Often, the translation industry typically sees work that
can fit into a few categories, such as PR application translation (that involve
birth and educational certificates in familiar formats) and notarized
translation (where a particular process and set of standards are adhered to for
every translation). However, much like life in general, sometimes a certified
translation company in Singapore may encounter a job with more atypical
requests. As a professional translator, one not only needs to be diligent in
adhering to previous standards and document formats, but also to have
flexibility of mind and adaptability in approach when encountering unexpected
requirements.
As an example, consider how a certified translation
provider in Singapore would translate a book of Chinese poetry to English. One
is obviously expected to correctly convey the meaning of the poem in the
requested language. However, a poem is not singularly a collection of words in
a single paragraph. For a poem to be recognized as a poem, the person writing
it generally considers its meter (i.e., the number of syllables in each line).
Some writers of poetry even consider the visual appearance of a poem, such as
if the text can fit a perfect square or has a repeating visual pattern of
varying lengths. This can throw up a host of new problems when a translator in
Singapore must consider line-length and syllable-quantities. In the case of
translating a poem from Chinese to English, consider how one would fit a 2-line
English explanation of a four-character Chinese idiom into a single line of
poetry, especially when one would have to duplicate the original’s metre.
One might also encounter similar challenges when translating
for more serious purposes, such as providing legal translation services. For
instance, one might not expect to be concerned about visuals for documents
intended for business purposes, but some companies may require a translation
company to adhere to the original document’s number of pages or other elements
of its format. In such a scenario, especially if one is translating from a
language that can pack a lot of meaning into a few narrow characters, one would
now have to pay attention to font sizes, spacing, paragraphing, and potentially
many other factors regarding document format that a translator may not have
originally expected to face.
To accommodate requirements like these, there are no
overall shortcuts one can take in this regard. One must simply be creative in
word choice (or have access to a thesaurus), while having a good grasp of
Microsoft Word’s various functions for arranging and calibrating a document’s contents.
Hopefully, the client will also be receptive to receiving and reviewing
multiple drafts to better achieve a final product that best fits their vision.
If one can satisfactorily complete a task like this, then such a provider of
certified document translation services in Singapore can be confident in the
high quality of their skills.
