• View
• Edit
• History
• Print

Timing

Timing refers to the process of matching lines of subtitles in a translated script to the original voice in the audio, so that the timed subtitle lines appear at the right point in the fansub. A person who engages in timing is called a timer, and their work allows typesetters and encoders to represent the translated script coherently in some digital form (i.e by previewing in VirtualDub? or some other video editing program) such that it can later be typesetted and encoded respectively.

Timing requires a timer to listen to the audio or identify easily identifiable syllables on a waveform to mark the start times and end times of each line in a script to a corresponding line in the audio. Currently, the popular timing format used by fansubbers is the SSA/ASS family of subtitles. There are three popular programs that can generate and edit these files:

• Sub Station Alpha
• Sabbu
• Aegisub

Timing is widely considered as the most boring and tedious task in the fansub process, but it can be satisfying and self-fulfilling in many ways, as it is also one of the quickest of all the jobs. A typical 25 minute episode can be timed on average in approximately 2-3 hours, or even as little as 20 minutes by an experienced timer.

Scene Timing

The concept of scene timing was first conceived by anime fansubbers sometime in 2003. As digital fansubbing progressed, timers became more exacting about the precision of matching subtitles not only with respect to the audio, but also to the switching, changing, or panning of visual scenes. Timers now believe that a scene-timed fansub better matches the flow of not only the voice but the animation. As such, this has led them to emphasize two characteristics of timing, both of which are now considered errors. These two errors are known as:

• Scene bleed
• Strobing

Scene bleed (or timing bleed) refers to a subtitle whose marked end time fails to disappear quickly enough, remaining on screen long after a scene change or after a character has spoken. This is now considered by fansubbers and leechers as a very noticeable and annoying feature that can only be remedied through scene timing, either by the timer or the typesetter, so as to "debleed" the subtitles.

Strobing refers to two subtitles that are timed very close together, and yet have a small gap between their start and end times, resulting in subtitles momentarily flickering between each line's appearence. In general, this is less of an issue with timers and a majority of fansub groups, but most timers have learned to adopt chain timing, where subtitles with a time gap of less than 35ms between each other have their start and end times joined together so that subtitles are consistently on screen and make a smooth transition to the next subtitled line.

While these "errors" were commonplace in VHS fansubs due to the difficulty of correcting mistakes in analog equipment, more and more timers in digital fansubs today now adopt the practice of scene timing to avoid such "mistakes." Scene timing will require more effort on part of the timer, but many modern fansubbing tools such as Sabbu or Aegisub now inherently support scene timing by loading the scene changes into the time line.

Karaoke Timing

Karaoke Timing is basically an intense version of timing, whereby the timer is not timing long sentences, but individual syllables in song lyrics, usually from the accompanying opening and ending themes of a typical anime series. While the timing process now requires more precision, it sometimes consists of actually very little work, since most songs in its entirety only request timings for 8-10 lines, or 90 seconds worth of lyrics. Most timers who work with karaoke also are typesetters as well, and may use various karaoke programs to create computer-generated karaoke effects.

Related Links

The Art of Timing - An in-depth guide to fansub timing.