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Welcome to the DTP Forum
Thread poster: Mauricio Coitiño
Mauricio Coitiño
Mauricio Coitiño  Identity Verified
Uruguay
Local time: 21:27
English to Spanish
+ ...
Mar 20, 2009

Dear Prozians,

Welcome to this new forum, where we'll try to gather as much knowledge and experience as we can in the area of Desktop Publishing services for the translation industry and associated technologies. I myself have been working in this area of intersection between Graphics Design and Translation for some years now, and probably have trained some of those of you who come see what this is about. It'll be my pleasure to moderate this forum and ensure it's useful and nurturin
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Dear Prozians,

Welcome to this new forum, where we'll try to gather as much knowledge and experience as we can in the area of Desktop Publishing services for the translation industry and associated technologies. I myself have been working in this area of intersection between Graphics Design and Translation for some years now, and probably have trained some of those of you who come see what this is about. It'll be my pleasure to moderate this forum and ensure it's useful and nurturing for all of us.
I count on you.
Regards,

Mauricio
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Rasha El-Gabry
Rasha El-Gabry  Identity Verified
United Kingdom
Local time: 00:27
English to Arabic
+ ...
Thank you note Mar 20, 2009

Dear Mauricio,
Thank you so much for thinking about such important topic. I have been so much interested in knowing more about DTP, especially with the increasing need for it nowadays. I hope you can provide us with a view as to the basics of DTP.

Rasha


 
Igor Indruch
Igor Indruch  Identity Verified
Czech Republic
Local time: 01:27
English to Czech
well, I am quite curious... Mar 20, 2009

...what this forum will be about.
Because, personally, I do not like very much when people say: "I want to learn some DTP basics" etc... because DTP actually means using some application like InDesign, QuarkXpress etc. And too many people just start "playing" with these tools without any knowledge about typography, which is the most important and difficult part of it. Learning how to use computer program can almost everybody. But not everybody is able to master typography. And for every l
... See more
...what this forum will be about.
Because, personally, I do not like very much when people say: "I want to learn some DTP basics" etc... because DTP actually means using some application like InDesign, QuarkXpress etc. And too many people just start "playing" with these tools without any knowledge about typography, which is the most important and difficult part of it. Learning how to use computer program can almost everybody. But not everybody is able to master typography. And for every language there are different typography rules.

I have one very "interesting" experience - for some time I was working as a proof-reader for a publishing house. I was reviewing a book, which was quite poorly translated. Well, I corrected what was necessary and send it to publisher. After a while PDF files "ready to print" came back for final review. To my surprise there were a lot of new errors - this time typographic ones. So I asked publisher how this is possible. Well - in order to cut costs, the publisher was outsourcing DTP to some bulgarian company. Quite undestandably, those bulgarian typesetters did know absolutely nothing about Czech typography...

[Edited at 2009-03-20 21:17 GMT]

[Edited at 2009-03-20 21:17 GMT]
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Mauricio Coitiño
Mauricio Coitiño  Identity Verified
Uruguay
Local time: 21:27
English to Spanish
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER
We're not typesetters nor graphics designers Mar 20, 2009

Dear Igor,

You've brought about an interesting issue: the frontier between translation and graphics design. Certainly, as a graphics designer with experience in editorial design, I wouldn't recommend a beginner to produce the ready-for-print version of any document.
The idea of this forum and the online courses is to help you be able to modify the text within a file, and AVOID modifying anything that's out of our scope. Layout and typography (letter space, line space, kerning,
... See more
Dear Igor,

You've brought about an interesting issue: the frontier between translation and graphics design. Certainly, as a graphics designer with experience in editorial design, I wouldn't recommend a beginner to produce the ready-for-print version of any document.
The idea of this forum and the online courses is to help you be able to modify the text within a file, and AVOID modifying anything that's out of our scope. Layout and typography (letter space, line space, kerning, etc.) are certainly beyond our territory.
Nevertheless, in some cases where the layout is flexible enough and the material is not very complex and long (a diagram, for example) it could be possible for a translator to deliver a ready-to-print file.
IMHO, there are no general rules that apply to all cases.
Regards,

Mauricio
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Han Li
Han Li  Identity Verified
China
Local time: 08:27
English to Chinese
+ ...
Agree Mar 21, 2009

Mauricio Coitiño wrote:

Dear Igor,

You've brought about an interesting issue: the frontier between translation and graphics design. Certainly, as a graphics designer with experience in editorial design, I wouldn't recommend a beginner to produce the ready-for-print version of any document.
The idea of this forum and the online courses is to help you be able to modify the text within a file, and AVOID modifying anything that's out of our scope. Layout and typography (letter space, line space, kerning, etc.) are certainly beyond our territory.
Nevertheless, in some cases where the layout is flexible enough and the material is not very complex and long (a diagram, for example) it could be possible for a translator to deliver a ready-to-print file.
IMHO, there are no general rules that apply to all cases.
Regards,

Mauricio


I think a translator doesn’t need very advanced knowledge when translating a read-for-print document made by InDesign or QuarkXPress from source language to target language. It's just need CAT tools and DTP applications, but it also need some basic knowledge, i.e. change the necessary fonts after translation, when dealing with a DTP format document.

Regards,
Han Li


 
Nicole Schnell
Nicole Schnell  Identity Verified
United States
Local time: 17:27
English to German
+ ...
In memoriam
Thank you, thank you, thank you, Igor Mar 21, 2009

Igor Indruch wrote:
And too many people just start "playing" with these tools without any knowledge about typography, which is the most important and difficult part of it. Learning how to use computer program can almost everybody. But not everybody is able to master typography. And for every language there are different typography rules.


For bringing this up.

This is one of my pet-peeves. Being an outsourcer, I am stunned that I receive German texts with American quotation marks, hyphens used instead of n- or m-dashes, double blank spaces between sentences (anyone still using typewriters? It's 2009), I could go on and on. Such things are considered TYPOS.


 
Han Li
Han Li  Identity Verified
China
Local time: 08:27
English to Chinese
+ ...
It can be solved Mar 21, 2009

Nicole Schnell wrote:
This is one of my pet-peeves. Being an outsourcer, I am stunned that I receive German texts with American quotation marks, hyphens used instead of n- or m-dashes, ……. Such things are considered TYPOS.


This is just because the translator hasn’t the basic knowledge on the DTP appliances. It can be solved by defined a combined font for the target language. I don't think these problems can be neglected by translators.


 
Nicole Schnell
Nicole Schnell  Identity Verified
United States
Local time: 17:27
English to German
+ ...
In memoriam
Typing 101 Mar 21, 2009

Han Li wrote:

I don't think these problems can be neglected by translators.


Exactly. Every secretary can do that. Translators should be perfect. Before touching highly sophisticated DTP software such as Indesign and QuarkXpress, a translator should know when to hit the space bar or where to find the most basic keys for proper punctuation marks.

A client of mine asked me for help with compiling a list of such common mistakes for quality assurance purposes. Amazing, how long this list has turned out already.


 
Fabio Descalzi
Fabio Descalzi  Identity Verified
Uruguay
Local time: 21:27
Member (2004)
German to Spanish
+ ...
Welcome Mauricio to your Forum Mar 21, 2009

Hi Mauricio

It is a real pleasure to see you here, greeting ProZians at this very brand-new technical forum of devoted to your speciality.

I know Mauricio in person and I can assure you that he is very engaging and enthusiastic. So wish him best of luck in his double task of moderating and guiding ProZians thru these not-so-well-known waters.

Best regards from another Uruguayan,
Fabio


 
Nicole Schnell
Nicole Schnell  Identity Verified
United States
Local time: 17:27
English to German
+ ...
In memoriam
This is wonderful news! Mar 21, 2009

Welcome, Mauricio!!!



 
Marna Renteria
Marna Renteria  Identity Verified
United States
Local time: 20:27
Spanish to English
DTP Learning Mar 23, 2009

Thank you for starting this forum! I definitely need to learn how to understand how this fits into the quoting process: Should it be by page or by the hour? What is involved? With the right software, why would typography be affected if the translation is done correctly?

[Edited at 2009-03-23 20:29 GMT]


 
Nicole Schnell
Nicole Schnell  Identity Verified
United States
Local time: 17:27
English to German
+ ...
In memoriam
Never charge by page. Mar 24, 2009

chiriz wrote:

Thank you for starting this forum! I definitely need to learn how to understand how this fits into the quoting process: Should it be by page or by the hour? What is involved? With the right software, why would typography be affected if the translation is done correctly?

[Edited at 2009-03-23 20:29 GMT]


Usually there is more to DTP than filling columns with text. Other jobs may look like this:





You also will have to work with kerning and tracking. Also: Fonts other than system fonts have different names in different countries, in some cases you need to find the equivalent and replace the existing one, depending on where the product will be printed. Any software is only as good as the person who handles it and nothing happens automatically.

Something in general:
Translators usually tend to re-create a layout in word (e.g., when the text was converted from PDF), not realizing that the layouter has to remove all this well-meant formatting before he/she can actually work with it. What a waste of time unless it was part of the job and was paid in serious hourly rates.


 
Roberta Anderson
Roberta Anderson  Identity Verified
Italy
Local time: 01:27
Member (2001)
English to Italian
+ ...
Some typographic considerations Mar 24, 2009

chiriz wrote:
With the right software, why would typography be affected if the translation is done correctly?


There are several issues that become apparent only at layout stage.
During translation, text tends to grow by 10-15%, depending on your source and target languages.
Usually, the translated document still has to fit within the same space on the page, with specific margins and white areas to maintain the original intended design and geometry. To achieve this, you can tweak some typographic settings within certain limits, paying attention not to alter the original design which consists also of a specific font size/leading combination (this gives the page an overall impression of airiness or denseness, which is not accidental but intended and to be retained).
With justified text, you have to tweak your J&H settings to avoid gaps or squeezed text and too many consecutive hyphens.
With left aligned text, you have to be careful to avoid excessive raggedness, again still avoiding too many consecutive hyphenated lines.
This is particularly tricky when dealing with narrow-column layouts.

If a heading line in the original has a certain style applied to some words, the translation has to take into account where the specially formatted word falls within the sentence, for its graphic appearance.
Then there are for instance tables, where text length within each cell is crucial. A good translation may still result in awful-looking tables.

Even when you have the source layout files to work on, these are all issues that need to be dealt with.
And then there may also be issues with the source layout files themselves; I've had many where the originator did not create them with the idea that they would be re-used by others, so for instance all formatting was applied locally and not saved as styles. This has a huge impact on layout workload, and makes it harder to achieve stylistic consistency (usually the best thing in such cases is to create all necessary styles before starting to flow in the translated text).

And Nicole says, very often well-meant formatting done during translation means extra work at layout stage. I also agree with Nicole that the correct use of n- and m-dashes, non-breaking spaces and straight and curly apostrophes/quotes is often overlooked at translation stage.

It's not just a matter of knowing how to use a certain application - it's a matter of being aware of some basic and not so basic typographical rules and issues.


 
José Henrique Lamensdorf
José Henrique Lamensdorf  Identity Verified
Brazil
Local time: 21:27
English to Portuguese
+ ...
In memoriam
De-formatting text Mar 24, 2009

Nicole Schnell wrote:
Something in general:
Translators usually tend to re-create a layout in word (e.g., when the text was converted from PDF), not realizing that the layouter has to remove all this well-meant formatting before he/she can actually work with it. What a waste of time unless it was part of the job and was paid in serious hourly rates.


There are two basic types of DTP operators when translation is involved. I can't figure out adequate names for each.

Type A
This is my type. I translate EN-PT only, but I speak IT-FR-ES. So I know my way around and what I'm doing in DTP if the translation involves any pair among these five languages. I don't need references, and prefer to receive plain TXT. If I get a half-formatted DOC or RTF, I run it through Windows Notepad to get it cleaned.

I won't take a DTP job involving any language I don't speak with minimum fluency. Though I have a basic-survival-level knowledge of PL, I won't touch a DTP job involving it.

Type B
These people have no idea on the languages they are handling. They export the text from the DTP program into a MS Word table or an Excel spreadsheet, and need it translated accurately, with all formatting (bolds, italics, underlines) by the translator.
Their hyphenhation will be only as good as the dictionary in their DTP appication. If anything is missing, it will remain untranslated.

I once had a French-made car whose manual had been translated into European PT, but it was PT, only to comply with Brazilian laws on imports. A few parts here and there were left in French, possibly because the DTP operator didn't find the translated text for them.


 
Nicole Schnell
Nicole Schnell  Identity Verified
United States
Local time: 17:27
English to German
+ ...
In memoriam
About Type B Mar 24, 2009

Sounds like a disease. Which it is, in a way...

José Henrique Lamensdorf wrote:

These people have no idea on the languages they are handling.



Many translation agencies have their own DTP departments. Ha, ha. How is the poor DTP-guy supposed to know about the typographic rules of a foreign language? At times I have the feeling that blindness, aside from being cheap, is one of the major criteria for hiring. Being capable of "handling" a software is not sufficient. This is where the translator's responsibility for the finished product comes into play.

My favorite anecdote:
I outsourced a largish proofreading job. Everything was corrected, except the punctuation. "Oh, I was supposed to do that, too?", asked the proofreader. Who else is supposed to clean up this mess? Certainly not the DTP-person who, in this language, probably wouldn't be able to order a cup of coffee at a restaurant.


 
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