Wednesday, September 14, 2011

My job

I've been active at this blog for a couple of months now. I guess some of you would want to know a little bit something about me apart from what I've written in my profile/bio. Well, let me tell you about what I do for a living. Whenever someone asks, what exactly do I do, I just tell them "writer" just as a shortcut. The more accurate answer is a little bit more complicated. It's pretty awesome job though. I work for a production company that does various media-related works (TV shows, documentaries, concerts, even films, commercials, etc.) but the department I belong in is the SUBTITLING department. Yes, subtitles, or more accurately, English language templates/close captioning for DVD, Blu-Ray, cable and satellite.

I'm in charge of quality control, that means I correct already subtitled works for any misheard subtitles, typos or mistakes in protocol. So basically, like movie critics, I actually get paid to watch movies. Not only movies though but also TV series, DVD/Blu-Ray featurettes and occasionally even business/corporate/instructional videos. We receive projects from UK and U.S. so most of my work is in English. We seldom get the big, big latest tent pole blockbusters though. We do get a lot of older movies though so I get to either rewatch old favorites or catch up on some classics, obscure and otherwise, that I may have missed.

Add to that the fact that I have relatively flexible work hours (I can theoretically go to work any time I want to provided I complete an 8 hour a day work week), the office is but a short commute from my work, and there are days where I have enough free time to blog and write side projects and dream passion projects (like screenplays, novels, etc.), it's a sweet deal. Plus I get weekends and holidays off.

There are drawbacks though. The salary though perfectly fine for where I am in my life right now could be higher. Though there are days where I have next to nothing to do, there are also days where I could get stuck doing overtime until 1 or 2 in the morning! The worst projects are audio commentaries. Yes, they need English language templates for audio commentaries too. They can be a bitch because we usually have to start from scratch from them and they can be a bitch to do especially if it's a multiple speaker type where talking is almost non-stop for 90 minutes to two hours. Another thing that pisses me off is having to do audio commentaries for films I wanted to see but haven't yet. Having to do the audio commentary spoils the movie for me way too much. For instance I had to the Attack the Block commentary and that hasn't been released in my country (yet). I tried to minimize the damage by watching the movie out of order (since the subtitles is broken up into files) and trying to avoid watching the movie itself as much as possible.

This was fun. I have an idea. To all those who have read this blogpost and follow my blog, post ONE question for me on the comments. Any question at all. I shall answer as truthfully as I can. The deadline is the moment I post the NEXT blog entry.

14 comments:

The Angry Lurker said...

What is your favourite piece of film music/song and why? Nice job by the way.

Mark said...

That is a pretty cool job. Here's a question, what would you say is the most well known movie you've worked with?

Anonymous said...

Does God exist? :P

Bersercules said...

What if you are proof reading a comedy's subtitle and one of the jokes in it is a play on words that doesn't translate to english and the subtitle that's there is a funny substitute but inacurate? Do you leave it in or do you go for a more acurate but unfunny subtitle?
I have always wondered this. I watch a lot of subtitled TV show and I always worry I'm missing out when the comedy show I'm watching stops being funny for a few minutes.

Bart said...

sounds like a sweet job

Outcast said...

Sounds cool buddy. I'll not ask a question but it's a good job to have. Keep up the good work! :)

Enigmatic Vapor said...

My question: What is the purpose of you writing this post?

Sweet Lily said...

Awesome!

my day in a sentence said...

No way! That's a really cool job! :)

Anonymous said...

Very interesting biographical post.

I linked to this blog.

Anonymous said...

thats a pretty sweet job man congrats

msmariah said...

People think my job is glamorous as well, but it's not. So I completely understand. Sounds cool from the outside though.

fatbloodyfinger said...

Sounds like a fascinating job. It's more interesting than mine, though your hours sounds more insane.

Thomas Duder, Author of the Things said...

How did you come to learn English? I've actually heard quite a few reasons to learn a different languages from many types of people, and it always strikes me as being an individual choice then anything that's forced (except for a few places around the globe where it's mandatory to learn a different language), y'knowwhatImean?

So what's the story behind yer multi-lingualism?