looking to localization to help grow their user base and make your media easy for people who speak different languages to understand.

We’ve got a quick and easy guide that highlights the steps you should know, along with useful techniques when it comes to video translation.

[Average read time: 2 minutes]

Burned-in captions and subtitling are a commonly-requested video localization option, despite the fact that we’re living in the age of SRT and WebVTT sidecar files. Why? Because burning in allows more control of the text that appears on screen, which is critical for some content. For this reason, producers and multimedia localization professionals must know how to produce high-quality burned-in video deliverables.

This post lists 4 tips you must keep in mind when burning captions and subtitles to picture.

[Average read time: 3 minutes]

It’s time to look at the trends we expect to shape foreign-language voice-over, video dubbing and subtitling in the year ahead. 2018 was a year of rapid growth and tumultuous change in multimedia localization. This coming year we expect similarly robust growth, but also the solidification of a few long-term trends in the industry, particularly around online video streaming.

This post lists the three trends we believe will impact multimedia localization in 2019.

[Average read time: 3 minutes]

E-Learning localization is the hardest task in foreign-language multimedia. If a project workflow doesn't account for every element in a course, production budgets can increase drastically and builds can end up with both linguistic and functional bugs. It's critical to set up e-Learning projects properly – and that starts with a rigorous quoting process.

This post provides JBI Studios' E-Learning, Audio & Video Localization Quote Checklist, an easy-to-use table to help you get a quick, accurate and comprehensive quote for your e-Learning projects.

[Average read time: 3 minutes]

2018 is almost over, so it's time to look at the greatest hits of the year on the JBI Studios Blog – the most-read posts about voice-over, dubbing, subtitling and e-Learning localization. Our readers flocked to our analyses of new media challenges, as well as to our how-to's on the basics of multimedia localization production. And in all, the list reflects the rapid industry growth of the past year.

Here they are – the 5 most-read posts of 2018 on the JBI Studios Blog.

[Average read time: 3 minutes]

Captioning and subtitling workflows have strict processes and technical specifications for integration. Minor issues during setup, in fact, can lead to caption and subtitle tracks that don't display properly – or don't appear at all. That means that thorough project scoping is critical to the success of video localization and accessibility projects. Not sure what information you need to get an accurate quote?

This post provides JBI Studios' Subtitling, Captioning & Video Localization Quote Checklist, an easy-to-use table with the information you need to quote your projects properly.

[Average read time: 3 minutes]

Transcreation is the key to great multilingual marketing spots. Why? Because this service creates content specifically for each locale, maximizing the engagement of your international audience through expert copywriting, voice-over, dubbing, titles replacement, conceptual re-design and video production. And of course, it's tricky to get right. So what do marketing and multimedia localization professionals need to know to ensure successful transcreation projects?

This post lists the 3 basics elements you must know for cost-effective and timeline-sensitive transcreation.

[Average read time: 4 minutes]

Accurate quoting is critical to the success of any voice-over, dubbing or video localization production. It avoids last-minute additions to the budget and delays in the timeline. But it's also necessary to ensure a cost-effective and streamlined workflow – and a high-quality production. Not sure what you need for a thorough quote?

This post provides JBI Studios' Voice-Over, Dubbing & Video Localization Quote Checklist, with all the information you need for a quote in one easy-to-use table.

[Average read time: 3 minutes]

Pick-ups almost always mean trouble for voice-over, dubbing and video localization projects. For starters, they add unexpectedly to budgets, particularly on internationalization drives with multiple target languages. More critically, though, they lengthen timelines, often delaying a product or service launch, or even a commercial spot’s air-date. Fortunately, it’s possible to minimize them – and even to avoid them altogether.

This post lists the 3 steps multimedia localization professionals and producers can take to avoid pick-up sessions.

[Average read time: 4 minutes]

Animated content for kids – including feature films, TV shows and web series – has seen a surge in dubbing requests. Digital technology has made animation more streamlined and cost-effective, and online streaming has made distribution much more rapid and far-reaching. So what do multimedia localization providers need to know to localize this content?

This post lists 3 tips that every video localization professional must know to dub kids’ animated shows.

[Average read time: 3 minutes]

Captioning & subtitling for corporate, e-Learning and entertainment content has never been more streamlined or cost-effective. In fact, it takes work to keep up with the constant improvements in functionality and language support, even for seasoned studio professionals. But it's still critical to have a working knowledge of this technology to keep multimedia localization projects on time and on budget – and we can help with the terminology.

This post provides JBI Studios' Glossary of Captioning & Subtitling Terms, an invaluable tool for video accessibility and localization projects.

[Average read time: 3 minutes]

Text-based formats like SRT and WebVTT have revolutionized subtitling and captioning, making the process more adaptable, streamlined and cost-effective, especially for multilingual releases. Right-to-left languages, including Arabic, Farsi, Urdu and Hebrew have been no exception. That said, these languages still require special attention to avoid issues in text-based deliverables.

This post lists the 4 tips multimedia localization professionals must know to ensure the integrity of their right-to-left subtitling projects.

[Average read time: 3 minutes]