Saudisoft Multimedia Localization Projects

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Multimedia Localization 
Arabic and Urdu Customer Case Study ​ 

 
Client: International Bank      
 

The project

Our client has decided to publish Arabic and Urdu versions of multimedia packages on foreign investments and international trade in Africa. The Client conducted case studies, interviews about the countries that need to be supported in Africa, so the need arose to localize those materials for the purpose of introducing the client services to the world.    
 
The scope of the project was localization from English into Arabic and Urdu. Localization scope covered text translation, audio, video and graphics localization as well as voiceover, subtitling and animation phases.
 
Challenges
The main challenges in front of our teams were the mass publications, Bidirectional (Arabic and Urdu support both; Right to Left and Left To Right directions) issues, and the high level of requirements.
 
The mass productions included Video/Audio, complex PowerPoint, and Flash files, all of them had BiDi issues need to be solved, such as:
·        Reading orders
·        Neutral characters
·        Alignments
 
In Arabic and Urdu, characters should be displayed interlaced and from right to left (RTL) and Right Aligned. Tools/Automation was the main challenge as:
-          Flash was not supporting BiDi
-          PowerPoint; even though it supports Arabic and Urdu features, flipping slides should go one by one which is time-consuming.

Arabic Text Displayed in Flash - "This just an example and not from our clients'material"
 

Saudisoft solution

Saudisoft, with its significant experience in the localization industry, worked on the technical challenges of BiDi localization activities involved in the production of the final Arabic and Urdu multimedia packages.
 
We utilized our broad experience in software solutions and well-experienced engineers to develop tools that could save time and maintain the high quality required.
 
For PPT mass productions, we developed an internal tool to change the layout from left to right automatically. This allowed our Desktop Publishing (DTP) engineers to flip hundreds of slides in a few minutes comparing to days/weeks/
 
At the same time, we developed plug-ins for flash that allowed the correct display of Arabic/Urdu text (interlaced and from right to left).

Same Arabic text displayed in Flash after using our workaround - "This just an example and not from our clients'material"
 

Approach

Every package went through several processes to deliver it with the quality, accuracy required.
 
Video/Audio Localization 
·         Audio transcription 
·         Script translation 
·         Audio recording for the voiceover part, according to the client's voice preference 
·         Video subtitling (client requested subtitling for some content and a voiceover for the rest) 
·         Audio/video  synchronization  
 

Flash Localization 

·         Generate XML files with all localizable content and create localization kits for the text localization phase 
·         Flash engineering, utilizing SaudiSoft experts' workarounds to handle complex and challenging text effects in the localized versions 
·         Apply the above video/audio localization process for the video/audio part 
·         Conversion of Flash files to HTML5, including animation, audio, database, and CSS for RTL support 
        

Complex PowerPoint Localization 

·         Create translation packages using our CAT tool 
·         Apply the above video/audio localization process for the video/audio part 
·         Layout and animation of the final localized versions
 
Above all, we were also responsible for the Web Testing part. This enabled our testers to see the whole localized version in one place and was able to report bugs to our team and fix it which affected the overall produced quality.
 

Why Saudisoft?

Given the importance of an institution with the size of the client, we took the responsibility for delivering the material in the tone, quality, and accuracy preferred by our client.
 Saudisoft, with its localization, engineering team, could deliver professional localized multimedia packages along with translation memories, terminology databases and clean QA reports.
Thus, the multimedia packages were published on time and within budget.