Standard Project News (jointly with Translation Teachers Association non-profit institution).
This is a reminder that Standards are of advisory nature and are based on the best practices of the top experts and colleagues from other organizations, including scholars abroad. There was made a list of committees. Staffing up is continued. To date the following topics are in progress (committees are burgeoning out):
Standards of subtitling for people with special cognitive needs / Easy reading standards / Audio-description (external reviewer and lead organization: Eurasian Subtitlers’ League – Subtitle Translators and Editors Association).
Summary description: By 2020-2030 the amount of services in this sphere will supposedly increase 20 times on the territory of the Russian Federation. The RF Government Decree valid from January 1, states that all the free-to-air and cable broadcasters are required to provide captioning service for deaf and hearing impaired people for television programs transmitted. According to experts, the existing Standard (GOST) has become obsolete and discords both international standards and test data. The need for a new standard is obvious. Pursuant to the globally-applicable classification, digital inclusion services are part of audio-visual translation.
Standards of subtitling for foreign vendors providing content for the Russian market and international subtitling standards for Russian vendors (external reviewer and lead organization: Eurasian Subtitlers’ League – Subtitle Translators and Editors Association)
Summary description: The aim of the committee is twofold. There are no written standards for subtitling and subtitle translation to be followed by broadcasting and streaming platforms on the territory of the Russian Federation. Those that exist, are empirical and were not actually tested with respect to manner of perceiving of various age groups under various conditions (cps, position, color and etc.). A closely related topic is making recommendations to a voice-over and dubbing standard.
However, following the adoption of the RF Government Decree on December 13, 2019 on Russian audio-visual content export promotion, preparation of standards for our broadcasters has become equally important.
Standards of professional training of audio-visual translators, subtitles and university professors (external reviewer and lead organization: Translation Teachers Association).
Summary description: To date professional training of audio-visual translators and subtitlers is not provided in the Russian Federation. Respectively, despite of vast employers’ demand and keen interest of students, there is no standard on professional training of audio-visual translators, subtitles and university professors in this sphere. Draft Professional Standard for translators already covers audio-visual translation. Hence, from 2020 this sphere of knowledge should also be accurately reflected in educational standards and university curricula. The committee is set up to address concerns and desires of employers regarding curricula, training and testing standards, as well as to review available practices of universities and institutions for supplementary education.
Standards of surtitling for opera and stage performances (external reviewer and lead organization: Eurasian Subtitlers’ League – Subtitle Translators and Editors Association).
Summary description: Currently, necessity of surtitles for opera and other musical stage performances elicits no debates due to herculean efforts of artistic directors and composes. However, surtitles created in situ fail to meet any standards or research findings, and often prevent comfortable watching of a performance. The purpose of this Standard is to shape a single approach based on experimental research of Russian and foreign academicians and experience of practitioners from the best drama and opera theatres of the Russian Federation.
Standards of subtitling for immersive environments (stereoscopic movies, virtual reality, augmented reality) (external reviewer and lead organization: Eurasian Subtitlers’ League – Subtitle Translators and Editors Association)
Summary description: Over the next 10 years the extent of content created with the help of cognitive immersive technology is supposed to increase 45-50 times. Explosion in this sphere is caused by uptake of 5g and Big Data technologies. According to Russian (V. Pyatin) and foreign researchers, human brain perceives and analyzes texts and subtitles, in particular, in immersive environment in a different way. Since the majority of educational experts consider training to be the major field of VR and AR application, a standard regulating translation and rendering of subtitles would significantly increase learning efficiency.
Standards of audio-visual educational programs’ subtitling (external reviewer and lead organization: Eurasian Subtitlers’ League – Subtitle Translators and Editors Association)
Summary description: Educational programs are one of the most complex and least-studied aspects of subtitling and audio-visual translation. They combine dense terminology, non-compressibility and subtitles’ transparency for viewer – the main requirement to any subtitles. However, there are studies to address these challenges. Moreover, research data demonstrates that Digital Natives born at the turn of the century perceive 80% of educational information as audio-visual content and not as printed texts. Hence, the importance of visual data carriers will continue to grow in teaching. A standard is required to prevent massively produced amateur and frankly speaking harmful presentations of educational content.
Standards of vertical subtitling for mobile devices.
Summary description: Watching video and audio-visual content on handheld devices resulted in emerging of a narrower vertically elongated frame size. It is half of a 4:3 picture and four times less than a 16:9 picture. The new frame dramatically changed requirements on readability and translation of the vertical subtitles. This sphere of scientific interest needs to be studied from the neurophysiology and translation point of view, followed by formulation of standards.