A Labor of Love: Movie Translation for The Last Lecture

[nocturnalK]

Dear All,

I'm going to be corny and frank about this. There is a very uplifting video called The Last Lecture featuring Randy Pausch. Some or many of you may have watched this movie, and if you have not, then I would highly recommend it to you. Here is the link:

I have been searching for a version of this video with Thai subtitles. I and my Thai friend can not find any. I believe a translation currently does not exist.

I would like to have the movie translated for two reasons:

1. There is a girl I really admire who would love this film. She is my best friend in Thailand, and I think the world of her. I'd like to have this movie translated for her as a parting gift.

2. I believe this video would simply be great for the Thai youth. I'd like for young people in Thailand to have access to this. If you have seen the video, it will be easy to understand why.

My plan is to:

1. Get a Thai translation of the video

2. Create a subtitle file

3. Encode the video

4. Upload it to YouTube for everyone to see and share.

I need help with step 1 for sure. Do any of you know someone that can do this type of translation? Who makes Thai subtitles for foreign films? Maybe they would be interested in doing this. I am sure it will have a positive impact on at least 100 hundred people. Just see the view count on YouTube as is.

If there is anything information or anything you can do to help me out, please let me know.

[nocturnalK]

I have looked into making a subtitle request at opensubtitles.org. In order to do so, a listing on imdb.com is required. Currently, there is not a listing. I have submitted a request to have the title added. If the title is accepted, I can put in a request at opensubtitles.org for the film to be translated.

If that is successful, I will be asking the community to support the request as high-demand requests have a greater likelihood of being worked on.

I am still searching for other ways to get this properly translated, and I have an English transcript to work with.

[WhizBang]

The simplest way to approach this would be to enlist the help of a Thai friend who was fluent in English and use a program like Subtitle Edit to create your subtitles.

Could also consider a voice over second audio track in spoken Thai and add that to the original video file.

In either case, mkvmergeGUI (part of MKVToolNix) will allow the merging of both subtitles and audio tracks without the need to re-encode the video.

Both MKVToolNix and SubTitle Edit are free by the way.

[nocturnalK]

The simplest way to approach this would be to enlist the help of a Thai friend who was fluent in English and use a program like Subtitle Edit to create your subtitles.

Could also consider a voice over second audio track in spoken Thai and add that to the original video file.

In either case, mkvmergeGUI (part of MKVToolNix) will allow the merging of both subtitles and audio tracks without the need to re-encode the video.

Both MKVToolNix and SubTitle Edit are free by the way.

Thanks for the info on the tools.

My Thai friends have a basic understanding of English. None are fluent enough to be able to translate this properly. Does anyone have a Thai friend I can borrow? I'm in the Chiang Mai area and am willing to compensate.

I'm going to look into document translation services. Considering I have the script, this could be a reasonable path. Can anyone recommend a good translator or translation service? I don't have much money to put into this, but I'd like to at least get a ballpark figure. I will begin perusing through the forums to look for one.

[casualbiker]

Dunno if this helps : http://m.sanook.com/m/clipvideo_view/?vdo_name_t=The+last+lecture+thai+subtitle&smi_nickname=lattebrownie&embed_url=http%3A%2F%2Fvideo.sanook.com%2Fembed%2Fplayer%2F385845&vdo_type=ไทย&display_date=22+ก.ย.+51+13.53+น.&source=ไทย

[Tywais]

My Thai friends have a basic understanding of English. None are fluent enough to be able to translate this properly. Does anyone have a Thai friend I can borrow? I'm in the Chiang Mai area and am willing to compensate.

Might try the Chiang Mai University Fine Arts department as I believe they do film work also and may find a student interested in it as a project.

http://culture360.asef.org/organisation/chiang-mai-university-faculty-of-fine-arts-gallery/

//edit - looks like casualbiker may have found the solution.

[nocturnalK]

I've looked at Casualbike's video. The two are on the same lecture, but the quality and impact is far from the same. I have enlisted a Thai friend to help. I will see how far we can get with this.

Keep the advice coming