TV animation series for 8-11 year olds: Polinopolis
The What
My role: Spanish to English Translator
Client: Mago Audiovisual Production company
Challenge: Maintaining voice and tone consistency across 52 episodes with numerous characters and different end users
Key terms: creative translation, voice and tone, documentation
Tools: FinalDraft for scriptwriting, CafeTran for translation, Notion for documentation
👋 Say hi to Polinopolis’ favourite duo!
One is a kind-hearted vegan forest spirit.
The other is an 11 year old boy who loves pizza and computer games.
And guess what? They don't speak the same!
Each character needed its own voice and tone guide in this imaginative series.
The How
Solution:
I used a computer-aided translation (CAT) tool for repetitions of single units such as character names, place names, onomatopoeias and technical terminology.
For longer phrases or variances in repetitions, such as catchphrases, jokes or songs (yes, I also translated these), I needed something better.
I received a new episode to translate every week for a year. This meant I had the time to gradually build up my own information documentation system using a database on Notion.
I created different headings and categories so it was easy to search and filter results, and made regular modifications and updates to make sure it was relevant and useful.
The lesson:
Documentation is key to consistency and working efficiently.
My only regret? That I didn’t start one sooner.
Want to read more about translating for kids? Check out my blog on ‘How I translate for younger audiences’.