The shinwei thread

[shinwei]

Let's see, where to start.

I'm currently an undergrad at Caltech majoring in Applied Physics. I've taken a little bit of Japanese but most of my Japanese was learned from having a lot of exposure. I'm Chinese by birth and naturally am fluent in that language. I've also taken six years of Spanish and two years of Latin... but I'm really not too confident with my ability in either.


I've been in the manga community for a really long time, and I actually started off as an Editor for Mangadownloads (mangadownloads.org) editing Rurouni Kenshin back in 2002. I still edit here and there, but editing is really time consuming and translating is really fast.

In regards to my translations, I prioritize understandability over accuracy. This means I will often change lines to make them sound better in English if they just sound really bad from a more accurate translation. Whether you like that or not, its up to you - but in my opinion some lines are just so cheesy they really need to be changed.

Anyway, thanks for having me.

 

[xallisto]

In regards to my translations, I prioritize understandability over accuracy.

Thats my kinda guy

Nice to have you here shinwei.

 

[Gold Knight]

I can certainly understand the need to change the wordings sometimes for the English audience, literal translations can go only so far before you lose their attention.

Since you edited Rurouni Kenshin, what do you think of Viz's work on RK so far?

How did you get into One Piece?

And boy, Applied Physics sounds tough. Best of luck there. Thanks for your translations so far and hope to see more from you in the near future

 

[njt]

First off, thanks for joining and welcome to the site. I’m the webmaster and I appreciate any fellow translator that takes the time to join. The reason for this site is I felt that translations released and then scanlated and the translations being thrown away never to be looked at again was a waste to the translators hard work. So I decided to create a site where we can keep track of all old translations, and the translator can get thanked for their hard work.

I also wanted to make this site a place where other beginning translators could get some help either by seeing how other translators translated things, or asking a fellow translator directly.

For manga that doesn’t get the Japanese script written with it, I ask that the translator add the Japanese along with the translation (both for ease of cross referencing) and it’s just easier to catch simple mistakes that way. So with your translations, could you please write the Japanese along with it? (Just the kana, ro-maji isn’t necessary)

In regards to my translations, I prioritize understandability over accuracy. This means I will often change lines to make them sound better in English if they just sound really bad from a more accurate translation. Whether you like that or not, its up to you - but in my opinion some lines are just so cheesy they really need to be changed.

Anyway, thanks for having me.

Also regarding your comment on how you prioritize understandability, I believe that’s good up to a point, you can still keep the correct translation (that is being liberal) while still keeping the translation’s true meaning. However very bad mistakes happen when you either stray off too much, or take a guess at what something means (it’s better to openly say you don’t know what something means, than to go off an assumption, also saying you are not sure will make an easier for perhaps someone who does understand it to explain it to you, and you can both learn from it. As well as the rest of the audience gets a great translation.). So all I ask is to be honest and open minded, and add in some Japanese (if it’s too much of a burden say so and I’ll see that it’s done (either by me or someone else).

With that said, let me know if you have any questions or if there is any thing I can do to help you out (or feel free to ask the other mods/admins, all are really helpful just keep in mind, I’m the only one on the staff that knows Japanese^^. ) Ah, and on that note I’ve been translating for a little over a year now, lived in Japan for nearly 3 years, I took but failed the JLPT 1級 (got 54% ) and plan on taking it again this year . Anyways, !

 

[shinwei]

Since you edited Rurouni Kenshin, what do you think of Viz's work on RK so far?

I haven't seen Viz's work on RK. My English SJ subscription was only for one year and I was too lazy to renew it.

How did you get into One Piece?

At the time Mangadownloads only had two projects: RK and One Piece. Kenshin was my favorite manga at the time so I mainly edited that, but pretty soon I got sucked into One Piece too and wanted to edit it as well. Unfortunately Viz licensed it and the project was dropped before I got to edit it.

I started reading One Piece back when Mangascreener was the only group doing it though, but their really small Edited Mangas really didn't do it justice so I didn't get too into it (not to mention the fact that One Piece started off humble and then snowballed into the behemoth it is today). One day I decided to do some research on One Piece and I learned that the author, Oda Eiichiro was an assistant to Nobuhiro Watsuki during the Jinchuu Arc (which was my favorite arc). That was somewhat of a clincher for me.

Interesting tidbit: in Volume 19 Chapter 161 Page 54 of Rurouni Kenshin, you will see Sanosuke kick out a bomb from the fat puppet's belly. It has a Straw Hat mark on it, to commemorate the beginning of One Piece!

 

[njt]

Ah- also note that I'm reading OP right now, I borrowed volumes 1-40 from my wife's cousin . I'm currently on volume 14 I must say it really is a well done story . I like how Mr. 3 Talks....ガネ・・・　カネ・・・ I wonder how the english translation of that went.....

 

[Gold Knight]

Interesting tidbit: in Volume 19 Chapter 161 Page 54 of Rurouni Kenshin, you will see Sanosuke kick out a bomb from the fat puppet's belly. It has a Straw Hat mark on it, to commemorate the beginning of One Piece!

Yeah, I saw it right off the bat ;D I knew it was One Piece connected since I was an One Piece reader before I was a RK reader (due to my English SJ subscription).

 

[Galth]

From how many different and what specific manga have you translated chapters from? ( i've seen you all over the place on these forums )

 

[Leen]

Hi, welcome to this forum.

Applied physics seems to be too tough for me. I have always like physics but I am never good at it. Still hoping to improve and later get on to engineering. At least I think engineering wont be as tough as applied physics.

All right, question time.
Which country are you from since you are a chinese?
I am a chinese too. However, I have not write or read chinese in like 7 years time and so most of them, I have forgotten completely except for some basic characters. Where should I start if I want to re-learn my chinese back?

Thanks for your time.

 

[shinwei]

All right, question time.
Which country are you from since you are a chinese?
I am a chinese too. However, I have not write or read chinese in like 7 years time and so most of them, I have forgotten completely except for some basic characters. Where should I start if I want to re-learn my chinese back?

Its pretty much the same deal for me. I'm from China
My reading/writing skills in Chinese suck too, but I speak Chinese everyday with my family so I once I know how something is pronounced I can understand it. I'm also good at using the dictionary (www.zhongwen.com) so whenever I read stuff I can just look up the characters I don't know.

 

[shoked]

welcome to this forum and this translator section.

thats a good link (looks like i am collecting links..lol) and something that i noticed is your big signature and my questions are?

Did you use photoshop to make it? if answer is yes, it means that you have some skills on it so just wondering what other job have you do for mangas aside from translations?

also i would like to know what future project or what mangas get your interest and which kind of mangas are your favorite?

 

[Miso]

Welcome shinwei and many thanks for your translations !

I really enjoy reading yours as it's easily understandable. Plus, you translate one of my favourite mangas, One Piece.

Do you also watch anime?
If so, what media do you prefer? Are you more the anime or more the manga type?

 

[shinwei]

thats a good link (looks like i am collecting links..lol) and something that i noticed is your big signature and my questions are?

Did you use photoshop to make it? if answer is yes, it means that you have some skills on it so just wondering what other job have you do for mangas aside from translations?

also i would like to know what future project or what mangas get your interest and which kind of mangas are your favorite?

I think what your first question is asking me whether or not my sig is as big as your questions... in which case the answer is YES ^^

Yes I did use Photoshop to make my sig, and as I stated in my first post I started off as an Editor. However, whenever I edit manga I just can't bring myself to edit in an LQ fashion so it takes forever and gets really tedious. Translating is much faster and less tedious ^^

One Piece is definitely my favorite manga - and in my opinion is the deepest and most emotional manga that is currently running on Jump. I'm also translating D. Gray-man at the moment because there was a lot of begging going on for that to be translated, and one of my friends in real life thinks Linali is cute. That manga does seem kind of shallow though, but that's ok - Allen's arm is kickass.

I do enjoy Naruto and Bleach a lot, but in my opinion their quality has been waning lately - almost as if the mangaka are running out of ideas. I think it has to do with the pacing - if you introduce too many characters at once, their significance is decreased and it becomes harder to come up with new ideas for new characters to introduce later down the road.

In terms of the future, I don't think my skill with Kanji is good enough to translate manga outside of Jump at this point. Jump is really nice in that it gives the yomigana (pronunciation key) for all the Kanji in the text, so its easy for me to figure out how to pronounce them and look them up if necessary. However, that shouldn't be too much of a problem since Jump is so big!

I'm playing a game called Jump Superstars for the Nintendo DS at the moment and loving it - I just wish I knew more people who also owned it so we could play together. By playing that game, I was introduced to a hell of a lot of manga that I have never seen before. Such as: Pyuu to Fuku Jaguar, Katekyo Hitman Reborn!, and Gintama. The game also places a lot of emphasis on Bobobobo-bo-bobo, which seems a bit too silly for my tastes. Oh, and by the way, Gomu Gomu no Storm kicks serious butt in that game, and so does 6Block Naruto's Rasengan - it's crazy.

Do you also watch anime?
If so, what media do you prefer? Are you more the anime or more the manga type?

I'm definitely more the manga type, but I do watch anime. The (japanese) voice acting in One Piece is superb
I really hate what they did to it in the English dub. When will they understand..?

 

[Gold Knight]

I'm playing a game called Jump Superstars for the Nintendo DS at the moment and loving it - I just wish I knew more people who also owned it so we could play together. By playing that game, I was introduced to a hell of a lot of manga that I have never seen before. Such as: Pyuu to Fuku Jaguar, Katekyo Hitman Reborn!, and Gintama. The game also places a lot of emphasis on Bobobobo-bo-bobo, which seems a bit too silly for my tastes. Oh, and by the way, Gomu Gomu no Storm kicks serious butt in that game, and so does 6Block Naruto's Rasengan - it's crazy.

NJT is quite a big fan of that game. I'd love to play it... but of course I'd have to learn Japanese. Which I've always planned on learning, though, for various different reasons, but I never thought being able to play a game would be one of them XD

Anyway, I was surprised to see that you could translate Chinese too!!!

You're a very useful translator to have around

 

[shinwei]

NJT is quite a big fan of that game. I'd love to play it... but of course I'd have to learn Japanese. Which I've always planned on learning, though, for various different reasons, but I never thought being able to play a game would be one of them XD

You totally do not have to know Japanese to play that game. Just use GameFAQs and you willl know everything

 

[Gold Knight]

Well, NJT told me in order to unlock special characters you had to do some reading?

 

[shinwei]

Well, NJT told me in order to unlock special characters you had to do some reading?

Naww... just have to read GameFAQs. The only thing you really have to read are the names of the characters - you get used to those pretty quick cuz you'll see them a lot.

 

[Gold Knight]

Cool XD

Well, I'll look into it ^^