Portfolio Archives - Arcaniam

Behind the video game: Into the World, A Ren’Py Post-Pandemic Game

arcaniam — Sun, 22 May 2022 22:45:45 +0000

Behind the video game: Into the World, A Ren’Py Post-Pandemic Game

This time a group of colleagues and me got our hands into a fun task: writing, coding, illustrating, and localizing a videogame from 0.

I must say, that even though we were already exposed to videogames on different platforms and learning how to write code to implement the localization, we never had to create a whole videogame from scratch.

First, we had to decide what story we wanted to tell for a teaser type of project, then we had to see what platform will suit our needs the best, and even more important, does this platform supported localization?

But the only way to start is by starting.

Brainstorming a videogame is probably one of the most interesting things to do, especially when you belong to a group of designers and developers who have a very different range of tastes and ideas… I mean, we went from a Zombie Simul Dating idea to a whole post-pandemic game with a very sweet lesson in between: become human, and not, this is not a videogame about androids.

Behind the narrative

After pandemic, we wanted to have a videogame that will make users experience the life of our protagonists:

Character 1, and Character 2,

We wanted our protagonist to have the experience of living a life where social skills are important, but due to the pandemic restrictions across the world, these abilities are rusty.
The teaser shows how the player can go to different scenes where it faces different choices. But if not until the protagonist gives the right answer that it can move forward into the story.

First, we created some documents to divide the scenes and prepare the dialog in between:

But when we had everything done, we realized that we needed to find a platform which will allow us to create the videogame.

We started thinking about using Unity, but then after some Google search we found out that for Visual Novels the most famous videogame maker is Ren’Py.

What is Ren’Py?

This free and cross-platform engine is perfect for digital storytelling. According to the webpage Ren’Py is a visual novel engine – used by thousands of creators from around the world – that helps you use words, images, and sounds to tell interactive stories that run on computers and mobile devices.

This was the perfect platform and soon we start learning how to use it, but then we ran into a problem.

We didn’t have our characters illustrations, and using other assets was not the best idea… So, I was appointed the illustrator, keep in mind that I haven’t draw from a project since I was 14. So I was excited and afraid of the poor results, all at once.

My Main Job: The Illustrator

As it usually goes, I soon got rid of the fear, bough my first drawing tablet, opened Photoshop and started working on my digital skills. Thanks to Internet I was able to find hundreds of tutorials for beginner illustrators, and I spent a crazy number of hours just watching illustrators teach the interesting world of digital illustration.

Soon I ran into some problems, but lucky me, my sister who is in my, and many others opinion, a Photoshop genius that got me out of my first obstacles while trying to create layers upon layers for my Master Files and then having to imported it into .gif

For example, silly me, I didn’t know that to create a .gif file I had to get rid of the background and then create a layer for the whites, so that the background would be transparent, but all the whites will be kept intact.

Or that is better to use different layers for different information. For example, for many characters, I illustrated different expressions within the same file, and to organize the different expressions I created different layers that I renamed and then put it into folders.

But also, I learned, that it is important as an illustrator to know the screen resolution of the videogame, so that you can make your characters size appropriate for the videogame.

I must say that the best part of all was when my team finished up putting together the code and I could play the game and see all the characters that I spent hours drawing and painting alive!

Even more exciting was that after we finished adding the localization via a Ren’Py Translator ToolKit for Spanish and Chinese, the translations were all there!

In a nutshell it was an awesome experience, to see what goes in the creation of a teaser like we did, I believe that just by doing is that we really learn what happens within workflows and the obstacles that can arise. I am very grateful to have the best team while taking this fun project, they made everything better.

I hope that you give a try to videogame creation, we for sure had a blast!

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Dubbing the scene “Relevant” from Birdman into Spanish

arcaniam — Sun, 22 May 2022 20:56:14 +0000

Dubbing the scene “Relevant” from Birdman into Spanish

The following post is a proof-of-concept project for Middlebury Institute of International Studies, I do not own the rights to the video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tn48hUyFrKQ or the movie.

The Art of Dubbing

According to ©2022 Encyclopedia Britannica, dubbing, in filmmaking is the process of adding new dialogue or other sounds to the soundtrack of a motion picture that has already been shot. Dubbing is most familiar to audiences as a means of translating foreign-language films into the audience’s language.

However, as a localization professional It’s not every day that we get to work on a dubbing project from the perspective of the dubbing supervisor, voice actors/actresses, and video editors, all at once. For that reason I decided to dub one monologue of one of my favorite movies of all times: Birdman, the unexpected virtue of ignorance and see what challenged I could face by doing so.

But once I started thinking about the best workflow for the project, I had only a glimpse of the challenges that were coming.

Preparing the Script (English / Spanish)
Recording voiceover (two voices)
Editing video to match lips from the original in Audition
Importing into Premiere Pro and creating a final file.

Things that I knew before going into the project

Its widely know that Spanish expands when translating from English most of the time, for that reason I knew that I had to count the words to match that into the translation. I had to be brief in Spanish, while trying to convey the same meaning.
I knew that I had to use the razor tool in Audition to match the lip from the dubbed
audio with the original file.
I knew that there were any distractions where I could put some audio over because the lips were not there, the lips where ALWAYS there in this clip.

But… It was “1:35” min clip so I should be fine right?

Wrong.

The unexpected virtue of ignorance – Why?

First, I am not a professional actress, keep in mind that Emma Stone got an Academy Award nomination for her role on this movie. I had to really imprint my voice with frustration, anger, sadness, and think about all the emotions that I couldn’t convey. But besides that, I didn’t realize that the recording was even more crucial than I anticipated.

Second, I am not a professional video editor, although I feel pretty confident now about my skills in Audition and Premiere Pro, I know that there are some high-level skills that professionals use that I don’t know about, so I watched a lot of tutorials to get things right.

Third, in Dubbing, Each second counts.

This last challenge was the most difficult one for this project because I realize that if not only how many words are in a script that count. Its also the pacing of the voice actor/actress while speaking. A sentence with only 8 words can turn into a long audio frame in Audition. So, I had to record myself multiple times to achieve that “matching” of the lips of the original clip.

The final product

After many recordings, editing sessions and a lot of patience, a 1:35 clip turned into 6 hours of work. At the end, I got a final cut that it doesn’t make me feel completely bad about it, but it can be improved by real voice actors/actresses and video editors. However, this experience allowed me to understand a bit more what it’s behind the effort of dubbing. I can say that after my Project Showcase, I have even more admiration for all the voice actors/actresses, video editors, dubbing supervisors and project managers who work to make the movies and the TV shows that people who doesn’t speak the original language can enjoy.

My recommendation to whoever is looking into getting into the Entertainment Industry is to try it yourself, there are many tutorials online and programs that you can learn, and even if you don’t achieve professional level in your first project, you will learn more about it that if you were just watching it from afar.

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Localization Practicum

arcaniam — Fri, 20 May 2022 04:41:04 +0000

Localization Practicum

Women in Localization

Women in Localization (W.L.) is certified as a 501 (c)(3) tax-exempt nonprofit. Its mission is to foster a global community for the advancement of women and the localization industry through networking, education, career advancement, mentoring and recognition for women’s accomplishments. Founded in the San Francisco Bay Area in 2008, W.L. is supported by thousands of women and men across the globe and local chapters who support members locally.

This was a second semester with Women in Localization, MIIS Chapter. In 2021, when some of my classmates and I took the challenge of becoming the second generation to manage the chapter at our Alma Mater, we didn’t know all the amazing events that we would be able to put in place.

We knew that as members of one of the most renown localization organizations in the world, we were facing with the opportunity to create new experiences and a platform of learning and nurturing the advancement of women in our industry. But we also knew, that with a great power comes great responsibility (and yes, I am quoting Spiderman). Keep in mind that we were only the second generation of the Chapter at MIIS, so we were still learning how to implement best practices and transition from a pandemic world into the “New Normal.”

The first major challenge was moving half of our events from the comfort place of Zoom and thinking about in person events in a post-pandemic world. That wasn’t as easy as we expected but it was extremely rewarding to be able to connect with all the localization enthusiast and some alumni and professors in person.

At the beginning of our 4th semester, we were still not sure about throwing an in-person event with such little data about the most recent wave of the pandemic. For that reason, we decided to wait a bit and prepare an online event that we called “Stand out from the crowd” (that you can watch if you become a member of Women in Localization!) where we had a stellar panel which included Edith Bendermacher (Head of Globalization Strategy, Localization Operations at NetApp), Bryce Craft (Director of Employer Relations at MIIS), Veronika Gonzalez (Recruiter for the Translation Industry), and Xingchen Hu (Globalization Manager at OKCoin), In February 17th, and overall success where we spoke about the interesting topic of how to get hired in the localization industry with our experts.

After the success of this event and knowing that the wave was waning down. We got prepare for an in-person event, while having most of the WL members in a remote setting. On March 11th we were able to throw our first Happy Hour of the semester in a fun event, surrounded by pizza and snacks, that brough together localization enthusiasts, MIIS students, Alumni and even the famous author and professor Tucker Johnson.

Among other things that the second generation of WL MIIS Chapter had to do, was to understand that with graduation our time in the Chapter was also getting close to end. After interviewing different candidates, we ended up with our new leadership that will be third generation of Women in Localization at MIIS Chapter, I am hopefully for the next generation, and I will always treasure having being part of this amazing organization while I was finishing my master’s degree at MIIS, my Alma Mater.

A NEW CHAPTER – LANDING MY DREAM INTERNSHIP

The main goal of coming to MIIS, was to learn from the best and acquiring the knowledge and skills to take my career to the next level. I wasn’t sure what “next level” really mean at that time, but the opportunity came to me when I was less expecting it…

In my first semester at MIIS I did a list of the top 5 companies where some of the best professionals in our industry were at. One of these dream companies was Deluxe Entertainment Inc.

On December of 2021, I saw a post where Deluxe was looking for their first intern for their Localization division in The United States, and with excitement I applied to it. Two months after, when I almost forgot about applying to the position, thinking that I was not being considered, I got that email from the recruiter telling me to give them my availability for an interview with four people that I did not know yet, but all had very important titles within the organization. My first though was – was the interview with the four of them at the same time? I could feel my heart racing, and my impostor syndrome arising.

However, after panicking, recollecting myself, studying, and thinking about everything that I learned at my previous jobs in the industry as a translator, interpreter, and localization professional, I calmed down, and remembered that the only thing that I could do was to be myself.

After that interview, I realized that I completely forgot about my nerves while I was talking to them. Even in the distance of a Zoom call, they made me felt welcomed since that moment, although I wasn’t a Deluxe employee just yet.

Deluxe Entertainment

Deluxe Media Inc., formerly Deluxe Entertainment Services Inc. (or simply Deluxe) is an American media company, whose clients include motion picture groups, television studios, digital content providers, and advertising agencies. The company has been recognized with ten Academy Awards for scientific and technical achievement. Founded in 1915 by producer William Fox, Deluxe’s headquarters are in Los Angeles and New York, with operations in 25 media markets worldwide.

After all, I got my dream internship just 3 months away from graduation. Deluxe took me on board and showed me day after day the amazing organization that they have, the systems that they use, the clients that they work for, the files that they work on, the workflows, and all the different initiatives and projects that are in place to deliver a fully localized product. They worked with my schedule and tailored my internship where I had the opportunity to get to know each division and met so many amazing localization professionals daily.

While at the internship, I realized that each of the Deluxe employees were not only excellent professionals, but also that they were in the entertainment industry because they had passion for it. That realization, even though that I was drowning in the workload of what entails to be a master’s degree Candidate for the TLM program at MIIS, made me felt energized.

However, the cherry on top, was when I got invited to attend our Internship Check In, at their Ontario and Hollywood Way offices. At that time, I was in the middle of classes, but I KNEW that I couldn’t throw away such an opportunity. So, I said yes, packed a small bag, sent an email to my professors about not being able to attend classes, and a few weeks after I was into a plane heading to Burbank, the capital of entertainment.

I honestly did not know what I was expecting, I mean, I knew that it would be great, but the experience itself was beyond my expectations. I learned so much that day, not only about their cinema division, but also, I got to know the installations and they gave me a personal tour. But the best part was when I arrived at the Hollywood Way office, and I was able to meet most of the people that I met online, in person. Once again, they went an extra mile to make me feel welcome. It was a short visit, but after jumping on the plane back to Monterey, I left with the feeling that even though that after graduation most of us don’t know what’s next, whatever is next would be also amazing because the world is our oyster.

Overall, I can truly say that the internship with Deluxe reinforced my love for the entertainment and localization industry in a way that I never felt before.
Now I know that next level means being able to integrate my knowledge of localization into the industry that I always wanted to belong and fulfilling a dream long overdue. I cannot thank Deluxe Entertainment enough for seeing my potential and giving me the opportunity to learn the day to day of their end-to-end global localization operations.

Without a doubt, I can say that my Practicum was incredible, and I would not change a thing, working with two international organizations such as Women in Localization and Deluxe Entertainment, made me feel closer to the industry, the importance of evangelization and the importance of continuous learning. Women in Localization gave me the courage to evangelize localization and make other women feel that there is a place for us in this industry, and Deluxe showed me what global truly means and how different is when you work in a place where everyone feels passion for what they do.

Finally, I am grateful to my Alma Matter, MIIS, for giving me the opportunity of becoming part of these two amazing organizations through the Translation and Localization Management practicum.

And for those who are reading this with the aim to learn more about localization or what it means to have an internship with these two companies, remember that we all start somewhere, if you do not know where to start, please feel free to reach out to me or other localization professionals, there was a time where we also did not know where to begin.

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Modernizing The Ancient

arcaniam — Sun, 13 Dec 2020 15:14:00 +0000

Modernizing The Ancient

How can Localization of antique pictures make your marketing campaign stand out while saving you money?

A WORLD OF SHALLOW ADS

In today’s global world, it seems that we are continuously surrounded by new companies that want to reach their customers at any cost through their ads.

Sometimes, it looks like they are yelling for attention, but their loud message is often shallow and does not make sense. For that reason, advertising campaigns are less and less memorable, which becomes the worst experience when the ads are tentatively translated into our language. Still, they fail miserably in the eyes of the customers.

However, I am here to tell you that there are many opportunities to create memorable marketing campaigns that will resonate with audiences in other countries.

So, how can you make a high-value advertisement?

To capture a premium brand’s emotion is a vital asset to master. As you know, making your brand recognizable is very important for how your customers perceive you and ultimately create a valuable product worthy of its price. This post will show you a low-cost method but that will make you stand out from your competition.

The businesses that will take advantage of this are usually part of the premium liquor categories, fashion industry, and every product that benefits from its aging and traditional value.

THE BEGINNING OF ALL

1. Finding the right picture:

I wanted to find an antique picture that did not have any copyright issues, so first I checked The Public Domain Review. After that, I found an image that was a sister to this, so I went to the original Wellcome Collection, where I found this picture.

Note: I recommend for your project / product to also find assets that are copyright free, unless you want to spend a lot of money into acquiring the right license!

2. Creating a picture list

After finding the picture, it is vital to write all the source text into the first column and then write the translated text / or text from the CAT tool into the second column. By doing this, it will be easier to place all the right text onto the target image.

Note: If you are not a translator but only a designer, you should expect to receive the picture list from your client.

3. Selecting the right fonts, size, and kerning based on the original

One way to do this, is to leave a portion of the original text to see how to replicate that into the target language. The font was found in Google Fonts which is a copyright free typeface repertoire.

It is important to look at the right kerning and leading.

4. Vanishing the text:

To localize the text properly, you will have to vanish the source text following the texture effect your picture has. For example, in the following image I had to work around the shovel and the tomb.

You can use the healing brush tool in Photoshop unless you are lucky enough to use the content aware fill new AI feature. It will depend on your source picture.

5. Inserting the ad's text in the target language:

Some languages will be easier to localize than others due to the different language‘s rules. It is essential to take into consideration which languages expand and which one‘s contract. For the following example, the localization was done into Spanish, a language spoken by significant wine countries such as Spain, Chile, and Argentina. However, since romance languages are very similar, it will be easier to localize this into French, Italian, Catalan, and Portuguese, which are also crucial for the wine industry.

Note: it is essential to add the proper texture, bevel, and emboss effects to the text to retain the antique look that you are looking for.

6. Add the mockup/picture of your product to the antique image:

Like a magic trick, the final step of the process is to incorporate your product, which will intertwine with the antique image. In my case, I created a whole new wine based on my branding to show you how to do it. Anything can work!

To do this, you will have to use the pen tool and add more textures to blend seamlessly with the original picture.

NEXT STEPS

Of course, as with every process, there are a considerable number of challenges that you will face, which is the reason why you must work with an expert to help you with the localization of your advertisement.

If you want to see how I resolved some of the challenges and which ones were in my project, you can watch the video:

If you have an idea for your brand and wish to consult me, do not hesitate to contact me. I am also available to work with you to localize your product and make your advertising campaigns stand out.

Source Image Credit: A man, half human and half skeleton. Etching.
Wellcome collection. Attribution. 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0).

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How CAT Tools Can Set Yourself Apart from Others

arcaniam — Sun, 13 Dec 2020 03:51:00 +0000

How CAT Tools Can Set Yourself Apart from Others

A Creative Simulation

Translation of the screenplay of Chinatown

My name is Marianna Guedez F, and I translate and interpret for a living. In my journey to become a professional, I have taken different classes to gain the skills that hopefully will make a difference. In the following portfolio, I will show you a simulation project that I did to understand better how to work with CAT tools and collaborate with future coworkers before taking a real-life localization project.

Furthermore, I will give you some tips to apply in REGEX that will facilitate your translation process.

BONUS TIP: At the end of this portfolio, you will find a link to a post on the Top 6 Reasons to Start Using Memsource for your Translations Today.

Proposal/SOW

What did we learn?

Deliverables

Reports

4 Awesome Tricks to Make your Translations Easier with the Verbal Expressions Feature (QA) in SDL Trados!

In translating from English to Spanish, we can face many problems with formatting. By using regular expressions, we can avoid a few that will make your life easier. Here are some of the ideas you can implement in Trados using the QA check function – Regular Expressions.

A common mistake is that while translating from English to Spanish, translators make it not to remember that numbers and currencies use a “,” in English, while in Spanish, they use a space between numbers. This can create massive problems, especially when we are talking about money.

However, there is an easy trick that you can follow to avoid this problem.

EN-ES number comma formatting

Create your project in SDL Trados. (Do not forget to create the TM!)

2. Open the document; you will have the source language on your left and the target language at your right.

3. Identify the problem. The numbers in English are the same as in Spanish separate by a comma. This is a mistake in Spanish.

4. Resolve the problem:

a) Go to the Review tab and click on Quality Assurance at the top right corner.

b) Open Regular Expressions.

c) Check “Search Regular Expressions” and write the following code:

RegEx source: \d{1}\,\d{1}

RegEx target: \d{1}\,\d{1}

Condition: Report if both target and source regEx patterns match

Add Action

d) Click on Verify to check to the pattern in the text.

e) The functionality finds the problem and sends a warning.

f) Now as a translator you can fix the problem!

Easy right?

EN-ES finding days of the week capitalized- warning

Another problem that you can also fix while translating from EN to SP is finding the days of the week in capital letters. Remember that in English, the week’s days are in capital letters, whereas in Spanish are in lowercase, unless there are at the beginning of a sentence.

Imagine that we have a text with days of the week in English, and we need to translate that into Spanish. As translators, sometimes we forget that the days of the week do not use capital letters. Like in this short example:

Here is a nice trick to find those problems on your text!

Follow the same process, but this time add this code in the Regular Expressions tab:

Description: EN-ES finding days of the week capital error

Condition: Report if both target and source Regex patterns match

Add Action

Warning!

Now we can fix it

Another problem is that, as translators, we could face a problem of capitalization while working on a document from EN to ES that includes nationalities. Remember that whereas in English nationalities are capitalized, in Spanish, we do not capitalize the nationalities. Therefore, if the nationality is capitalized in Spanish in a Trados’s doc, you could use verbal expressions to cause a warning.

Since there are so many nationalities, you can change this formula to add the nationalities that your document requires. In this string, the nationalities are represented by the ones that are in the source text.

EN-ES nationalities capitalization warning

Follow the same process, but this time adds this code in the Regular Expressions tab:

RegEx source: \w\s(Turks|Japanese|Germans|Brazilians|Asians)

RegEx target: \w\s(Turcos|Japoneses|Alemanes|Brasileños|Asiáticos)

Condition: Report if both target and source Regex patterns match

Add Action

Change one word to another

By using Regular Expressions, we could find a word in a text and replace it with another very fast. This could happen when you are localizing a text for a specific locale that has a preference. Imagine a document with thousands of words where there is a word that you must replace with another. This will tell you where they are.

In this specific text, we want to replace the word ID with cédula, instead of “documento“.

So, we go to the Verbal Expression tab and enter the following formula to trigger a warning.

Description: Document Substitution Using Correct Spanish Verbiage

Regex Source: \s(ID)\W

RegEx target: (Cédula|cédula)

Condition: Report if source matches but not the target

And then you will see the warning:

Now, you can make the change manually, or if there are too many, you can always use the find-and-replace function (Alt+F) in SDL Trados.

If you are still interested to learn more about CAT tools check my latest post on Top 6 Reasons to Start Using Memsource For your Translations Today

Top 6 Reasons to Start Using Memsource For your Translations Today

If you are a translator, it is likely that you already know what a CAT tool is and why translators are using it more now than ever.

Technology, Translation and Its Pros and Cons

arcaniam — Fri, 23 Oct 2020 03:52:29 +0000

Technology, Translation and Its Pros and Cons

The world is rapidly changing, and the advancement of new technologies and data management is challenging to keep up with all the new developments in our field.
Everywhere we go (physically and virtually), people talk about Deep Learning, Neural Machine Translations, NPL, and even AI. The threat of robots taking over humans’ tasks seems more realistic than what we read in a science fiction novel…

Or even worse, the notion that translators will be replaced by machines sooner than later…

Should be worry?

I am here to tell you that you should not. My name is Marianna Guedez and after many years working as a translator and interpreter, I entered into the Localization field and experienced firsthand that sometimes technology is not as perfect as we might think. There are still many features to improve, and that as today, machines are not close to replacing humans.

In the following blog entry, I will show you the struggle my colleagues and I face while working on our first Neural Machine Translation project. Then I will talk to you about XLOC, the Keyword’s Studio CMS, and its pros and cons.

My Colleagues and I Worked on our First MT Project – This is What We Learned.

Our simulation was inspired by the idea of working in an MT Project to Translate D&D materials, especially campaigns (both fanmade and official).

MT Project Files

Download the DnD Initial Project Proposal 2021

Watch our presentation

As you can see even working with Machine Translation can be more problematic than we originally anticipated… Which is the reason because is important to learn the new technologies that are available in our field but also comprehend its limitations… So that we don’t have an erroneous perception of the scope of the technology as today.

As the example showed, technology will not replace humans, but knowing about it will give you a more competitive advantage over translators that do not about this world.

Furthermore, I would show you another awesome project that my colleagues and I embark on this year and, although is not related to machine translation, If you are thinking about a career in videogames localization, don’t skip this.

XLOC

Advantages and Disadvantages of a CMS in Videogame Localization

XLOC is the powerful Content Management System (CMS) dedicated to the development of global video games. Currently, XLOC is part of the localization process of Keywords Studios – The famous Global Services Platform for videogame localization that you probably heard about and if not, you should remediate that asap!

Presentation:

A Big Thanks to Keywords Studio for showing us XLOC!

Resources

XLOC Official page – If your organization if interested in learning more about XLOC I recommend you to reach out, they were extremely accommodating and made us feel at home!
Keywords Studio
Jenny McKearney
Rebecca Guttentag

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Localization Tricks: How to Use Effectively WPML with SiteOrigin Page Builder

arcaniam — Fri, 23 Oct 2020 03:51:40 +0000

Localization Tricks: How to Use Effectively WPML with SiteOrigin Page Builder

As a Localization Specialist, I am always shocked by how many localization problems can arise if we switch the way we built a webpage. For instance, the following example was meant to be an easy task in WordPress… But then, I had the fantastic idea of finding a more interesting way to create the Proof-of-Concept page we wanted to localize because why not?

So, after navigating among different tutorials in Google and YouTube, I found this fantastic tutorial by Greg Narayan, and immediately I was hooked. I followed the instructions to the T while recreating the Women in Localization page (our version is currently unpublished) and discovered the great functionalities and widgets of the Sydney Theme along with Site Origin Page Builder, one of the most powerful page builders of WordPress.

I was amazed by how fast I was able to build a WordPress from scratch and how awesome it looked in record time!

While I was getting myself excited with how beautiful our proof-of-concept page was looking I stopped for a second to see if WPML, the powerful multilingual plugin for WordPress that we wanted to use, supported Site Origin Page Builder, and quickly I found my answer or so I thought:

So after that reassurance, I finished the English page so that my colleagues and I could localize it without any problems in our target languages. Unfortunately, I did not know that I had open a whole can of worms for me and my colleagues…

The Does and Don’ts of Localizing a Website Built with SiteOrigin Page Builder

Traditionally, while localizing a webpage, Localizers will use the plugin WPML String Translation to localize the strings into the different target languages. However, SiteOrigin Page Builder magic is mostly done via widgets and not strings.

This SiteOrigin Page Builder structure adds a whole new layer of complexity to our Localization Workflow, as my colleagues and I discovered a little bit too late.

After banging our heads against the wall (figuratively and almost literally), my colleague Dean Christopher found a solution that rescued us from the disaster, as he explains better in his post that I encourage you to look at it.

After that, we had smooth sailing and localized almost all the pages until we found other small bumps in the road. (Like the Localization of the Contact Form and Events page, that my colleague Ying-Ting Wu describes perfectly in his blog.)

A Nice Touch: How I use WPML to Localize Pictures with Text.

Besides, what my colleagues already covered in their own blogs. I found very easy the WPML plugin for localizing pictures.

SOURCE LANGUAGE (EN)

TARGET LANGUAGE (ES)

How we did it?

Activate WPML Media

2. Navitage to WPML Media Translation

3. Find the picture from the source text that you want to localize, and click on edit the target language.

Voila!

If the picture doesn’t change you have to go to where the widget is located and manually changed it. For example, these pictures are part of Services, so I had to change them there.

As you can see thanks to putting our knowledge together to find the different solutions that we encounter we would able to fully localize the webpage built with SiteOrigin Builder into Spanish and Chinese. So, if you have any questions about your website localization method please feel free to ask for advice, it always pays off! 🙂

If you want to learn more about the overall process, do not forget to watch our video below.

Resources:

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