Under/Over: subtitling the celebs

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About the client

VEON accelerates local data-based digital services to improve access and engagement for all. They provide essential communications and digital services to customers in ten countries, each with growing economies, populations and disposable incomes. They expand mobile network infrastructure, create customer engagement platforms and use technology to improve the customer experience and make support systems more efficient.

The project

Services:
Translation, Transcreation and Subtitling

Languages:
Russian, Ukrainian, Italian and many others

VSI London’s subtitling team worked with online giant VEON on a project entitled ‘Under/Over’, an interview series from Pitchfork and licensed by Conde Nast that prompts contemporary artists to have their say on randomly selected themes.

As one of the industry’s ‘Most Trusted Voices in Music’, it’s no surprise that the magazine’s distribution list is impressive, with viewers tuning in from across the globe to see their favourite celebrities discussing the important topics of our time. With subject matters ranging from memes to music, our team successfully translated, subtitled and delivered the content for a global audience.

Our approach

The first step was to translate the files into their respective languages which, on such a broad project, was no mean feat – we worked from English into Russian, Ukrainian and Italian, among many other languages. In addition to this, the informal and unconventional tone of the interviews meant that particular attention had to be paid to translate the individual nuances of each language – this is where transcreation came into play.

Transcreation not only transfers your message to another language but also takes into account the particularities of the target culture, thereby making it more applicable to the desired audience. Without transcreation, many of the series’ references and jokes would have been lost on global viewers.  

Once successfully translated, we were able to move onto the bulk of the project; the subtitles. The technical team were heavily involved throughout the entire process, delivering burnt-in subtitle files with consistently fast turnarounds – a challenging but interesting process.

With such a vast pool of in-house and freelance subtitlers, we were well equipped to deliver the requested files within VEON’s tight deadline, highlighting our ability to complete fast turnarounds at competitive prices.

Outcome

The VSI Group prides itself on its reputation, and we were pleased to work with our long-standing client VEON on this multi-language project. We would recommend you tune in to the offbeat series here: http://bit.ly/2oDAMNl