Scanlation troubles.

BatDan

What I'm going to tell you is very odd but, I'm going to try to retranslate all the scanlations (I've noticed that even Null's scripts have inaccuricies.) Now, I don't know Japanese and I'm not planning to scan the tankos I have. I'm planning to take the pages on Stoptazmo or the MSN groups and then put them in a program and try to find a way to re-translate.

Like I said, I don't know Japanese and if I use a translation from Stephan, Ocean, or Ooshi. Then they'll find me, kill me, and rape my remains. So, I'm going to need all the help I can get. If someone does the translations, I'll use Paint to replace the current dialogue and type it up. But should I use Photoshop instead? Which I don't have by the way.

So, what do you think?

Expects people to turn down my idea and say "go to hell you sick bastard, live with the current scans and don't bitch about it."

Bounty1Berry

I'd bet you could go pretty far without having to do any "translation"– just rephrasing the existing scanlated pages with cleaner grammar, better word choices, and correct names.

Paint only saves as BMP. For efficiency's sake, a format like PNG, GIF, or JPEG is preferrable. JPEG being lossy, so it's less than ideal.

It might be interesting to try and convert the images to black-and-white instead of greyscale or true colour if applicable; mostly they're originally drawn that way and it might shrink file sizes.

My old Patty sig was a scan from a volume I owned, and using the "2color" filter in Pixia, with a pretty high threshold, you can convert to pure B&W pretty well. Pixia doesn't handle text that well, so I can't really reccomend it. Try the GIMP? It probably has a similar filter.

BatDan

Have you read the early scans B1B? I just reread 126 (Instinct) and you can definatly tell the translation sucks. Zoro's Yaki Onigiri was changed to "Killing Evil Fire Swords," Usopp's attacks have changed. The biggest offense was when Sanji at the end of the chapter picked up a Den Den Mushi (which was changed to Bug Phone) and instead of saying "This is the shitty restaurant" he says it's just a restaurant. It's not the excluding of the language it's the fact that a famous quote was translated wrong.

Sandai Mera

I really would want to see decent quality scans of the Buggy Arc

Polygon

What program will you use?

BatDan

@Octogon:

What program will you use?

Would Photoshop work? Because I have to buy it, and I don't think MS Paint will do me justice. What other programs are good?

I was reading some of the Buggy arc. The first chapter was okay but after that it was Baki-sama.

warp

the translations are pretty good when it comes to text it just seems that the names our off why dont u just change the names to the right 1.

oh wait isnt that like stealing

edit itd be also cool if u guys could translate the sbs

Polygon

@BatDan:

Would Photoshop work? Because I have to buy it, and I don't think MS Paint will do me justice. What other programs are good?

I was reading some of the Buggy arc. The first chapter was okay but after that it was Baki-sama.

PhotoShop and/or Gimp should work. But how are you gonna do the translations?

BatDan

@Octogon:

PhotoShop and/or Gimp should work. But how are you gonna do the translations?

That's still I problem I need to figure out. My only hope is to pay someone to translate for me, or learn Japanese which will take forever and I want to help the commuinity out right now.

Carly

Meh. Part of the reason that the old stuff needs to be redone is in part to somewhat bad translation, but also because the scans are really LQ.

I mean – I translate what I want to for OP (such as Red/Blue) but that's because I've got quality stuff to LOOK at while I'm doing it, so I don't misread say 間　for 聞　or something. And you know, translators aren't stupid; if you just rephrase what they've given for the chapter it's practically the same as ripping them off anyway. Even then some lines are just undoubtedly the same any way you slice it.

But seeing as how I was helping you out find online resources for learning Japanese... you are pretty much SOL for doing it on your own :p Get someone who's good with the language at least.

Bounty1Berry

@BatDan:

Have you read the early scans B1B? I just reread 126 (Instinct) and you can definatly tell the translation sucks. Zoro's Yaki Onigiri was changed to "Killing Evil Fire Swords," Usopp's attacks have changed. The biggest offense was when Sanji at the end of the chapter picked up a Den Den Mushi (which was changed to Bug Phone) and instead of saying "This is the shitty restaurant" he says it's just a restaurant. It's not the excluding of the language it's the fact that a famous quote was translated wrong.

Well, it's sort of the point. We know from seeing good fansubs and translations what we expect to see in those balloons. That's why they look weird now. We can probably piece together the big ones from memory– things like "This is the crappy restaurant" or "Tell them to eat shit", and the little ones, we can draw from the original scanlations sent through a quality-checking.

oceanizer

@Bounty1Berry:

Paint only saves as BMP.

Paint does save in jpg and other formats on Win XP even though quality is low. Just letting you know :P

I've been contacted several times in the past (maybe from 10 different groups) asking if I want to join them (or cooperate them or whatever) to create better scanlations. I even remember somebody from #arlong-park @ rizon asked me if I want to scanlate One Piece with them.

… Better way for you to do it is to contact Null and ask them if they want to rerelease earlier chapters. Assuming by your post, you have absolutely no knowledge of producing scanlation and let me tell you, it is hard for a total beginner to produce a quality scanlation.

Oh, but contact them only if you have good translation, please.

BatDan

Well, how am I going to translate it Ocean? I said I don't know Japanese and I don't have a very good scanner either. Plus, I don't want to spend a ton of money buying online to get all 38 volumes.

You know, why is it I try to think of the well being of One Piece and I just fuck everything up.

Carly

No, you didn't fuck up anything ! :laugh: It's just that we're not sure if you really realize how much work has to go into producing quality scanlations. It's about… 20-23 volumes that would need to be rescanned/retranslated, and that's a ton of work, especially when it takes a while to do each chapter anyway. If you've got a quick translator it's not so bad but you've also got to fix pages, typeset, etc.

oceanizer

BatDan, that's why maybe you should wait until you can actually offer something. Whether it'd be scanning, translating, proofreading, or editting, all requires skill and if you're a beginner, you'll need some guidance from somebody.

For example, me, if I like the series and if that series is not licensed in N.A., I won't mind buying the Tanko, debind them, and scan them. I know I can offer translation and I can offer guidance to Photoshopping and QCing. (Basically I can do decent job on everything but proofreading.) But I gained those knowledge after staying with a scanlation group and heavily involved with it for certain amount of time.

Most of scanlation groups have their own way to scanlate stuff, that's why I recommended to join one of them and get some knowledge, then start thinking of making on your own.

If you have nothing to offer… ... what will people gain from helping you? :(

BatDan

Where can I join these "groups" so that I may learn?
What do you mean by "debind" do you actually take the tanko and rip the spine off?

Of course, what I want to do is the perfect scanlation. My OCD mind can't take the fact that no one notices the Kana for "no" in Luffy's attacks. Just "Gomu Gomu."

I'll use actually Japanese tankos and not Chinese or Korean where the translation would then suck (I reread some Alabasta and they called Pell "Bere")

oceanizer

Yup I melt the glue by microwaving or ironing and take pages apart. That way, the scan will look good. Maybe you wonder if I can still read those in bookform… I can, since I buy two copies :x

For what group... You might want to practice a little before joining any group since... There are already bunch of people who knows how to use Photoshop. They'd rather take somebody who already knows basic Photoshopping than a total newbie :/

Bounty1Berry

This post is deleted!

Shylu

Just giving a heads up, if you're looking for good scans, there is a torrent for OP manga v1-38 at Tokyotosho. But like Ocean said, it's very hard to make quality scanlations for beginners. Even putting in the words take so much time and effort.

BatDan

So, how much does Photoshop cost? I don't mean the cheap version, I mean the good version. Also, where can I get good Photoshop guides?

warp

my computer lab teacher says like 50 dollars, but then agian thats her so yeah..

Polygon

@BatDan:

So, how much does Photoshop cost? I don't mean the cheap version, I mean the good version. Also, where can I get good Photoshop guides?

You can get photoshop free from torrent sites, but it's easier to get gimp then to buy photoshop.

oceanizer

http://store.adobe.com/store/products/master.jhtml?id=catPhotoshop
I don't know how much the student version cost… (Is it even offered?)

KatanaJon1.1

Yup I melt the glue by microwaving or ironing and take pages apart. That way, the scan will look good. Maybe you wonder if I can still read those in bookform… I can, since I buy two copies :x

I find the mental image of manga in a microwave amusing.

op74

I just use Paint to make my copies better . I use what this person and that person said to make one just for me .

oceanizer

@KatanaJon1.1:

I find the mental image of manga in a microwave amusing.

My housemates love it. Don't microwave too long though. 10 seconds, flip, another 15 seconds is enough.

xD!

Bounty1Berry

I bet you get exciting results if they have like metallic print (like it seems the English volumes have the logos done in metallic ink)

StrawHatLuffy

@BatDan:

So, how much does Photoshop cost? I don't mean the cheap version, I mean the good version. Also, where can I get good Photoshop guides?

…. It costs about a thousand Singapore dollar if I am not wrong. Work it out to USD.

Link: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B00081I76A/qid=1128753762/sr=8-2/ref=pd_bbs_2/102-9668293-7062564?v=glance&s=software&n=507846

BatDan

@StrawHatLuffy:

…. It costs about a thousand Singapore dollar if I am not wrong. Work it out to USD.

Link: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B00081I76A/qid=1128753762/sr=8-2/ref=pd_bbs_2/102-9668293-7062564?v=glance&s=software&n=507846

According to the website you showed me. It's $556.99 in USD. To rich for my blood but I'll find a way to earn it. But if my Japanese lessons keep going well, then I don't need the scanlations anymore.

But if I help the people who can't speak Japanese who want to read the scans, then I'll start photoshoppinng and translating.

I live in a fucking dream world.

Jaquejo

Batdan, lots of this people in this thread have mentioned it already, but you haven't seemed to have noticed. There is a free program called the GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program) that has something like 95% of the functionality of Photoshop. Visit www.gimp.org.

Bounty1Berry

The thing is that you don't need anything as big as Photoshop or GIMP to do scanlations. You're erasing small circles and squares, and typing black text in it.

The GIMP text tool is decent, and it totals about 10Mb– a couple hours on a 44k dialup from hell. BUT it has its own user interface and a bit of a learning curve. Again, you're not doing anything demanding, though, so I'd bet you can reach an ample level of workability in an evening.

Carly

GIMP ? A learning curve ? The only thing you have to get used to is right-clicking for menus and that's ridiculously useful…

Shylu

@Carly:

GIMP ? A learning curve ? The only thing you have to get used to is right-clicking for menus and that's ridiculously useful…

If you're switching from Photoshop to GIMP, the different menu names can be quite confusing at first. I think it's easier to learn GIMP from scratch rather than switching.:sleep:

oceanizer

@Bounty1Berry:

The thing is that you don't need anything as big as Photoshop or GIMP to do scanlations. You're erasing small circles and squares, and typing black text in it.

That won't make a "quality" scanlation though :/

Konis

Most of the current Null stuff is reasonable accurate. Is it perfect? No. But for the most part it's readable and at least close enough to convey what's going on..

Now, is your problem with the translation or the quality of the scans? If you say quality of scans, you better mean stuff before 233.. because I work my ASS off to make those pages look decent.

Also, if you take the pages off MSN.. you'll be taking mostly NULL pages, pages that I, and people who work with me, have done our damnedest to make at least presentable. By taking the pages off MSN (unless you intend to take the raws, which will require many MANY countless hours to clean) you will be stealing my hard work.

Unless you plan to retranslate and edit all the pages yourself (and from the sound of it, it seems you don't really have the skill to do either) it doesn't seem like you should be undertaking such a huge task.

Do I seem angry? You're damn right I am. I'm sick to fricking death of Null being in the shadow of EVERY TRANSLATOR OUT THERE! People who don't even know how to read Japanese are more than happy to say we're inaccurate… and that pisses me off. Hell, we get blamed for bad translations that were done before Null was even working on One Piece!

I'm angry, and I'm offended.

PS - If you take Null's stuff, erase our dialogue, and put in your own... I will do to you what you think Stephen and the others would do to you if you stole their scripts. =P

Jaquejo

Konis, while I understand your indignation, I think you should take some time to realise that those scanlations are not your property. They legally belong to Oda and his publishers. Please understand that before you get too wrapped up in your own indignation. Now, I'm not defending using anyone else's cleaning or translating work without their permission. But understand that you are basically doing the same thing to Oda when you release with NULL. We tolerate you doing it because we love it and want to read and understand it as much as you do.

PS - Thanks for being part of a great team that lets me read One Piece.

Seta Ginny

If you have such a problem with the early scanslations…why don't you just BUY the manga? High quality, no typos, fairly accurate translations, you don't have to read it off the computer screen - AND IT'S LEGAL. Plus, they haven't been censoring, despite the Zoro/Zolo thing (which was changed because they had a lawsuit from Disney waved in their face - not because of any censorship issues.) I'm extremely fussy with my manga, and I don't mind reading the english volumes.

If you're still gungho about scanslating, why don't you buy the original tankabons, scan them, and translate them yourself? Rip off Viz's translation if you have to...but don't get the people who give us the scripts every week in trouble.

I see scanslations as a way to get a look at chapters I can't read in English. I think null does a really good job at that. I don't NEED perfect scanslations, because scanslations aren't supposed to be something you cherish and hold forever - they're bootlegs to get you through until you have access to the real thing. And Null's recent work is pretty damn high quality, in fact, it's rather spoiling when you look at other scanslators out there (not necessarily for One Piece, but for other series.)

I think your heart is in the right place on this. But I also think it's rather unnecessary, and as others have pointed out...a tremendous amount of training and work, for something not really needed in the first place.

Konis

@Jaquejo:

Konis, while I understand your indignation, I think you should take some time to realise that those scanlations are not your property. They legally belong to Oda and his publishers. Please understand that before you get too wrapped up in your own indignation. Now, I'm not defending using anyone else's cleaning or translating work without their permission. But understand that you are basically doing the same thing to Oda when you release with NULL. We tolerate you doing it because we love it and want to read and understand it as much as you do.

PS - Thanks for being part of a great team that lets me read One Piece.

The scanlations are NOT my property. The manga is NOT my property The time and effort I put in to making them clean and readable… THAT'S my property. You clearly inderstand that the thing that angers me most is the thought of someone taking the hard work Null has done and just slapping their own text into it, why even say the rest? I have every right to be indignant about that. I've surrendered 15 - 20 hours or more of my life to this manga every week for over 50 chapters... the thanks any of us get is often someone whining about how horrible we are... often people who don't even read the scanlation, because the scripts are "So much better".

What you're saying is I have no more right to tell someone not to use my editing than Stephen, Ooshi, or Ocean have any right to say don't use their translations. Is that what you believe?

The "wrapped up in my own indignation" comment was unwarrented. For as long as I've been doing this, I've put up with a lot of crap with very few times I've said anything about it. But when someone makes noises that they want to take "Null's inacurate work" and just erase out the text, replacing it with their own... you're damn right I have something to say. The translation isn't the only work that goes into a scanlation... the cleaning is very tme consuming as well.

I love One Piece, and I want the scanlation to be as readable and at least close to the intent as it can be within my power. I don't do it for "fame", 'cuz there sure as hell isn't any. I don't do it for money, my 15 - 20 hours a week is free. I don't even do it for respect, because there aren't many that give that to Null (Though I am thankful to those that do). I do it because I LOVE ONE PIECE.

GoAnderson

For what it's worth, Konis, I think you guys've been doing a great job. I know you don't have to do it – you do it out of love of OP, right? That's truly respectable.

You've got my well-wishes, all. Please, keep it up.

To those of you who hate NULL... Why? Their scripts are accurate, they're clean, they just feel good... So, why the hatin'? That ain't be cool, y'all.

... 'r somethin'. O_o

Mog

Curious: When has anyone said they hated NULL? To my knowledge, all complaints have been directed towards the earlier chapters on the MSN site, only a few of which are NULL's.

And let's face it, NULL's earlier One Piece release were, in fact, crap.

oceanizer

Konis, don't worry about it too much. I don't think there are any accurate enough J->E translator who is willing to scanlate what is already published in English ~.~ (Kind of waste of time?)

I mean, if somebody is to start scanlating it now from v1, probably his/her progress won't be fast enough to beat VIZ's progress.

And yeah, editting takes much more time than translating. I could translate one chapter in about the same amount of time I spend editting one or two pages of magazine scan. ~.~

Phlemingo

Oh yes Konis, I am unknown but please let it be known that you are supported. I remember back when Arlong Park's main site was still up and there always were people complaining about Null's scanlations in the comments, I'd always say something about appreciating it and that they had a bad reputation before, but now, it's very good in fact.

Most people that complain about this are usually jumping on the bandwagon. Sure, I don't think it's perfect, I disagree ALOT with some of the dialogue too. But I don't bitch about it, because it's only proper to appreciate what you get… what's more for free.

Also please note that I do not wish to bash, but I have been following this topic with disbelief because 1) He who has a life shall not excavate archaeological manga to scanlate for not much reason and 2) He that is unable to do should not criticise.

booya.

Kalei

I've been wanting to re-text certain scans for my own personal use actually. A lot of times Null's trans' are inaccurate and the names they use are… well some of them I just don't like. One of the most annoying things being this:

Lucchi.

Lucci already sounds correct, they didn't need to add the "h" in there. Come on, guys. Gucci. Lucci. Same pronnunciation.

Edit: You know I love ya, Conis xD Don't take this personally.

Ubiq

@Seta:

Plus, they haven't been censoring, despite the Zoro/Zolo thing (which was changed because they had a lawsuit from Disney waved in their face - not because of any censorship issues.)

God, no many how many times I try to kill this, it keeps clawing it's way back up from Hell.

Once again, Disney does not own the Zorro trademark; if you'll notice, the two Antonio Banderas films were made by Sony, not Disney. The New Zorro series from the early 1990s was made by New World Television, not Disney. The trademark belongs to Zorro Productions.

Had Shueisha wanted to trademark Roronoa Zoro, then they could have done so. The burden of proof for a trademark violation would have been on Zorro Productions and it's hard to believe that their case would be considered credible by any sane judge.

The more likely case is that they deliberately chose that spelling for marketing purposes and the name was dictated by the dub; why else trademark all of the major characters names only months after the dub came out after not bothering to do so in the two previous years?

Greg

BatDan, didn't you propose this months ago and get shot down then too?

More than anything I think the big question is, what's the point?

Sure go ahead and do it. Who gives a crap so long a it's your original work. But….there's HOW many translations of OP chapters floating around these days? Just at the boards are drowning in them not to mention the archived stuff like stephen's near-Bible and null as a reliable source.

I'm not gonna bitch you out for wanting to try, no one should because you're a kid trying to do good, but if you wanna make a name for yourself the best thing to do is that which hasn't been done and do it better than anyone could. That makes you a legend.

sabret00the

heh amusing thread, i have to say NULL really bought forth a level of pride in me for reading/collecting the manga so i think you Konis and all your colleges.

to the guy that started teh thread, while i feel like your hearts in the right place, your plan of action is wrong, no matter what you have to understand that people come here and put alot of effort into their works JUST so this community can strive, without people like Saiyaman, Maplesnow, Kaizoku-Fansubs, Gerusama Fansubs, BALF, NULL, Ooshi and/or oceanizer this community couldn't exist in the first place, making blanketed statements isn't the way to go.

Now the thing that i completely agree with Konis about is that someone who cannot speak or read japanese coming in and talking about inaccuracies is beyond reason. alot of translation from J->E is about interpretation and who's to say that whoever you seem to be fishing to aquire will be better at it?

I've fought to myself many times, it would be so good to join a fansub group, i actually know what i'd wanna be a timer, but i'm not gonna come and talk down about everyone else in my bid to acheive it. humility will take you a long way and what seems to be a 2 page thread could've been a quite convo with Konis as you told her what inaccuracies their were in her work so she could correct and re-release, you never know you could've even ended up being hired as a QC guy.

The idea of wanting to start a scanlation group with neither having raws, photoshop, psp and/or translation skills is ludicrous. don't get me wrong i find the idea just as ludicrous that neither Ooshi or oceanizer seem to want to join or allow their work to be used for scanlations but yours is more so, i say if you got such a problem with it, buy it and leave it at that.

Kinai

@Bounty1Berry:

Paint only saves as BMP.

What Paint?? The one that I have with Windows XP have a lot more options. The preselected is bmp, but there are other. For example: JPG.

Kinai.

oceanizer

Probably he's on 2000.