Dub or Sub

[FaceDancer]

I would try and sort through this shitstorm, but I don't want to. So, I'll try and explain myself.

When watching a dub, your focus on vision, hearing the sound effects, and hearing the dialogue (I differentiate the two for a reason, because one ear may dominate in phonetical sounds while the other focuses on non-phonetical sounds). You claim that it is better for watching the show because you do not miss anything.

When watching a sub, your focus is in vision (both action and reading) and aural stimulation (in this case, mostly non-phonetical). You say we lose something when we are forced to read the subtitles, as if doing so drags us away from the action in the same way a wall takes away my vision of a person on the other side. This is most definitely not the case. I'm not trying to say one is better than the other, but rather both are the same.

Also, er, Red Fox of Fire, have you ever heard of peripheral vision?

[Narga_Rocks]

This is exaggerated, which was my point (and I even started with "This is exaggerated" so idk how you missed that). Thing is you/I can glance down to read the taunt in time for me to watch the animation, heck, if I'm not in full screen mode, I don't even move my eyes to read what it says: I can see everything at once. Periphiral Vision was the term I was looking for, face, so thanks.

And yes, you have to concentrate on the text instead of the action when watching subs, thats the whole point, isn't it? You can't do both? And I was saying the difference in concentration needed for reading subs and simply listening to the dubbed is the equivalent of the difference in concentration needed to breathe and blink.

Except the complaint isn't about concentrating. You can both breathe and blink and walk and chew gum all at the same time. Certain actions easily combine with each other because they don't interfere with each other.

You can easily listen to the words and sound effects while watching something and get everything from it. This is because your eyes and your ears are separate. However, reading is something that uses the eyes, and watching the action also uses the eyes. This is a problem.

Good thing having the same function has absolutely no relevance to the point at all then.

But your point was stupid to begin with because you don't seem to be understanding the complaint. Your eyes need to watch the action. Consider, then:

you have a clogged nose. Can only breathe through your mouth. What's easier:

blinking + eating

breathing + eating

Your point was stupid because one of your examples interferes with the secondary action while the other does not. The point you seem to be missing.

alternate scenario:

eye exam + breathing

eye exam + blinking

which one is the optometrist happier with? One of them interferes with whatever he is attempting to do while looking into your eye. The other does not.

The point isn't about concentration. It's not that we are saying you have 50 points of concentration total, and watching takes 30 while listening takes 20 and reading takes 30 so you can't pull off reading + watching. Nobody is saying that reading takes more effort than listening. Which is why you comparing the effort and concentration requirements of blinking and breathing is completely stupid.

Also, er, Red Fox of Fire, have you ever heard of peripheral vision?

The trouble with that is that it's not the same as your main vision. Think about it, you don't drive while looking at your dashboard the whole time. Or I hope you don't, anyway. Peripheral vision is not as good as what you are looking at. I doubt you can read with peripheral vision. So you focus on the words.

Anyone here play music with a conductor? Peripheral vision is just fine for getting the beat that the conductor is using, but it's not good for much else (like if he were to hold up a sign saying "when you get to bar 96, I actually want you to go back to bar 50 instead of 70 like we said"). Similarly, I'd never be able to look at the conductor and use peripheral vision to read the music. It's my statement that both the subtitles and the action on the screen are too detailed to rely on peripheral vision for either of them. Sure, you might be able to know that he's swinging his sword while you are reading, but can you tell that his eyes are glowing red instead of blue or some other details that are harder to see? It's a little tough to follow while reading. You could probably figure out when someone falls that they lost, but you'd miss out on some details. Peripheral vision is simply inferior to the vision you have when you are actually looking at something.

[Furby]

I used to say dub because I like hearing things in English, and subs can be so horribly inconsistent that it breaks you out of just watching the bloody anime.

But I've switched over to subs after some rather horrible dubbing attempts.

Still, there are an occassional series (Hellsing Ultimate, Spice and Wolf Season I) that do such an amazing job dubing that I'd be ashamed to not listen to it. These are few and far between, though, and you often get voices that just don't sound right (I point to Mikuru and Yuki from the Haruhi dub. Mikuru sounds like she's always whispering, and Yuki's monotone doesn't sound (Which may be the point, I guess, but rather then just being flat voiced, it sounds like someone is imitating a computer. Though, they got Kyon spot on).

Edited August 31, 2010 by Furby

[Zkirsche]

I think you missed this:

This is exaggerated, which was my point (and I even started with "This is exaggerated" so idk how you missed that). Thing is you/I can glance down to read the taunt in time for me to watch the animation, heck, if I'm not in full screen mode, I don't even move my eyes to read what it says: I can see everything at once. Periphiral Vision was the term I was looking for, face, so thanks.

Nobody is saying that reading takes more effort than listening.

They are saying that it takes away from the actual show itself, and I say it does so just about as much as making out what they're saying, blinking (because when blinking, you can't see) and breathing aka: absolutely nothing at all.

It's my statement that both the subtitles and the action on the screen are too detailed to rely on peripheral vision for either of them.

And it's my statement, as someone who prefers subtitles and watches subs often, that it isn't.

Edited August 31, 2010 by Zwiebel

[Florete]

Pedantism, much?

In the right context, no, not at all. Again, people aren't currently using the argument I use this counter for, so it obviously won't have the same effect.

That's not the only bad thing about the naruto dub IMO

If you're other problem is that Naruto sounds too annoying, you are missing the point (sorry for assuming, but I get that complaint a lot).

Nope, hate him. Hate most dubs and thier actors and still haven't, to this day, found a dub which I have liked. Renji is one of my least fav's, though.

But, judging from what I've seen, it is better all the time.

And this is why I am here. Before continuing, it would be nice to know which dubs you have experienced.

When watching a sub, your focus is in vision (both action and reading) and aural stimulation (in this case, mostly non-phonetical). You say we lose something when we are forced to read the subtitles, as if doing so drags us away from the action in the same way a wall takes away my vision of a person on the other side. This is most definitely not the case. I'm not trying to say one is better than the other, but rather both are the same.

But it does. Not only does it take your attention away, relying on subtitles also adds more room for imagination as to how things are being said. Japanese is obviously structured differently than English, so say a sentence a character speaks has some emphasis put on a single word. If you don't understand it aside from what you are reading, you can mentally put it where it feels most comfortable, but if you actually understood it it can come off differently and can often sound completely out of place (while I'm at it, this is also the issue with people always thinking the Japanese are some kind of Gods of voice acting; even the Japanese themselves know their actors often overact).

That might not have been completely relevant to what you said now that I look back, but what you said made me think of that so I'll leave it anyway.

Also, er, Red Fox of Fire, have you ever heard of peripheral vision?

I have, of course. Narga covered this well, though.

[Malexis]

Subs!

Except for a few series like One Piece's funimation dub and Fullmetal Alchemist.

[Zkirsche]

In the right context, no, not at all. Again, people aren't currently using the argument I use this counter for, so it obviously won't have the same effect.

No, it still smells of pedantism to me. It's the way that they're viewed, and there's very little difference (IMO) between them. It's completely different to whats being viewed. (As in, different voice acting, different names, perhaps censorship so even different content).

And this is why I am here. Before continuing, it would be nice to know which dubs you have experienced.

Chrono Crusade, Bleach, Naruto, Shaman King, Digimon, Noein (although that wasn't too bad, I guess, not as good as subbed though) and Spiral. I never have watched death note or one piece in dub, as far as I can remember.

If you're other problem is that Naruto sounds too annoying, you are missing the point (sorry for assuming, but I get that complaint a lot).

Well, out of interest, what is the point then? If I don't like the way the character sounds and findit annoying to listen to, why would I want to listen to it? And moe importantly, why would I put myself through listening to it when there's a better alternative?

[Narga_Rocks]

I think you missed this:

They are saying that it takes away from the actual show itself, and I say it does so just about as much as making out what they're saying, blinking (because when blinking, you can't see) and breathing aka: absolutely nothing at all.

blinking is shorter than reading, unless you are insanely fast at reading. Like, Johnny 5 from Short Circuit fast. Well, I guess not that fast, since he supposedly reads entire pages in less time than it takes you or I to blink.

It takes away from the show since you are relying on peripheral vision to watch the action.

And it's my statement, as someone who prefers subtitles and watches subs often, that it isn't.

maybe you just don't know what you are missing since your peripheral vision only catches what it catches. Of course you don't know what greater detail you may have been able to see if you'd been focusing on the screen and not the subs. If you don't know it's there how can you know that you missed it?

Besides, it's pretty clear that whatever you are able to get from the show or whatever percentage you convince yourself that you got, some of the rest of us find that we miss stuff. I couldn't count the number of times I had to rewind because I was reading. Either from not being able to read it all or because there was some action that I knew I missed while reading what they were saying. And it sounds like Red Fox has the same problem.

I hate to go back to something you ignored, since you clearly didn't want to consider it the first time, but again: driving. Are you going to read a map while driving? Trust me, you'll miss something and come close to crashing. It's one thing to glance at your mirror or glance at your speedometer and then look back at the road. For the 0.2 seconds it takes to do the action you can mostly predict what will happen on the road during the time that your attention is away from it.

Tell you what, get out in a car, stick a book at the top of the steering wheel, and start reading while trying to drive. Never look at the road directly. Only ever use your peripheral vision for the road. After doing that for a few hours, if you aren't yet in a hospital, come back and tell me that you don't miss stuff if you rely on peripheral vision.

[Ansem]

Sub. They always sound cool when they are speaking in Japanese/Other foreign languages

[Florete]

No, it still smells of pedantism to me. It's the way that they're viewed, and there's very little difference (IMO) between them. It's completely different to whats being viewed. (As in, different voice acting, different names, perhaps censorship so even different content).

Names are, like, never changes these days, and censorship only happens for tv broadcasting, and even that is limited these days since most anime ends up aired on Adult Swim and Syfy which only censor strong language. If you still think it's pedantic, I don't think there's much more to discuss on that line of thought.

Chrono Crusade, Bleach, Naruto, Shaman King, Digimon, Noein (although that wasn't too bad, I guess, not as good as subbed though) and Spiral. I never have watched death note or one piece in dub, as far as I can remember.

That's a very limited pool, and nothing very recent either. I'm unfamiliar with Chrono Crusade, Noein, and Spiral, Shaman King I know is bad, Digimon is probably bad from the looks of it, and I don't know why people always have problems with Bleach and Naruto. They are both perfectly fine to me.

Well, out of interest, what is the point then? If I don't like the way the character sounds and findit annoying to listen to, why would I want to listen to it? And moe importantly, why would I put myself through listening to it when there's a better alternative?

The point is that Naruto is a stupid and annoying character. I knew this from reading the manga before I ever even watched the show. If you find him annoying in the dub but not the sub, obviously the dub did it better.

I hate to go back to something you ignored, since you clearly didn't want to consider it the first time, but again: driving. Are you going to read a map while driving? Trust me, you'll miss something and come close to crashing. It's one thing to glance at your mirror or glance at your speedometer and then look back at the road. For the 0.2 seconds it takes to do the action you can mostly predict what will happen on the road during the time that your attention is away from it.

Ha, when I was learning to drive I had problems just checking my mirrors and and braking in time, especially on the freeway (I swear they always stopped when my attention was switched to the mirrors).

[Zkirsche]

blinking is shorter than reading, unless you are insanely fast at reading. Like, Johnny 5 from Short Circuit fast. Well, I guess not that fast, since he supposedly reads entire pages in less time than it takes you or I to blink.

It takes away from the show since you are relying on peripheral vision to watch the action.

There's nothing else to say, but it doesn't. I can say, without a shadow of a doubt, that I get all of the action when reading subs. And you're just going to have to leave it at that.

Besides, it's pretty clear that whatever you are able to get from the show or whatever percentage you convince yourself that you got, some of the rest of us find that we miss stuff. I couldn't count the number of times I had to rewind because I was reading. Either from not being able to read it all or because there was some action that I knew I missed while reading what they were saying. And it sounds like Red Fox has the same problem.

So you guys have that problem. That's fine, just don't come complaining to people who don't have that problem/don't find that problem significant when they say they prefer reading subs because of it, because to us, that reason just doesn't exist as a correct argument for watching dubbed over subbed.

Watching/reading subs is not the same as reading a book whilst driving.

Names are, like, never changes these days

Well, Shaman king was one of my favourite series as a kid growing up, so to see names like Horo Horo get changed into something pathetic liek Trey Racer kinda destroys any and all credibility of that show for me.

That's a very limited pool, and nothing very recent either.

Well, with reading the ongoing series, I kind of abandoned other series and just stuck to it. I don't have the time or teh patience to be watching anime series in the fullest anymore. So even though I meant to watch/read stuff liek prince of tennis and FMA, I never got aroudn to it.

I'm unfamiliar with Chrono Crusade, Noein, and Spiral, Shaman King I know is bad, Digimon is probably bad from the looks of it,

Chrono has some of my least favourite acting. I couldn't put up with it past the first episode. It was that bad. "Merciful Mothermcree!" my ass.

They are both perfectly fine to me.

Well, not to me. And not to a lot of other people.

The point is that Naruto is a stupid and annoying character. I knew this from reading the manga before I ever even watched the show. If you find him annoying in the dub but not the sub, obviously the dub did it better.

But it's not what Naruto is saying/how naruto acts which annoys me, it's the voice. That isn't right.

And it's not just Naruto either, they completely messed up Shino, in my opinion. And Shikamaru too.

[Narga_Rocks]

Watching/reading subs is not the same as reading a book whilst driving.

Why not? Read something in one location while trying to get visual information from another. And I told you to put the book at the top of your wheel so that the positioning is the same. Read something in the same position relative to the road as the subtiltles in an anime is relative to the action. No real difference aside from the consequence of missing something. Maybe you need big print in the book or something, but it is the same action. Unless you think there is significantly more information on the road you need to process than there is on the screen in an anime.

[Nightmare]

It's not just information on the road, it's reacting to the information on the road in time. If you didn't have to react/drive while...well, driving, then yes, it would be very easy to read a book while observing the road at the same time.

[Zkirsche]

Unless you think there is significantly more information on the road you need to process than there is on the screen in an anime.

It's not just information on the road, it's reacting to the information on the road in time. If you didn't have to react/drive while...well, driving, then yes, it would be very easy to read a book while observing the road at the same time.

These sum it up perfectly.

Edited August 31, 2010 by Zwiebel

[FaceDancer]

The trouble with that is that it's not the same as your main vision. Think about it, you don't drive while looking at your dashboard the whole time. Or I hope you don't, anyway. Peripheral vision is not as good as what you are looking at. I doubt you can read with peripheral vision. So you focus on the words.

Ahh, I see you think I'm talking about watching the action while reading through peripheral vision. I do the opposite, because it's much easier. I read the text while simultaneously watching the action through my peripheral vision. To liken it to driving is hardly appropriate, as I am doing everything within my head and not my head, hands, and feet (I'm trying to say that driving takes more things at once whereas watching a show does not, so to try and relate the two is silly).

But it does. Not only does it take your attention away, relying on subtitles also adds more room for imagination as to how things are being said. Japanese is obviously structured differently than English, so say a sentence a character speaks has some emphasis put on a single word. If you don't understand it aside from what you are reading, you can mentally put it where it feels most comfortable, but if you actually understood it it can come off differently and can often sound completely out of place (while I'm at it, this is also the issue with people always thinking the Japanese are some kind of Gods of voice acting; even the Japanese themselves know their actors often overact).

That might not have been completely relevant to what you said now that I look back, but what you said made me think of that so I'll leave it anyway.

Maybe it does to you, but not for me. I've been watching shows subbed for a long time now and I've been able to recall shows I haven't watched in 7-8 years, shows I watched in subs. I watched the action and read the text in acceptable times, and my understanding has not been hindered as a result. I read on upwards of 700 wpm, so what little time I spend reading isn't long enough for something drastic to happen in the show. If there were to be a climactic scene, it would not last for a second and then disappear with no way of gathering what had happened beforehand. Does that make sense?

And no lol I'm not trying to say "Japanese VA are better than everyone else," but rather that I can understand a subbed show just as well as a dubbed and not sacrifice visual enjoyment.

[Narga_Rocks]

It's not just information on the road, it's reacting to the information on the road in time. If you didn't have to react/drive while...well, driving, then yes, it would be very easy to read a book while observing the road at the same time.

These sum it up perfectly.

Not really. Reacting is part of processing. Or, processing comes before reacting. "Observing" is different from "Processing". If you are merely "observing" anime, then I can see why you maybe have an easier time of reading subs then those that try to process the stuff. We try to read more into it, and thus it is more active, and thus it's a little difficult to do that and read at the same time. Compare "hearing" to "listening". Similar idea. If you are ignoring the minutiae, then it's much easier to read and watch at the same time.

When I'm hearing someone, I know they are talking, and perhaps I can repeat a word or two, but after a minute if you ask me to tell you even the general idea of what someone is talking about I'm kinda screwed. If I'm listening, I'll probably even be able to repeat their argument as if it is my own. Comparing observing to processing what you see is similar.

Ahh, I see you think I'm talking about watching the action while reading through peripheral vision.

False. If you can't even understand that much from what I'm saying then I'm not going to bother with you.

[FaceDancer]

False. If you can't even understand that much from what I'm saying then I'm not going to bother with you.

Well aren't we the grumpy one :( I thought maybe I had written it in a way that was different from what I thought.

lol Ok so I skipped a paragraph, but still, I think you're underestimating the abilities of the eye. Differentiating colors in peripheral vision isn't impossible (in fact, I'd go so far as to say you can do it). It's not like I train my eyes for this shit. And back to your dashboard example, I must look forward, side to side, and up into a mirror so that I may see my surroundings. When I'm watching shows, my eyes are focused in a single area with the subtitles conveniently placed below. I'm not straining anything by reading and then watching at the same time, so I say again that trying to compare driving a car and watching anime with subtitles (in regards to peripheral vision) is not very good.

Edited September 1, 2010 by FaceDancer

[Nightmare]

Not really. Reacting is part of processing. Or, processing comes before reacting. "Observing" is different from "Processing". If you are merely "observing" anime, then I can see why you maybe have an easier time of reading subs then those that try to process the stuff. We try to read more into it, and thus it is more active, and thus it's a little difficult to do that and read at the same time. Compare "hearing" to "listening". Similar idea. If you are ignoring the minutiae, then it's much easier to read and watch at the same time.

I used it interchangeably, but ok, it's just as easy to process the information on the road and that of the book when you don't actually have to react to the information on the road. When you're driving, you need to actually do something other than sitting on a chair, while when you're watching anime, all you're doing is sitting there and watching, unless you watch a special kind of interactive anime that I have not heard of.

Replace "watching" with "processing" as desired. I don't watch things without processing them, anyway, so it's all the same to me.

[Florete]

I'm not continuing the reading while watching thing anymore because it's gone into an area that doesn't really matter to me and pursuing it further won't be beneficial, as far as I can tell.

Well, Shaman king was one of my favourite series as a kid growing up, so to see names like Horo Horo get changed into something pathetic liek Trey Racer kinda destroys any and all credibility of that show for me.

I can understand that. That's part of why I said that one was bad.

Chrono has some of my least favourite acting. I couldn't put up with it past the first episode. It was that bad. "Merciful Mothermcree!" my ass.

It's got a good cast with names like Greg Ayres, Monica Rial, and Kira Vincent-Davis (although I'm not a huge fan of Tiffany Grant and Jessica Boone myself), so maybe what annoyed you was a choice few things that don't come back later. I've not actually seen it, though, so I can only speculate based on what I know from the cast members.

Well, not to me. And not to a lot of other people.

I know. That's why I said I don't understand. People have been very accepting of dubs like Code Geass which have a lot of the same voice actors and therefore the same style of acting.

But it's not what Naruto is saying/how naruto acts which annoys me, it's the voice. That isn't right.

Are you sure you aren't just saying this because you're used to him in Japanese? That is usually the case in a situation like this.

And it's not just Naruto either, they completely messed up Shino, in my opinion. And Shikamaru too.

Shino actually got changed midway through. I didn't even notice, but my brother said the new guy was a lot better. And Shikamaru? I thought he was one of the most well-done, and I've heard even sub fans who don't like the dub for the most part say that Shikamaru was done well also.

[FaceDancer]

This reminds me oh so much of the PS3 v. 360 threads.

[Narga_Rocks]

I used it interchangeably, but ok, it's just as easy to process the information on the road and that of the book when you don't actually have to react to the information on the road. When you're driving, you need to actually do something other than sitting on a chair, while when you're watching anime, all you're doing is sitting there and watching, unless you watch a special kind of interactive anime that I have not heard of.

Replace "watching" with "processing" as desired. I don't watch things without processing them, anyway, so it's all the same to me.

Why can't you move the wheel while reading, though? Your hands are separate from your eyes and your ears. Obviously while rotating the wheel you won't be able to continue reading because the words move, but I'm not asking you to do that. But otherwise?

I just find it hard to believe that you could see what all the cars are even doing while you are looking down. Forget the book, since I mentioned the speedometer earlier. Actually, scratch that, forget everything but the "try to drive using peripheral vision" problem. You aren't concentrating on what you read, none of that. You are simply staring at a fixed point inside your car that is a similar location to where subtitles are in anime. Never let your eyes deviate. 100% of your concentration, however, is put into driving. Do you really think that you can glean enough information from your peripheral vision to drive safely?

[Nightmare]

I just find it hard to believe that you could see what all the cars are even doing while you are looking down. Forget the book, since I mentioned the speedometer earlier. Actually, scratch that, forget everything but the "try to drive using peripheral vision" problem. You aren't concentrating on what you read, none of that. You are simply staring at a fixed point inside your car that is a similar location to where subtitles are in anime. Never let your eyes deviate. 100% of your concentration, however, is put into driving. Do you really think that you can glean enough information from your peripheral vision to drive safely?

Well no, no one can unless they have superhuman eyes, and if anyone is 100% using peripheral vision then they're doing it wrong (I'm assuming you're replying to FaceDancer's argument). I really only take a quick glance at the subs and get what I need. Unless it's overly long (which it never is), this suffices. While I'm glancing at the sub, I use my peripheral vision to keep track of what's happening in the show (this all takes less than a second).

My point, however, is that with a little bit of focus and training, watching subbed shows should really be no different than watching dubbed ones. If you're not willing to go through that tiny bit of effort, that's alright. Just saying that it's not impossible to watch subs and enjoy them as much as dubs.

[FaceDancer]

Well no, no one can unless they have superhuman eyes, and if anyone is 100% using peripheral vision then they're doing it wrong (I'm assuming you're replying to FaceDancer's argument). I really only take a quick glance at the subs and get what I need. Unless it's overly long (which it never is), this suffices. While I'm glancing at the sub, I use my peripheral vision to keep track of what's happening in the show (this all takes less than a second).

My point, however, is that with a little bit of focus and training, watching subbed shows should really be no different than watching dubbed ones. If you're not willing to go through that tiny bit of effort, that's alright. Just saying that it's not impossible to watch subs and enjoy them as much as dubs.

(I love how everyone assumes that if I don't mention how much I do something, they think I'm doing it all the time.) Nightmare does exactly what I do, I only use peripheral vision when reading the subs. It's not like I'm watching the whole show out of the corner of my eye lol

[Florete]

Narga, if you want to continue this you can, I'm not stopping you, but I think the way things are continuing now is a bit off-track and is becoming fairly pointless. I never meant to start an argument of "Can you properly watch a show while reading subtitles?" because, honestly, I can for the most part, and I do (click the link in my sig that says "My Anime List" and look at the "Currently Watching" portion. 9 of those are airing in Japan and are sub-only), and I think most people can as well (there are exceptions of course. Some people are slow readers, some people have dyslexia, etc.). I said what I did in the first place to counter the "I want to watch it the way the creators intended" argument, but that doesn't appear to be the subject anymore. Whether or not someone can read subtitles while getting the full effect of the show at the same time doesn't really mean much in the argument of quality for sub vs dub.

I'll say it again to be sure it's clear; I have no problem with people preferring subbed anime. I'm not trying to say that dubs > subs because it's more of a case-by-case basis. I just hate it when people say shit like "All dubs suck!" "Japanese version is always better!" and "Dub fans should disappear." all of which I have seen in the past.

And if I seem strangely hardcore about this, it's because I used to deal with this war on a daily basis on a few other forums I've visited, and still do on occasion. Those people are much more purist than people here, though, and are a lot harder to get through to (Lol @ saying Cowboy Bebop's dub was not good).

[Narga_Rocks]

It's not like I'm saying you'll get nothing from what your eyes see of the action while reading. Just saying that the split focus is bound to cause some problems, minor or major, and the severity depends on the person.