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Forum - View topicHey, Answerman! [2009-05-15]
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1stAgent
 Posts: 36 Location: Wisconsin |
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I've been gradually drifting away from the pro-fansub argument, but I will always love and treasure those wonderful purple Barney tapes from Kodocha. Made my day any time I got one of those in the mail.
Since I haven't watched my DVD of Girl Who Leapt Through Time, this might be the first time I've skipped a Flake out of fear of spoilers. |
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Kenotic
 Posts: 167 |
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But how else am I supposed to know that l33tN1NJ@77 worked on the encoding? Pushing "Start" on Handbrake is right up there with the story concept credits in my book.
From a general perusal on that Tube site and that other VO site, I get the feeling that most of fansubbing is showing off how much you know about Japanese --- or how much you think you know --- to those watching. The name "L0LFAIL SUBS" should be synonymous with quality, after all. |
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penguintruth
 Posts: 8503 Location: Penguinopolis |
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@Manga-ka and Editorial Pressure - Yeah, it was sort of weird when Goku's fight with Freeza went out for so long, especially in the anime, with 19 episodes. If you haven't defeated your opponent in five episodes, the two of you have to get married to each other.
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dtm42
Posts: 14084 Location: currently stalking my waifu |
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There, fixed it for you. |
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Ai no Kareshi
 Posts: 561 Location: South Africa |
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I know that I'm no moral leader when it comes to fansubs, but it always irks me when people defend "fansubbing in the old days" as "a lighter shade of gray".
I can see why the damage piracy brought could have been a lot less, and even how fansubs could have helped companies identify popular new series, but it feels as though you're praising them for the wrong reasons when you talk about operating expensive equipment and buying laserdiscs (compared to "avi files" uploaded by "intrepid nerds"). As if spending more money on piracy makes it any more admirable... and as you mentioned yourself, encoding video is no easy task. |
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vashfanatic
 Posts: 3495 Location: Back stateside |
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Oh holy cow, I so agree on the complaints you raised about how fansubs are fansubbed! I dislike elaborate karaoke, especially when it's the only thing in the file that's hard-subbed and you can't remove it; credits for the team should be left to the end of the project, or posted at a webpage (and if fansubbers are doing this for the love of anime anyway, who cares about credit?); and leaving in random Japanese unless it really is a word we don't have an equivalent for ("zaibatsu" comes to mind) is just... well, it defeats the purpose (and exciting challenge!) of translating in the first place. And use a note if you do, for crying out loud!
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Showsni
 Posts: 641 |
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For anime on normal telly, are things really that grim? Well, you're probably right; in the UK, there's pretty much no anime on television ever any more. Except occasionally Pokémon on CiTV and Mew Mew Power on Pop Girl...
Your anti fansub comments make me think of this: 
And, that kitten is so cute! |
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penguintruth
Posts: 8503 Location: Penguinopolis |
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I'm honestly in the dark about "hardsubs vs softsubs", and I don't mind karaoke, either. I understand the place of fansubs in the anime fan community, at least historically, but these days it's exaggerated, with companies bending over backwards to please their potential customers.
The funny thing is when official subs come out and fans complain that the little nuances in their favorite fansub of the program aren't there, even if those nuances were just bits added in for flavor. It's a poor excuse to not buy. |
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britannicamoore
 Posts: 2618 Location: Out. |
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It's kinda funny this came up as I was going to post this earlier today.
One thing:
Brian- you asked to know who worked on the show but not even Funi subbed the opening credits in their One Piece subs. So is that ok? Today, with that information a click away what is the point? It's out there if you want to know. And I do like karaoke. There needs to be more of that. |
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chaoticevl
Posts: 4 |
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while this will have very little purpose here, but since fansubbing and streaming was mentioned, and i want this idea to leave my head i'm posting it.
I'm sort of a fickle person with what I tend watch and even with the stuff i enjoy i almost never watch the whole thing i skim through it for plot or interesting battles. Streaming sites make this really hard to do so either i buy what I can or watch fan subs. For me the what I would like to see the anime companies do, those that use streaming sites anyway, is to create a file type that can be downloaded and watched a limited number of times at your leisure and one those times are up the file becomes corrupted. Since most likely the site it was downloaded from would have to have registration, it would some what keep people from redownloading it unless it was bought by either digital distribution or the DVD. While this probably isn't possible I'd still gladly support something like this as it allows a bit more freedom for when and how some one watches a show and is a possible means to prevent hording by more normal people. Now that this is posted i'll never have to think about it again. Sorry for wasting your time with a probably useless post. |
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cnet128
 Posts: 65 |
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Just popping in to add my two cents/pence/yen/equivalent-currency about the karaoke comment.
YES. PLEASE, NO MORE IN-YOUR-FACE KARAOKE. As a general rule, the less noticeable the karaoke is, the more enjoyable the OP/ED animation is, because flashy karaoke distracts from the animation whether you're trying to read it or not. Indeed, I generally prefer them with no karaoke at all (it's amazing how much difference it can make just removing those annoying bars of text), but if it's there, at least make it subtle. Extreme examples that come to mind are a certain One Piece subber who made part of the OP karaoke cover half the screen at one point, and especially a prominent subber of a certain current series who for some inexplicable reason have decided to try to "blend" the text into the actual animation, with the predictable result that text appears distractingly around the screen, moves about and generally makes it impossible to just watch the damn animation even if you actively try. Thankfully they're softsubs (who the heck tries to pull off elaborate effects with softsubs anyway?) and so I can just turn them off. And not bother to turn the subs on again afterwards. Seriously, this stuff has to stop. |
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captainbanana
Posts: 191 |
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I think the biggest problem with anti-fansub arguments is that the basis of the argument is usually that anime is streamed online, so there is no reason not to watch it online (legally). A lot of English speaking people everywhere are unable to access these videos. Funi and others are getting closer and closer to the dream, which is day-of streaming subtitles supported by ads, but people in the US and possibly Canada are the only ones reaping the benefits right now (of which I am one, but I have a ton of Dutch friends, for instance). Believe it or not, there are certainly enough fans overseas to keep the fansubbing going for an eternity if you can't bring the streams to them (Yes, I understand that there are licensing issues. The Japanese rights holder needs to work something out).
The answerman is right though. It's beyond difficult to compete with fansubbers that get HD rips straight from the source, and can deliver their encodes with excellent quality at such low file sizes. I don't know if there is ever going to be a way to combat that, although Blu-Ray releases seem like one option (which most companies aren't doing right now....I'm hoping for an FMA2 Blu-Ray release, but I'm not holding my breath). The argument that fansubbing is wrong, and thus shouldn't exist, is like tilting at windmills at this point. It's not going anywhere, and the industry has got to figure out a way to fix their business model (since the current model can't be fixed by anything short of us all going out and buying three times as much anime as we are now, which isn't going to happen). If ad-based streaming supplemented by DVD sales is viable, then I'm all for it. I certainly hope that it is viable. Oh, and I'll never watch Cartoon Network again. I know it isn't exactly their fault that the ratings weren't as high as they may have wanted, and that a repeat of Family Guy can easily top a new episode of a highly anticipated anime, but the way the Adult Swim staff handled the death of anime was atrocious. They basically told fans that had been loyal to Cartoon Network since the first-run DBZ days that they could shove it, and that they didn't matter anymore. Way to wreck a good thing, CN. I'll never forget the years of sprinting home from the bus stop in order to not miss the opening credits of DBZ, or sitting three inches from the TV as to not wake up my family during Adult Swim (when it was all anime that is. Comedy killed the Anime Star) |
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Zalis116
Moderator
 Posts: 6902 Location: Kazune City |
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Well, in one of the groups I work with, we sub old and obscure 80s/90s shows, not the "episode aired 10 hours ago, where's my subs at?" stuff. We don't do any karaoke effects whatsoever, just English and romaji, in the exact same fonts (but different colors) as the main dialogue. Which, incidentally, are no-nonsense white or *SHOCK* yellow styles intended for readability, not aesthetics. Basically, similar to what you might find in official DVD or VHS releases. After Effects isn't used at all -- if any text is too complicated for Aegisub's and our capabilities, it gets an \an8 and goes on the top of the screen. While we do include fansubber credits, we don't integrate them in the same style or position as the production credits. And although honorifics are used, you won't find any gratuitous Japanese. At least if I have a hand in translating or editing the releases, it'll be smooth, localized English without any translator notes unless absolutely necessary. Hasn't happened yet. Yes, I realize this constitutes a non-influential minority of the fansubbing scene. But I thought I'd mention that exceptions to the rules do exist. By the way, that "keikaku means plan" bit was a joke image, not from an actual fansub. However, the humor wouldn't work if there weren't a basis in reality. I assure you, this image is completely undoctored: 
spoiler[In case anyone wants to justify that... yes, I know the girl didn't understand the concept of marriage, but putting "Marr...iage"? would have worked just as well. ] In fact, that whole release is practically 625 minutes of Japanese lessons, including such basics as Hai means "Yes." |
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Mohawk52
 Posts: 8202 Location: England, UK |
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I too loved "TGWLTT", but to be fair to that rather misguided Flake, spoiler[I too thought the ending was a bit wanting for a sequel as well, ]and it seemed that that was what the writer, and director was hinting at with it. Here's hoping at any rate.
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PetrifiedJello
Posts: 3782 |
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What a shame about Cartoon Network. Damn, I used to watch that station every day, back when it had decent cartoons.
I agree with the Flapjack opinion. At first, the show seemed odd, but that's also its appeal. Bubby for the win with this show. Having read the news from network executives (concerned about ad revenue loss and dwindling viewership), the dying network comment is pretty accurate. But I'm very curious as to why distributors don't opt to fill the gap. Sure, Funi and ADV have their own stations, but they're not available to all cable services. Worse, the services aren't the same. If anything, I'd expect cable companies to jump at the opportunity to open dedicated On Demand slots for a chance to share revenues of customers. There's been a big push for a la carte cable programming, and this would be a perfect time to take advantage of this demand, even if the anime market is niche. I'm not sure if it's server capacity or just outright refusal to try which deters the chance to try it. --- Do people really think ANN produces anime? Oops. Never mind. Temporarily forgot my profession. But if this woman's that upset over this ending, best she not view [insert an anime with a "bad" ending here]. --- For the QotW, I don't do cosplay. But with the funds, there are several things I would love to have made: A 1:1 scale Voltron mech suit (lions version). Even though trying to watch an episode of this series makes me cringe now, there's no denying Voltron's influence in the mech world. It's just awesome. I want talking/working (moving parts) versions of all the staves used in the Lyrical Nanoha series. Those were awesome. A 1:1 scale replica of Faye's Redtail. Adding flight would be a plus. Sadly, the rest of my wish list isn't possible regardless how much money's involved. Most are replicas of the worlds found in many anime series. |
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