Archive

Posts Tagged ‘subtitling’

Subtitling language learning exercises with Sanako Study 1200 Student

2011/05/24 Leave a comment

I love to work with target language subtitles in the media-rich environment of the Language Resource Center: Target language subtitles provide readily available transcripts of non-ephemeral, often authentic target language to base language learning exercises on.

More and more target language subtitles are included in newer editions of movies. In addition, projects that crowd-source subtitles for other video materials, have sprung up on the web also, e.g. http://www.universalsubtitles.org/en/  . So if you just want the transcripts to build language learning exercises from, you have a variety of choices.

If however you think “Der Weg ist das Ziel” and the listening comprehension and writing activities in creating subtitles are valuable language learning exercises in themselves, the Sanako Student player comes with a subtitling mode:

In the following screencast I subtitle one of my own training screencasts (explaining how to access timestretched animated GIFs for practicing Chinese stroke order in the LRC environment) in a 3-step process: type along as fast as you can while listening to a first run of the screencast; listen to the screencast again and correct errors; finally, to adjust the timing of the subtitles (which the Sanako makes especially easy), listen to the screencast for a third time (talk about “massed presentation”).

Categories: all-languages, e-languages Tags: , , ,

Swift-TX subtitling with Windows XP Japanese IME

2010/11/24 Leave a comment

In order to get Swift to work with Japanese , you have to set the font in the swift preferences:

This computer worked –

 

meaning: IME showing up here.

”Input mode” must be set to Hiragana, not “direct input” which (if I recall correctly think) we did in XP/ control panel/ “regional and language settings”.

We could replicate getting it to work on other XP computers:

by resetting of the “input mode” from “direct input” to “hiragana”,

 

AND after a restart of switch and opening a new swift file:

 

Next problem:

when you use ctrl up/down arrow , spurious spaces appear between letters.

Categories: Japanese, Translation Tags: , , ,

Swift-TX Subtitling/Screen Translation Software: Preference Dialogues

2010/11/24 Leave a comment

This impressive array of preferences dialogues of the Swift subtitling software by Softel is in desperate need of a FAQ

– which I have yet to write (feel free to make suggestions in the comments).

OK, here is one bit: Japanese.

Categories: Translation Tags: , ,

Subtitling Audio Files with Windows Media Player Enhanced Tag Editor

2009/12/14 Leave a comment

Working with (target language) subtitles is a common requirement in digital language labs.

While the method demonstrated in the following screencast requires some getting used to – remember to share and reuse the result -, the advantage over Sanako Media Assistant subtitling is that the subtitles get stored in the file and not only linked to in a separate file (links tend to/are bound to break if you try to manage your product in course management systems or erepositories): subtitling-with-windows-media-player-enhanced-tag-editor.wmv.

And then there is this very nice capability of YouTube.com: http://www.google.com/support/youtube/bin/answer.py?answer=100077, if you dare navigate the waters of copyright, data protection and privacy (FERPA).

Note: The  newer Windows Media Editor does not contain the tag editor any more, but on Windows XP, you can roll back the Windows Media Player version by going to Control Panel / Add or Remove Programs / Remove a program. Click Windows Media Player 11, and then click Remove

Categories: e-languages, Listening, Reading, service-is-learning-materials-creation Tags: , ,

Swift Subtitling Frequently Asked Questions

2009/03/20 Leave a comment
Categories: e-languages, Translation Tags: , ,

Swift Subtitling with Input Language Japanese in Windows XP

2009/03/20 Leave a comment
  1. Go to control panel / regional and language options / tab: languages.
  2.  
  3. Check whether (1) Japanese / Keyboard / MS  IME Standard 2003 is installed. Otherwise (2) button:add it
  4. With (1) Japanese / Keyboard / MS  IME Standard 2003 is installed selected, click on (3) button: properties and ensure these settings are right, then click button: “ok”
  6. Now Open Swift.
  7. Menu file / preferences / tab: open:/ section:available fonts, button:add, add ms pgothic, section: default font, button:change, select ms pgothic, like here:
  9. Menu file / preferences / tab: spelling and languages, select primary language: Japanese, like here, then close with button: ok,
  11. Close the existing and open a new swift file.
  12. With swift still being the active application, ensure that in the windows language bar (if you do not see all the language bar icons, right click on input language icon , choose additional icons in the taskbar ; you may also have to right-click left of the input language icon, uncheck lock language bar, then resize the bar for the additional icons to show) the right input language is chosen, like here:
  14. Troubleshooting: It has been observed that the IME popup editor does not appear like here: . This may be related to the IME option “Input type” getting reset from “Hiragana”to “Direct Input”. Double-check this. Also, if all else fails, close existing and open a new file within Swift and/or close and reopen Swift, making sure that the IME settings remain.
  15. Still won’t work? Contact me.
Categories: e-languages, Institution-is-London-Metropolitan-University, step-by-step-guides, Translation, Writing Tags: , , , , , ,