Video marketing is the most effective creative content. The English language is spoken by 25.3% of internet users worldwide. Translating your video content is then a great idea to reach 75 % of internet users. So, how can we translate videos?
First, ask yourself if the video is relevant for foreign markets. If the answer is positive, it’s time to translate!
There are two options to translate your video content:
– voice-over
– subtitling
In both cases, the first step is to transcribe video content, and translate it. Transcribing means converting data from an audio or video format into a written document format. Transcription has to be time coded, for synchronizing the voice over and subtitles.
Subtitles
Subtitles can be either burnt in, or produced as separated files. “Hard coding” or “burning-in” subtitles means taking the subtitle track and writing it into the video itself. The other way is to add files that contain subtitle information such as vtt, srt files…
These files include start and stop times, ensuring subtitles will be displayed at the right moment in your video. SRT and VTT files work on most social media sites that let you upload captions. You’ll also get huge SEO benefits adding files that contain subtitles to your video. Indeed, when you upload SRT or VTT files to platforms like Youtube, they’re indexed by Google.
Voice over
With voice over, the original script narrative is first translated, then recorded by a voice talent. Voice over is different to dubbing, which is the substitution of the original actors’ voices. With the UN style voice-over, the original dialogue can still be heard in the background.
Otherwise, the original audio is completely replaced by a newly recorded voice over translation. You will need a voice-over native artist for the recording, and a recording studio. You can also produce the audio with an artificial voice and text-to-speech synthesis.
Text-to-speech synthesis has made great strides over the course of the last few years.
