Hello, everyone.
Today's topic for oversea VOCALOID(s) fans is “lyrics translation into English”.

When you want translate some lyrics for fun, you should know 3 things.

First of all, “never use an automatic translate system”. Google, Babelfish or any other system, they have no sense of language. Those programs exchange a word to another language's one, with searching dictionary. Since they start searching, what hit first is the word they reply. The worst way of understanding literary works. It means worst mistake of Japanese grammar. I'll show you the reason in next paragraph.

Second thing is “learning the Japanese grammar”. I met many mistakes on/offline. The most terrible mistake is between the verb's predicative form and attributive form. Tell those difference is not easy for native Japanese. The auto programs never tell it, so that I wrote at first “never use auto-translate system”. The only way of good translation is learn correct grammar.

Third thing is understanding Japanese culture. My friend, damesuke-kun wrote like this : fill in this mind gap and build a bridge between different cultures. That is what I want to and other translators do with love and passion.

For example, let's see my latest translate work “Solar power” ( http://piapro.jp/t/uXU6 Original Japanese lyrics here http://piapro.jp/t/eYp6 ). I used the word “explode” instead of “burst out”. I knew the background of original lyricist (SOSOSO P). He have been thinking about explosion of the nuclear power plants in Fukushima, and worried about power shortage in summer. The anxiety is not only his, but all Japanese concern. These circumstances are mine, too. So I use the word “explode” for this lyric. The word is not so strange to depict the lyric (and its background) in this case. When another lyric says “爆発させる”, I think the meaning from lyricist’s thought and backgrounds. The different word/phrase will be used for it. I am not a dictionary- search script. I have a sense and heart.

I hope this is helpful. Please feel free to contact me in Twitter (@Kirimisakana) or PIAPRO comment.