We provide World Class Audio, Translation and Language Services specifically designed for Multimedia and are uniquely positioned between the two worlds to deliver unprecedented quality and service.

Our twenty-seven years of experience give us the most important criteria needed to get your translation services project produced correctly… Perspective.

With perspective comes the ability to truly assess any translation or language services project and the ability to strategically apply the best professional processes and cost effective measures to produce your project correctly the first time.

Why is this important to you? Because you need a company that will always deliver a product you will be proud of. With LRS Recording you will never have to worry about jeopardizing your client relationship while working in a language you don’t understand.

HAVE YOU EVER HAD THESE CHALLENGES?
* Your clients wants you to provide the English media project you just finished in six languages and you have no idea how to get started?

Or you have actually tried this and had bad experiences with:
• Inaccurate translated scripts resulting in expensive production revisions and in some cases legal actions
• Scripts that do not conform to the correct timings to match the video
• Foreign language voice talent who are not native to the target country
• Foreign language voice talent that do not read well, speak clearly
• Poor audio quality
• Inconsistent audio levels
• Mouth noises
• Audio that is not RECORDED correctly to match the video causing a lot of post nightmares.
• Companies not being able to deliver on time
• Companies who low ball estimates only to up-charge the client after the project is completed.
• hours and hours of frustrating editing
• scheduling nightmares???

Well just like you, we’ve seen our share of these as well. Except we’ve experienced this because companies comes to us and ask us to help fix a project someone else could not deliver. They unfortunately fell victim to vendors who were not foreign language specialist and they did not deliver what they said they would.

Read More
Read More

HERE’S OUR STORY OF FINDING A SOLUTION:

Our surveys have told us that most media production companies who either try this themselves or outsource to the wrong company have had horrible experiences getting their media projects translated and produced into other languages.

We’ve always been curious as to why this happens so frequently. So we set out to address all of these issues. We started with using our system of checks and balances for a translation services project. We went through the entire sequence or process a typical video would go through. Then ask our clients who had bad experiences if they could let us know what their exact experiences were and how much of the processes were explained up front. So we wanted to know what the…

1. Initial project meeting or phone conversation and what that conversation contained.
2. What the qualification and proof of experience the vendor had for this type of work.
3. The process of how the translation gets done… what the qualification of the translator were…
and what checks and balances were in place to verify the accuracy of the translation.
4. What the strategies were going to be used for correct timings of the audio and how to best deal with the different aspects of the video when it came to… talking heads, narration only and multiple people on camera interacting with each other.
5. What the media was needed by the vendor
6. What the qualifications of the voice talent & bilingual producer were and if they were native to the target language
7. What the final deliver format needed to be
8. How the final delivered format was going to be implemented into the master video timeline by the client.
9. What support the client would get when they received the master format
10. What guarantees were giving by the vendor
11. What the revision process and cost were to do changes and fixes

HERE’ ARE THE RESULTS WE RECEIVED AND HOW WE HAVE HELPED OTHERS SINCE THEN.

What we found was that the vendors PRIMARY business was not in the translation and language services industry. They had media production abilities but lacked the experience and more importantly the PERSPECTIVE of working with the intricate nuances of the foreign languages themselves, did not have real access to experienced professional native voice talent and bilingual producers, and they lacked systems in place to assure quality and accuracy.

Some of the issues centered around the old way of producing language services for media work flows. The process included:

1. Working with timings per paragraph instead of actually working with the video in real time
2. Believing the biggest MYTH of translating a video project. Which is that the video will need to be lengthen or altered for each language once the vendor delivers the master audio back to the video house.
3. Did not use the original English audio in realtime so the bilingual voice talent could deliver the message with the correct feel and tone that is needed to get the proper representation of the project.
4. Scripts that were literally translated instead of being modified for a more “spoken word” or colloquial approach.
5. Using the old process of many multiple takes and then editing the selected takes later. This causes a lack of tonal continuity, speed changes and natural flow issues just to name a few. The correct way is to work linearly through a script in real time so the edit flows naturally from section to section and assures that the pitch and tone of the voice is the same at the end of the video as it is in the middle or beginning of the video.

These are just a few quick examples… there are more.

So here are the 8 steps we take based on our 27 years of experience.

1. INITIAL MEETING:
The client describes project and expectations they have for the final delivered project.
We respond with our questions and discuss target language countries and any specific needs that may need to be addressed as well as strategies on the most professional and most cost effective ways to approach the project. Every part of the process is then discussed so the client understands the entire process as well as what they are going to receive, timeline and format delivery options.

2. TRANSLATION:
Correctly formatted bilingual scripts are prepared in order to get a perfectly translated document. This is a two step process. First it is translated and then a second translator edits for timings.

TRANSLATION REVIEW:
This goes back to the client or an agreed 3rd part review process with a briefing on the special needs of this specific script and the art of timing a script to video. This collaborated effort assures the best possible translated script for production.

4. VOICE SELECTION & SCHEDULING:
Clients are then part of the voice selection process if they choose to do so. We have approximately 300 voice talent in 35 language on our secure FTP site to listen to.
Voice selections are made and schedules are assembled.

5. THE RECORDING SESSION:
Clients have the option of coming to the sessions or being patched into either an audio or video/audio feed to be apart of the session.
The recording session proceeds by working through the project in a linear fashion. Once this is done a review of the entire project is done and any fixes are recorded that may have been missed.

6. THE MASTERING PROCESS
The project is mastered and then verified by the bilingual producer before delivery to the client.

7. FINAL DELIVERY AND FOLLOW UP:
Final deliver is made and follow up is in place to assure that the client is comfortable with the delivered format. And a re-confirmation of re-addressing any issues they may have for FREE.

8. ONCE LAST VERIFICATION:
Once the client has mastered the final product they have the option of send it to our bilingual producer one last time before it is implemented.

IMPLEMENTING THE DO’S AND DON’TS
Here are the most common mistakes we see:

1. The client insist on supplying the translation for the audio scripts. This usually ends up with the translation being too long to fit the timings of the video. This causes costly delays and unnecessarily frustrating sessions. This is the true definition of ” A Penny Wise and A Dollar Foolish”. There intentions are good but even the best translators who do not have experience working with timings for multimedia have trouble translating these type of projects correctly.

2. The media production company has the belief that they will have to edit the video for each language to the new target language audio. This is no longer the case.

3. Video production is done without any thought of converting the project into multiple languages. Extremely fast paced English narrations become extremely difficult to keep up with in certain languages. Also there are colloquial English expression and jokes that simply do not translation easily or in some cases not at all. We have a program in place to help educate the video production companies on how to discuss this option at the original video production meetings.

4. In a effort to keep cost down the client insist that they only want one voice talent for everything. Technically this works but it does not represent the clients company in a very good light when played to the target audience. They often feels cheated and negative reactions happen.

So here’s what you need to do first…

Find a qualified, experienced and proven vendor. One that is truly a Foreign Language Specialist that only works in this field. One that their experiences have given them PERSPECTIVE which only time can do. With perspective comes a company that can truly assess ANY language services media project and strategically apply the correct professional and cost effective ways to produce your project. You need a company that will ALWAYS deliver a product that you will be proud of… so you never have to worry about jeopardizing your client relationship working in a language that you don’t understand.