Masaryk University Faculty of Arts Department of English and American Studies

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2.2.1Subtitles

2.1.1.2.1.1The History of Subtitling

As Jan Ivarsson (2004) explains, the need to convey the film dialogues to the audience arose already at the beginning of the 20th century with the production of silent films. This was done by inserting printed or drawn texts, called intertitles, between the sequences of the film. Translating these intertitles was fairly easy – the original text was simply removed and replaced by the translated one.

The film translation became more problematic with the arrival of sound film in 1927, as the intertitles disappeared and the dialogues had to be subtitled as the actors spoke. Although the films could be dubbed in several languages, it was considered too complex and expensive. The films, therefore, became translated by subtitles as they are known today, with the use of several different techniques throughout the 20th century. Those include the optical, mechanical, chemical and laser methods, based either on separate subtitle images projected on the film screen, or a direct imprint of subtitles on the film strip. The laser method, used commercially since 1988, inserts subtitles by burning away the emulsion without damaging the acetate film underneath. Laser subtitling, as Ivarsson points out, has been commercially very successful and is still used in cinema, while electronic subtitles took over the television broadcast.

The job of a subtitler was greatly simplified with the use of time codes, as the subtitles no longer required to be fed manually. Also, the PC with a subtitling software allowed the subtitler to carry out the whole job at his or her own home or office (Ivarsson 2004).

2.1.1.2.1.2Subtitling in the Czech Republic

While subtitling is the preferred way of audiovisual translation in the Czech cinema (with the exception of children's films), dubbing is dominant and holds its status quo in television broadcast. This is one of the factors contributing to Czech subtitlers being undervalued. While in some European countries the cost of subtitling one minute of a television broadcast is €15 - 20, it is €3.6 - 5.5 in the Czech Republic (Valenta 2010), from which the subtitler receives only about a half. As Pošta points out, the prices of professional subtitling software then correspond more with the first-mentioned subtitling prices (for instance, EZTitles cost €1,580 in 2013), thus making it inaccessible the majority of translators. There are several freeware subtitling tools available for download (such as Subtitle Workshop and VisualSubSync), each of them, however, covering only a fraction of the functions included in the professional software (Pošta 2010).

Another contributing fact is that many amateur enthusiasts are willing to make subtitles for free, most notably the subtitling communities centering around the websitewww.titulky.com, or the fan sites of particular TV shows (such as www.edna.cz). These amateur subtitlers (also fansubbers) thus provide subtitles for films and TV shows downloadable from the internet, for those viewers not willing to wait months or years until they are aired on Czech televisions, or just preferring subtitles to dubbing.

As more and more young viewers and frequent cinemagoers tend to prefer subtitles to dubbing, we may witness the trend change from dubbing to subtitles in Czech television in the future. So far there have been only a few exceptions, such as the late-night broadcasts of Filmový klub on ČT2 or the popular TV shows How I Met Your Mother and The Big Bang Theory on Prima COOL. These subtitled episodes, however, have been aired in afternoons as reruns of the previous days' prime time dubbed broadcasts, implying that dubbing is still prioritized.

2.1.1.2.1.3Subtitling Procedures

Subtitles are required to meet certain principles to secure a good readability and uniformity. The following subchapters contain guidelines for European subtitling proposed by Fotios Karamitroglou (1998) as well as insights of other experts. This set of standards, however, is only a recommendation and the guidelines required by each client (e.g. film producers, DVD makers or TV broadcasters) may differ.

.2.1.3.1 Layout

Subtitles should be positioned at the bottom of the screen, this way they are less likely to obstruct the image action. Karamitroglou (1998) also advises to leave a sufficient gap (1/12 of the total screen height) between the lowest subtitle line and the screen edge, so that the viewer's eye does not travel a long distance between the image and the subtitles. In extreme cases, the subtitles can be moved elsewhere (usually top of the screen). This can happen, according to Díaz Cintas and Remael (2007), when the background brightness of the bottom part of the screen would make the subtitles illegible, when there is an important action happening in the subtitles' usual place or when essential data are displayed at the bottom of the screen, such as other subtitles or inserts with dates and information about a speaker). As the viewer is accustomed only to subtitles projected at the bottom, any unnecessary relocation should be avoided.

As for the number of lines of subtitles, no more than two should be presented at a time. Therefore, the subtitles do not cover more than 2/12 of the screen at a time. In the case of a single-line subtitle, the use of the second line is preferred over the first line, thus keeping clear of the image as much as possible (Karamitroglou 1998).

The number of characters per subtitle line recommended by Karamitroglou (1998) is around 35, while Díaz Cintas and Remael (2007), as well as most subtitling programs set the maximum to 40 characters. More than 40 characters per line would require a smaller font size, reducing the legibility of the text on some screens.

As Karamitroglou suggests, there should be a maximum of 2 sentences per subtitle, each of them preferably on a separate line. Pošta (2011), however, sees no reason why there should not be, for example, 3 short sentences per subtitle.

The subtitled text should be centered instead of aligned to the left, considering that most action is taking place in the center of the screen. The viewer's eyes thus travel a smaller distance from the action to the beginning of the subtitles. The text should be aligned to the left only when a two-line subtitle covers two speakers (Karamitroglou 1998).

.2.1.3.2 Duration

According to Karamitroglou, the average reading speed for a text of average complexity (a mix of formal and informal language) ranges between 150-180 words per minute, i.e. between 2.5-3 words per second or 15-18 characters per second (cps). A full two-line subtitle consisting of 14-16 words should thus remain on the screen for approximately 5.5 seconds. A common practice is to add another quarter to half a second for the brain to start processing the subtitle. It is also important not to display the full two-line subtitle for more than 6 seconds. Otherwise, it may cause automatic re-reading of the subtitle by fast readers. If children’s programmes are subtitled and not revoiced as recommended, the subtitler has to take into account that the average reading speed of children (aged 6-14) is even lower, about 90-120 words per minute, and estimate the duration of the subtitles on screen accordingly.

For the full single-line subtitle the maximum duration advised by Karamitroglou is 3.5 seconds. The average reading speed for long and short subtitles differs, because people tend to read bigger bulks of text faster. The duration longer than 3.5 seconds could again make fast readers to re-read the subtitle. If there is a single-word subtitle, the recommended minimum time of projection ranges from 1 second (Díaz Cintas and Remael 2007) to 1.5 seconds (Karamitroglou 1998), however short or simple the word is, to avoid flashing subtitles.

Furthermore, there should be at least a 1/4 of a second gap between two consecutive subtitles, signaling the brain efficiently enough that there was a change of subtitle. When the preceding and the following subtitle are of the same length, the viewer might not otherwise perceive such change and ignore the new subtitle (Karamitroglou 1998).

Finally, the duration of subtitles should also respect the change of scene. They should disappear from the screen preferably before the shot changes and certainly by the time the scene changes, as the viewers’ attention tends to divert away from the subtitles to the new scene. However, this is not always possible, for example, when the camera cuts follow each other too quickly.

.2.1.3.3 Punctuation and Letter Case

Apart from their standard textual use, some punctuation marks and letter cases may also have other functions in subtitles.

The triple-dot punctuation mark (…), in Karamitroglou's opinion, should be used after the last character of a subtitle, when a sentence is not finished and continues over the next subtitle, and should also be inserted right before the first character of the subsequent subtitle. The viewer can thus assume the sentence is incomplete and expect a continuation of the sentence in the next subtitle. Pošta (2011) claims, however, that the trend in Czech subtitles does not require the use of triple-dot mark for this purpose, assuming that the absence of a full stop, question mark or exclamation mark at the end of a subtitle predicts continuation by itself. Also, with regard to Pravidla českého pravopisu, a Czech viewer expects a pause in speech or interruption when the triple-dot mark is used (Pošta 2011).

Dashes or hyphens are used before the first character of each of the lines of a two-line subtitle when the subtitle covers utterances of two speakers, namely a dialogue. The choice between dashes and hyphens, and whether to put a space after these marks depends on the target language preference.

Italics should be used to subtitle an off-screen source of a spoken text (e.g. when there is a voice of someone contemplating or narrating), for songs or when the voice comes from a TV, radio or telephone (Karamitroglou 1998).

Subtitles typed solely in upper-case, as Díaz Cintas and Remael (2007) advise, should not be used excessively, as capital letters are more difficult to read and occupy more space. Its uses are mainly limited to subtitling the title of the film or programme, signs, newspaper headlines, messages and banners that are written in upper case themselves.

Bold text, underline and parentheses should be completely avoided in subtitling (Karamitroglou 1998).

.2.1.3.4 Segmentation

When a sentence is too long for a single-line subtitle, it needs to be segmented into a two-line subtitle, distributing the words on each line. As Karamitroglou (1998) explains, the text should be then divided at its highest syntactic nodes possible (e.g. noun phrase + verb phrase), so that both segments are logically compact. The division, therefore, should never be between a noun and its article, in the middle of a compound, phrasal or reflexive verb, after a preposition or conjunction etc. Also, both lines of a two-line subtitle should be as equal in size as possible, since the reader is accustomed to reading text of a rectangular rather than a triangular shape. If both of these conditions cannot be met at the same time, syntax should be preferred over geometry.

.2.1.3.5 Omitting and Shortening

Some linguistic items of the original that do not contribute to the comprehension and appreciation of the target film as a whole can be omitted in the subtitles. These include padding expressions (e.g. well, you know, as I say) or responsive expressions recognized and comprehended by a majority of viewers (e.g. yes, no, ok, please, sorry, thank you) when clearly uttered. Omitting these items reduces the time required to read the subtitles and lets the viewers focus more on the visual part.

For the same reason, Karamitroglou (1998) also advises to shorten and simplify complex syntactic structures as long as a balance is kept between a) semantic aspects (maintaining the semantic load of the original), b) pragmatic aspects (maintaining the function of the original), and c) stylistics (maintaining the stylistics features of the original). He gives the following examples of subtitle shortening:

 Active for passive constructions

E.g. “It is believed by many people.”  “Many people believe.”

 Positive for negative expressions

E.g. “We went to a place we hadn’t been before.”  “We went to a new place.”

 Temporal prepositional phrases for subordinate clauses

E.g. “I’ll study when I finish watching this movie.”  “I’ll study after this movie.”

 Modified nouns for the referring relative clauses

E.g. “What I’d like is a cup of coffee.”  “I’d like a cup of coffee.”

 Straightforward question sentences for indicative pragmatic requests

E.g. “I would like to know if you are coming.”  “Are you coming?”

 Straightforward imperative sentences for indicative pragmatic requests

E.g. “I would like you to give me my keys back.”  “Give me my keys back.”

(Karamitroglou 1998).

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