|
|
|
|
Q3.
What information should go on the back of
the business card?
Q4. My customer only wants his name in Korean on the front side, is that
okay?
Q5.
What will the Asian side of my business
card look like?
Q6.
The person is Chinese, so should I ask him
to write his name in Chinese?
Q7. My client has an old card, should I fax that also?
Q8. The spelling of his name is unpronounceable, so should I ask him to
pronounce it for me?
Q9. I want to put the Japanese into an existing English Quark file. Is
that possible?
Q10. How to I get a price from you?
Q11. Should I send the original electronic file?
Q14. Can I give you my English Quark file and have you replace it with
Chinese?
Q15. Which languages do you translate or typeset in?
Q16. What is meant by translation?
Q17. What Mac applications do you support?
Q18. What Windows applications do you support?
Q19. What’s the difference between Simplified and Traditional Chinese
Q20. Can I send you a Mac zip disk or a CD?
Q21. My translator used PC Word to write his translation, can I send that to
you?
Q22. When I took our company’s computer made-for-Taiwan brochure to
Shanghai, why was the distributor unhappy with the translation?
Technical
Questions:
Q23. What is “Double-Byte Encoding”?
Q24. What is an EPS outlined file?
A: Yes, in some of the languages.
A. Prices are quoted on a per job basis depending on quantity, content, complexity of layout and the final requirement.
Q.
What information should go on the back of the business card? A. In the case of Chinese, Japanese and Korean business cards, the font side is in English and the reverse side contains all the information appearing on the front side in either English or the target language. To make the best impression, the Asian side should not be less impressive than the English side in terms of color, logo, etc. Translation of address is not useful for any practical purpose other than helping the reader pronounce the street, city or state. Business cards should be presented with decorum, usually with both hands; position the card so that it is in the reading position to the receiver. Do not be offended if your name is not pronounced exactly as you say it because all the sounds may not be available in that language, and every language has an inherent way pronouncing “English” words.
Q. My
customer only wants his name in Korean on the front side, is that okay? A. Yes, that’s fine. We can just do his name in Korean to be dropped above his English name.
Q.
What will the Asian side of my business card look like?
A. Normally, the Asian side will match the
English side as close as possible, which means that if the English side uses a
serif font, the Asian side will also use a serif font and the format will
resemble the English. This applies to brochures, labels, boxes, etc.
Another format for Chinese and Japanese is
called “Traditional” style where the characters are set vertically from right to
left.
Q. The
person is Chinese, so should I ask him to write his name in Chinese?
A. Most certainly! This goes for Japanese
names as well, because although there is an English spelling for their names,
there is a myriad of possibilities for character choices for the same full name.
Some Koreans also prefer to have their names in Chinese characters.
Q. My
client has an old card, should I fax that also?
A. By all means, yes! We want to maintain
consistency in translation.
Q. The
spelling of his name is unpronounceable, so should I ask him to pronounce it for
me?
A. Yes, we can’t write it in another
language if we can’t sound it out so a phonetic spelling is helpful because
almost all non-English names are translated phonetically to the target Asian
language.
Q. I
want to put the Japanese into an existing English Quark file. Is that possible?
A. Yes, that’s why we give you an EPS
outline Illustrator file. This format does not require any system fonts and is
usable in both Macintosh and Window programs and can be printed with laser
printers or can be printed out by a service bureau.
Q.
How to I get a price from you?
A. Just fax us a clear and readable copy of
the current English version along with a fax cover sheet along with any
important information such as target language and deadline.
Q.
Should I send the original electronic file?
A. It’s usually useful to have it, but if
it’s not available, then we will scan the faxed material or original printed
sheet for placement of the Asian language.
Q. I
am currently using Mac English Quark in designing. Why can’t I take your Mac
Japanese Quark file and place it in my English Quark?
A. In order to open a Japanese Quark file,
you need the Japanese Quark program, Japanese fonts, Japanese language support
installed in your computer. Japanese, Chinese, and Korean are two-byte
characters and English, Spanish, etc. are one byte characters. As they say,
“Women are from Venus and men are from mars—they are totally different.
Q.
Why can’t you just give me the Japanese text translation so I can lay it out
myself in Word, Quark, Illustrator, etc.?
A. The answer is the same as above. Unless
you have a Japanese operating system, the Japanese Quark program or other
Japanese Program in your computer, you will not be able to incorporate the
two-byte translation into the one-byte English program, and further more, you
need to be able to read the Asian language or have help in laying it out in the
correct location.
Q.
Can I give you my English Quark file and have you replace it with Chinese?
A. Yes, we can replace it with either
Simplified or Traditional Chinese characters, but they are EPS files placed in
the English Quark file. If you are a graphics person, you can do this
yourself. EPS files can be changed in English Illustrator, but once placed in
Quark, the graphic is no longer alterable.
Q.
Which languages do you translate or typeset in?
A. The majority of our work involves
Chinese, Japanese or Korean, but we also can provide it in Arabic, Cambodian,
French, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Brazilian included, Russian, Thai,
and Vietnamese. If there’s another language we did not mention, please feel
free to ask.
Q.
What is meant by translation?
A. People are often confused with the words
translation and typesetting and feel they are one and the same. Translation is
the conversion of text from usually English to a target language. It requires a
comprehensive knowledge of both languages. Ideally, the person translating the
target language is a native speaker of that language; in other words, someone
born and raised in that country. Someone just educated in Japan would not have
the nuances and cultural attitude of a native speaker.
Q.
What Mac applications do you support?
A. Adobe Illustrator (Chinese, Japanese and
English), Adobe PageMaker (Chinese, Japanese and English), Photoshop (English),
QuarkXpress (Traditional Chinese, Japanese, Korean and English) and MS Word
(English).
Q.
What Windows applications do you support?
A. Our work is basically done in Mac, but
we do have the following programs: Adobe Illustrator (English), PageMaker
(English), Photoshop (English) and MS Word (English) and is set up to read files
in some Asian languages.
Q.
What’s the difference between Simplified and Traditional Chinese
A. The difference is in the writing only.
Written characters can be read in Mandarin, Cantonese, Shanghai dialect, or some
other dialect. In 1945 the Beijing government simplified around 2,200
characters, and these characters are used in Mainland or Big China. Simplified
is used in Singapore also. Taiwan uses Traditional Chinese or complex Chinese
characters. If one brochure is to be used in Taiwan, U.S. and PR China, then
Traditional Chinese in the best choice.
Q.
Can I send you a Mac zip disk or a CD?
A. Yes. Zip disk, CD or regular Mac 1.3MB
floppy disk is fine.
Q. My
translator used PC Word to write his translation, can I send that to you?
A. Yes, we will try to convert the file to
usable Mac file. Please ask your translator to save the file as either Rich
Text or just text file. Recently, we have had better results using the Rich
Text format in conversions of the major Asian languages.
Q.
When I took our company’s computer made-for-Taiwan brochure to Shanghai, why was
the distributor unhappy with the translation?
A. The computer terminology used in Taiwan
is not the same as that used in China. The two countries have grown apart
during and after WWII and different terms are now used for changes since then in
all fields where a new word or term was required.
Technical
Questions:
Q.
What is “Double-Byte Encoding”?
A. Double-byte describes the Chinese,
Japanese and Korean languages which takes two bytes to represent one character.
English and most of the other languages uses one bye to express one letter, such
as “a”. The reason is because the Chinese characters, some of which are also
incorporated into the Japanese and Korean languages, are very complex. The
total number of Chinese characters are more than 50,000, but not all of them are
actively used.
Q.
What is an EPS outlined file?
A. An EPS (Encapsulated PostScript) is a
graphic file or a picture which can be used in many applications in both Mac and
PC platforms.
A. PDF stands for Portable Document
Format. The PDF file can be printed from both Macintosh and Window computers as
long as the computer has Adobe Acrobat Reader. It is a free program and can be
downloaded from www.adobe.com for
installation. This is the trouble-free method of receiving the Asian language
graphics file. The only drawback is that the text or layout cannot be altered.
A. FTP or File Transfer Protocol means the
file is uploaded to an FTP site and the same can be downloaded for use.
Usually, these are larger files, which are too heavy to just e-mail. |
|
Send mail to maytaico@earthlink.net with
questions or comments about this web site.
|
