Angie Kim : Midterm Portfolio – #1 Captions

Project Description:

The project is about improving subtitles for a scene of a movie (Old Boy, 2003) to make them more than just a way for people with disabilities to access content, but also as a means to enhance the story-telling in today’s media with creative input.

Documentation:

Transcript:

WooJin: Still haven’t figured it out? Bringing a complete stranger home..

(Woojin giggles)

WooJin: We hypnotized you both

Luckily you both were highly receptive compared to average people. Isn’t it fun?

One word gets you pregnant, one word gets you in love.

But no matter how much you two are receptive to hypnosis, getting people to fall in love isn’t easy.

So do you know what we did?

To the man who says those words, Mido was to perform a certain action.

When she grabs you hand, your reaction was to be, of course…

Your true mistake was not failing to find the answer.

You kept asking the wrong question, so how could you find the answer?

It’s not “Why did Lee Woo-Jin lock me up?”, (Annoyed) It’s “Why did he let me go?

(Relaxed) Once again, Why did Lee Woo-Jin release Oh Dae-su after just fifteen years, right?

 

Reflection questions: 

Why This Scene?

This selection is from one of my favorite movies, Old Boy(2003).

I chose this movie for several reasons:

– First, it’s not in English, which means non-Korean speakers would need to read the subtitles. It can be challenging to catch all the nuances through audio alone.
– Second, it has a fantastic soundtrack that really helps the viewer immerse themselves in the scene. I was curious about how I could convey this through captions.
– Third, it includes a variety of shots such as people talking, narrating, and transitioning between past and present.
– Lastly, it’s highly emotional and tense, which adds to its appeal.

What is the theme of the work? What is it you aim to express?

The project is about improving subtitles to make them more than just a way for people with disabilities to access content, but also as a means to enhance the story-telling in today’s media with creative input.

How is that theme particularly expressed through the modality of the week?

– Take small steps to create expressive captions that provide more than just dialogue information.
– Attempt to differentiate the captions for the actor’s voice, sound effects, and background music.
– Strive to establish a hierarchy of information among captions through their placement.

Which elements of the work are beautifully/wonderfully/perfectly expressed through the modality?

For me, the most satisfying aspect was creating the sound effects. I drew inspiration from comics and animations, trying to adapt their visual methods for expressing sounds.

– I discovered an interesting free and open-source tool called ‘Aegisub’, which is widely used for *fansubbing*.

What is fansubbing?

Fansubbing refers to the practice of creating unofficial, fan-made subtitles for media content, often for content that has not yet been officially translated. It is generally done by passionate fans who want to share the content with a broader audience. They often use creative typography and text effects to capture nuances in the dialogue and the overall mood of the scene.

(Links for docs of the software and an example usage)

[Aegisub Docs](https://aegisub.org/docs/)

[When fansubs go above and beyond – (Nisekoi)](https://www.reddit.com/r/anime/comments/hb2d3v/when_fansubs_go_above_and_beyond_nisekoi/)

The guidebook of the program is more of a technical guide on how to use a program, it features quite a lot of techniques.

[Typesetting in Aegisub](https://unanimated.github.io/ts/index.htm)

—

Where do the text and image rub up against each other in your assignment?

There’s a friction between the need to provide information and the risk of overloading the viewer with too much text. In certain scenes, the dialogue, sound effects, and background music all compete for space, creating a crowded visual experience.

Where do you find tension or curiosity?

The exploration of how colors, sizes and fonts can influence the mood and tone of a scene was fascinating. However, certain expressions like sarcasm or humor was challenging to convey through typeface/size alone.

Which elements are lost or inexpressible through the modality of the week?

While the modality allows for the representation of dialogue and some sound effects, it falls short in capturing the full range of non-verbal cues, such as tones, nuances, speed of speech and background music.

Additional Modality: 

People with lower vision or hearing may find it difficult due to the small font size.

Moreover, the high amount of text on a single screen, coupled with rapid scene changes, requires a high level of text and image literacy.

This movie utilizes a significant amount of mise-en-scene with colors, particularly red and green.

People with red-green color blindness might miss visual cues that provide deeper meaning and connections between scenes.

Additionally, I chose not to go bold with background music captions.

I aim to provide more cues for the background music because it has a significant influence on setting the mood for the viewers.

– But maybe too much text? I need to think about creative and effective ways with people!