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the-fantabulous-toast · 1 year

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Lettering sound effects in Shiori Experience

Hi! I’m Toast, the letterer on #dropout’s English translation of Shiori Experience. This series was my first time doing typesetting, and I’ve learned a lot over the two years I’ve been involved in the project. Each new chapter brings new challenges, and as our team has matured we’ve gotten more ambitious. We recently began translating the comic’s sound effects along with the dialogue, a decision which instantly doubled the size of our workload.

Our most recent release, Chapter 64, was probably the most technically complex chapter we’ve done so far. The sound effects in this chapter were varied and complicated, presenting a number of interesting challenges. Today I thought it would be fun to give y’all a peek behind the curtain, and show the thought process and effort that goes into the adaptation of sound effects in Shiori Experience.

Shiori Experience is a music manga [citation needed], so it isn’t surprising that the sound effects can get pretty complicated. Music manga need to convey not just the sound, but more importantly the impact of a performance, conveying an auditory experience in a totally silent medium. Shiori Experience’s approach to this problem is to make the sound effects semi-diegetic objects. They hang in the air, burst out of crowds, get obscured by foreground objects, and cast shadows on their environment. This is a really cool effect, but also makes converting them from Japanese to English a fucking nightmare.

(Look at the shadows)

Shiori Experience is kind of a nightmare

In some ways, lettering for Shiori Experience isn’t actually that difficult. Sound effects in this series are goddamn everywhere and they’re fucking gigantic, but they’re always straightforward. Much like the art of the series, the sound effects are clean and angular, strong dynamic shapes which are easy to parse even if you can’t read the katakana. For a great example of this, look at this sequence from Chapter 64.

This sequence demonstrates what you can achieve with good lettering. The sound of the band is conveyed perfectly with these visuals. The clear and regular beat of the drums, the dark and energetic bass line, the screaming uncontrollable energy of the electric guitar. We didn’t even bother translating it. We didn’t need to.

But look at the sequence again. In spite of its apparent complexity, there’s only two fonts here, a dynamic block text and an angular brush. Those two fonts represent the vast majority of SFX in Shiori Experience. The rest is just text effects and perspective tricks.

So to convert these sound effects into English, we just have to find equivalent fonts. It took me a while to pin down a set of fonts I was happy with. For the pointy brush font I eventually settled on Jolly Lodger, a brush font with a sort of piratey vibe. I’m still not 100% satisfied with this conversion, it isn’t as pointy as the original, but it’s good enough for now.

And for the big block font I chose Boogaloo. It looks a little thin when it’s on its own like this, but it really bulks up with the right text effects.

Great! We’ve got our fonts! Doing the sound effects should be as simple as erasing the old text and replacing it with the new text, right? Wrong. The nightmare begins.

Different approaches

There are several schools of thought when it comes to lettering manga SFX. One is the "keikkaku means plan" approach. In a translator's note outside the panel, or in plain text near the SFX, describe what the sound is. This is incredibly easy. This is also lame.

(This is from the official release of Dungeon Meshi. I wouldn’t want to redraw this one either, but like, come on guys.)

Another school of thought is style matching. Similar to the translator’s note approach, but rather than plain text, the translation uses similar text effects to the original SFX. This works fine, but it can create a lot of visual clutter if implemented poorly.

(This is from Drifting Dragons. Please read Drifting Dragons.)

The last approach is full replacement. In this approach, the original SFX is (are you ready for this?) fully replaced by the new SFX.

SFX Redrawing

Replacing a sound effect isn’t as simple as just erasing it. We work with tankoban pages, scans of the Japanese volume release. These files are flattened, with the art and text all on one layer as a single image. We can’t just disable the text. In order to remove the original SFX, we have to redraw them.

(for context this is from when I had covid)

Redrawing means recreating the art hidden by the original SFX. This is a complex process, requiring a steady hand, sharp eyes, and a lot of guesswork. Since we don’t know what precisely is underneath the original SFX, we have to use context to reconstruct it. The goal of any localization is to make the translation invisible to the reader. The same principle holds true in redrawing. The art we add needs to be invisible, meshing seamlessly with the original artwork.

(I made this dude up out of whole cloth. I’m honestly really proud of how he came out.)

#Dropout uses a mix of style matching and full replacement, with the choice between the two being determined by a number of factors. To illustrate that decision-making process, let’s break down the process of redrawing a page of Shiori Experience, specifically the spread across pages 172 and 173 from Chapter 64.

Deciding between Style Match and Full Replacement

This is the original untranslated page, and there’s a lot going on.

In the background of the first panel is the sound of the band, バアアアン, phonetically translated as "BA-A-A-A-N", localized as “BWAAAM”. In the foreground is the cheering of the crowd, ボオワアアア, "BO-O-WA-A-A-A" phonetically, “ROOAAR” localized. Lastly, along the side of panels 3 through 6 is applause, パチ, "PA-CHI", “CLAP”.

At a glance, this page is overwhelming. The cheering sound effect is huge, with custom text effects conveying the energy of the crowd. Worse is the clapping, which overlays multiple panels with dozens of unique partially obscured faces. This looks like a pain in the ass to redraw, but in the end I decided to do a full replacement instead of a simpler style match. With the number and size of the SFX combined with the visual density of the panels, doing a style match would result in a cluttered unreadable mess. Too much of the original artwork would be covered, and there just isn’t enough space. So, full replacement.

The redrawing process

As I’ve gained more experience, it’s been surprising to learn what constitutes a difficult redraw. You’d expect crowd shots to be the hardest, with lots of unique faces and little details, but they actually aren’t that bad IMO. More detail means more context means less guessing. Definitely a lot of work, but not difficult. Meanwhile, something like a gradient or screentone pattern which looks simple is actually a goddamn nightmare to recreate, as we'll see later.

That’s why I started my redraw for this page with the clapping. Again, this looks like it would be really hard, but looks can be deceiving. There’s a lot of clapping, yes, but the text is thin and spaced out. Whiting out the text reveals just how little artwork is actually hidden by the sound effects.

After whiting out the original text, the next step is connecting as many existing lines as I can. I do the panel and bubble borders on a separate layer since they’re simple structural elements. The artwork itself requires a bit more thought. I need to examine the original artwork carefully to avoid connecting lines that shouldn’t be connected. Context can also provide guidance where there are no lines to connect, such as the cheering guy’s hat in the first panel, or the clapping hand in the second panel. Also, when there’s lots of little SFX like this it’s easy to miss a few lines, like the box thing near the bottom of the last panel (don’t worry I catch it later).

The last step is adding in all the inking and screentones, the pattern templates which fill in the “color” to the line work. I have to go through with the clone stamp tool, collect samples from the image, and extend the pattern to fill the blank areas. This is the most annoying step in the process for me, because it requires a level of precision even beyond what’s required for the line work. Humans are pattern-recognition machines. Our brains are really good at catching tiny discrepancies, like when a section of a pattern doesn’t quite line up with the rest of it. My patch job on this panel wasn’t perfect, and you can see where I couldn’t quite line things up in areas like the guy’s checkered shirt in the first panel.

And with that, this redraw is complete! Now it’s time to insert the English translation of the sound effect.

SFX Lettering

The clapping SFX is in that same brush font I pointed out earlier, which we use JollyLodger for. There’s no real perspective things or text effects here, so mimicking the original isn’t difficult. Here’s the before and after.

This approach of fully redrawing the old SFX before inserting the new SFX only works in situations like this, where the text is small and there’s enough detail to reconstruct the image with a high level of confidence. As an SFX gets larger, like the roar of a crowd, the harder it gets to fully replace. This calls for a different approach.

Because of the size and complexity of this sound effect, I decided to do the lettering first. This is the block font I identified earlier, which is replaced by Boogaloo. I do some basic manipulation right away, applying a black outline and distorting the text to create the same perspective effect as the original. The SFX in this series are subtly three-dimensional, and the replacement text needs to be in the same orientation to sell the effect.

I’m also being careful with my placement here, doing my best to align the new text with the old. This will be important later.

Next we need to recreate the distortion effect. Photoshop has functionality to mimic this kind of effect, but I opted to do it manually. Osada (the mangaka) does all these layouts, SFX and all, on paper. The original effect was hand drawn, so the replacement effect is hand drawn.

The lettering for this effect is now complete, and we can begin the redraw process. Since we already have the letters in place, we have the advantage of knowing exactly where a redraw is needed, turning what would otherwise have been an enormous replacement into a minor patch job. From here, it’s the same process as the clapping SFX: Raw, Blank, Line, Fill.

Minor sidebar: translating Japanese sound effects presents an interesting and incredibly niche problem. The katakana symbol オ is translated phonetically as “o”. The problem with that is that when you’re replacing a オ with an O in a sound effect, the hole of the O is positions right on the center of the オ. This makes オ really annoying to redraw. Every O turns into a little window of totally new art, with barely any reference points to draw from. It violates the principle of invisibility, but there’s really no way around it. You can see I got a little lazy here, and clonestamped a different section of the crowd into the hole. As long as I don’t draw attention to it nobody will notice. I hope.

Sidebar over. Just for fun, here’s the before and after for the whole page.

Closing thoughts

So that’s what it takes to do the sound effects for one page of Shiori Experience. This page alone took me multiple days to complete, and it wasn’t even the most complicated page in this chapter. It isn’t why our releases take so long (that can be laid at the feet of staffing and scheduling issues), but hopefully I’ve given you a sense of how much work goes into each new chapter.

This chapter would have taken even longer without the help of Adi and Bangistus, who pitched in on a lot of the smaller SFX. Up until now the lettering of this series has been a solo show, Toast all the way down. Now that Adi and Bang are on the team I’m still keeping most of the big pages for myself, but being able to toss to the others when I get overwhelmed is going to be invaluable. Hopefully I can rely on them in the future as well, there’s some big things coming down the pipe

This series is a labor of love. Sometimes frustrating, often exhausting, but always worth it. I owe this series a lot, and I hope it shows in the work I put into it. I think it would be fun to do more behind the scenes process content like this, so maybe keep an eye out for that in the future.

Lastly, just as a status update, #dropout is not dropping Shiori Experience. We have a temporary translator who’s helping us put together Chapter 65, which will be coming out Eventually™. Not as long as last time, but like always don’t hold your breath. We’re not sure what will happen after 65 drops. We’re still desperately hiring for a main translator, seriously if you know anybody please hit me up.

That’s all from me. Take care y’all.

#shiori experience #scanlation #lettering #typesetting #redrawing #manga #toastpoasting

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signorpaolinopaperino · 22 days

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X Mickey 17-3: Invisible Bond

We've got to go back before we can go forward! XM introduced an antagonist in a side story who has made a couple reappearances in main stories. Even when the comics were being officially translated, these side stories were never published in English! So here's the story that character—Snobbs—was first introduced in. He plays a main role in XM 26-1 and XM 29-1!

Mickey attempts to travel to the Impossible for an explanation after Pipwolf leaves him high and dry with a new Guide.

Read/Download this issue:

Google Photos

Google Drive (cbr)

Written by Teresa Radice Art by Stefano Turconi

InDucks I XM 17-3

#topolino #x mickey #my scanlation #x-mickey #pipwolf #sorry but im not cleaning and typesetting a new title on this lol. i feel like the title is self-explanatory. you get it you see it #you dont really need to read this to understand the following stories w snobbs

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silvermoon424 · 9 months

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Hi! I wanted to know, how do you do typesetting for manga? What sort of tools do you use? I recently discovered a series that has text only translations, and wanted to learn how to typeset so I could combine them with the raw scans.

Hello! It's great to hear that someone else is getting into typesetting! I'm entirely self-taught (didn't even look at guides or anything, I just felt it out and it shows in my earlier work lol) but the nice thing about typesetting is that it's pretty easy to get a feel for. Honestly, Photoshop does most of the technical work; I would say a lot of typesetting has to do with art and visual aesthetics. It's your job to make things look right, and you can get really fancy with it (especially with sound effects).

I'm very slowly working on a very long PMMM doujinshi, here's a sample page of my work and what I mean about making things look "right" (in regards to text placement, cleaning bubbles, etc). My personal preference is to break up words as seldom as possible, which is a philosophy even a lot of official typesetters don't share lol (probably because a lot of typesetters value speed over little touches like that).

Anyway, Photoshop will be your best friend! I'll be honest, it's been a hot minute since I pirated my copy and I don't even think the method is valid anymore. From what I understand GenP (Windows) and AdobeZii (Mac) are the new methods of cracking Photoshop. Here are the GenP and AdobeZii subreddits for guidance. Also, if you have a Mac apparently downloading directly from Cmacked is the way to get Photoshop.

Anyway, I really can't get into all the tricks and intricacies I've learned over the years about typesetting. However, I found this AMAZING, comprehensive guide that I would strongly suggest using as a reference. They cover all of the fundamentals as well as a lot of the extras. There's even a few things in here that I wasn't aware of and will definitely be brushing up on!

I've also uploaded my font reference file to Google Docs. All the fonts show up as arial, but I've included screencaps of what they look like. These are all free fonts and can be found/downloaded if you just Google the name. Generally, Wild Words is considered the standard font in manga/doujinshi scanlations (although of course there are variants). It's what I use in all my standard text. All the rest are for sound effects, aside text, emotional text that is meant to be elevated, etc.

I would also suggest at least downloading custom heart and star shapes (or brushes) for Photoshop; there are a bunch of free ones available and those shapes tend to come up in manga speech bubbles a lot.

Oh, and make sure you make a credits page for your releases. Mine are super bare-bones (just white text on a black background for the most part) but you deserve to be credited for your labor! So does whoever translated the manga. Once you get the series up and rolling I would suggest starting to upload to Mangadex (the hub of scanlation where tens of thousands of people can see what you've made). If you need help figuring out how to do that, hit me up again when you get to that point. You'll have to create a group but it's super easy.

Am I forgetting anything else? This is such a near and dear hobby of mine and I feel like there's just so much to cover, lol. Please let me know if you have any other questions!

#typesetting #scanlation #scanlations #guide #my guides #tutorial #tutorials #resource #manga

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dadfathers · 11 months

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SPARE BIKE 111 hehehe

#yowamushi pedal #scanlating spare bike 111 w my sibling’s translation! cleaned and just have to typeset 👍 look forward to it ( ^-^)🫶#some small cuts from the cleaned and edited scan :•]#these 5 are in the chapter and no one else lol #oh wait and kinjou for like 1 page #shinkai peeking out from below fuku is hilarious…

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daily-mao-isara · 8 months

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Day 306 : Bkubstars!

Smart character?

[translated and typeset by me]

#enstars #mao isara #makoto yuuki #typesetting is so hard i have a new found respect for fan scanlations #also the sfx orignially has dots in it but have u ever tried redrawing dots? very hard #to do the bg of the last one i just selected and area and duplicated it...

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hua-fei-hua · 5 months

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ah the scanlation rights turf war over hanako-kun seems to have been resolved since i last caught up.... rest in pieces ropes of fate scanlations i was rooting for you,,,

#both groups have scanlations of similar quality with the redraws and sfx especially being of just stunning quality #but i liked rof's typesetting more... it felt a little more careful and attentive #i think i liked their translation style a little more too but it's been a while since i compared those #花話 #still the two groups competed on their releases for a long time it seems... i wonder what was going on there tbh

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tiashe · 1 year

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I won't be scanlating LGBMH anymore so if anyone wants to pick it up please go ahead :) I'd be happy to translate since that's the easiest part for me

#i have a couple random chapters fully translated but unscanlated anyway #also edit: i just realized i have one chapter almost fully scanlated so i'll try to typeset and finish it

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terezis · 1 year

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ok. i have put away photoshop. someone else will have to translate the rest of ophelia that’s not my job anymore. i did my time and i’m retired now. i am going to finish chapter two of ttw tonight

#here's my scanlation retrospective now that i have done four chapters:#LOVE typesetting #HATE redrawing #overall fun but too time-consuming for so little external validation. LOL #and my japanese is not That good yet so i spent half my time looking up obscure grammar rules......

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starbudspresents · 2 years

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Re.Gray 016 - Aria, pt. 8

[ Masterlist ] [Read on AO3] [ Raws ]

Summary: The end of the tragic tale, and a lot of notes about the symbol on Kanda's chest.

16th Night - Aria of an Old Clay Man and Lonely Nights ⑧

sfx: kasha [Lala's Innocence heart goes flying]

♦ 162

[This page contains no sound or dialogue, only the heart falling back into the blast zone, where Allen and Kanda lie a few steps apart in the sand. Timcanpy hovers worriedly near Allen's head.]

♦ 163

sfx: tosa [Innocence lands in the sand in front of Allen's face]

Allen: Please... live... Allen: one more time... Allen: for Lala...

♦ 164

16th Night - Aria of an Old Clay Man and Lonely Nights ⑧

♦ 165

Komui: Ahh, blue skies, Komui: emerald seas, Komui: por favor, Italia~! ♫1

sfx: birih [Kanda peels a bandage off his cheek, unmoved] Kanda: Get to the point.

Komui: The "point"? Komui: Hmph. Komui: The point is I'm jealous, damn it! sfx: pomu pomu pomu [Komui slamming his official seal down on papers as they're presented upon his desk]

Staff: Director... these need your stamp too... Komui: It's been three whole days since you reported your defeat of the Akuma! What are you still doing there!? Komui: Meanwhile I'm being run ragged by this lot, unable even to go outside, like a princess confined to her tower— 2

Kanda: Quit squawking, you're so loud.

♦ 166

Kanda: If you've got a problem, take it up with him! By the way, Komui, I really don't get along with him!

Komui: You don't get along with anyone. So? Where is Allen?

sfx: buchih [Kanda rips an IV out of his forearm with unnecessary force] Kanda: Tch. Still in the city with that doll!!

Komui: The doll named "Lala".... Komui: Not long now, hm?

Kanda: Probably not. Kanda: The doll that’s been around for the last five hundred years is gone already; that’s something else. Kanda: Should stop any second now.

♦ 167

Doctor: Wait, wait, what do you think you're doing!?

Kanda: Heading out. See him for your money.

sfx: zuh [Toma bows, proffering a money envelope]

Doctor: Huh? sfx: bunbun [doctor waves a forbidding hand at Kanda] Doctor: No, no, absolutely not! You've been badly wounded, your convalescence will take at least five months!!

Kanda: I'm good.

Doctor: I’m quite sure you’re not!!

Reever: Director, got room for more?

sfx: tosuh [Kanda thrusts the bundle of discarded bandages into the doctor's arms] sfx: basa [Kanda pulls his shirt on, revealing flawless, unbroken skin and a very interesting symbol3 tattooed over his heart] Kanda: Thanks for all your help.

♦ 168

Doctor: T-That’s impossible....

sfx: tsuktsukatsuka [Kanda still talking to Komui, but indistinct as he’s left the room]

Doctor: His wounds... They’re gone....

Komui: Took you quite a while to heal up this time, didn’t it.

Kanda: But I did heal. Komui: But the fact that it took you so long implies that it’s beginning to fail you. Komui: You mustn’t misgauge Komui: how much life you have left.

♦ 169

Kanda: So, Kanda: what do you want? Kanda: If you just called to pester me, I’m hanging up.

Komui: Good God, Reever, did you hear that just now? What harsh words!

Reever: Huh?

Komui: It’s actually about your next mission....

Mother: My goodness, what’s this now? Mother: She doesn’t usually fall sleep until I sing her a lullaby.... sfx: su— [baby’s breath whistling a little in her sleep] Mother: The wind is a little high today.... Mother: Perhaps the rustling of the trees sounds like singing. sfx: saa.... [trees rustling in the wind]

♦ 170

Narr: Later: Narr: Upon having her heart returned, Lala stirred once more. Narr: However.... Lala: Honoured human.... Lala: Shall I sing for you....?

Narr: She was no longer “Lala”, Narr: but the doll Guzol had first encountered.

♦ 171

Lala: Honoured human.... sfx: gishi gishi gishi [dusty creaking as she crawls towards Guzol] Lala: I am a doll... made to sing.... Lala: Honoured human....

Lala, past: Guzol, Lala, past: what song would you like next?

Guzol, past: Look how well you’re cleaning up, Lala!

Lala, past: Lala?

Guzol, past: A name for you, miss ghost. May I call you that?

♦ 172

Lala: Little boy, shall I sing for you...?

Guzol: You’d sing for me...? Guzol: Lala...

♦ 173

Guzol: I love you so much.4

Lala: Are you sleeping? Lala: A lullaby, then.

♦ 174

Narr: Thenceforth, the doll sang her lullaby without cease.

Kanda: Hey, no sleeping on the job, lookout.

Allen: ! Allen: Hmm...? Allen: What’s Mr. Five-Months’-Convalescence doing here?

sfx: dosah [Kanda flumps down on the steps a few down from Allen]

Kanda: I’m good.

Allen: I doubt that....

Kanda: Drop it.

♦ 175

Kanda: Got a call from Komui. Kanda: I’m heading out on my next mission from here. Kanda: You get the Innocence back to headquarters.

Allen: ...... Allen: Understood.

Kanda: ............ Kanda: If it’s too hard on you, just stop the doll already. It’s not Lala anymore.

Allen: They made a promise. Allen: Only Guzol was allowed to break her.

♦ 176

Kanda: You’re still so naive. Kanda: We’re “destroyers”, not “saviours”. Allen: ......I know. Allen: But I—

sfx: hyuoh [sudden silence] sfx: ooooo [truly nothing but the wind singing now]

♦ 177

Allen: She’s stopped singing... Narr: On the third night after Guzol’s passing, Narr: the doll stopped.

sfx: su [Allen kneels at her side]

♦ 178

Lala: Thank you, Lala: for letting me sing until I broke. Lala: This way, I’ve kept our promise. sfx: gasha... [she collapses into Allen’s lap, a silent mechanical heap]

Kanda: Hey? What’s—

Allen: Kanda.... Allen: Despite it all, I’d like to become a destroyer who can save.

Volume 2 - Aria of Old Clay Man and Lonely Nights [END]

♦♥♦

FOOTNOTES

A bit of cringe: a) "Por favor" means "please"... in Spanish. In Italian, it's "per favore", which is close but would be spelled differently in katakana, so he definitely just got this wrong. b) Even if he'd gotten it right, "Please Italy" would still be bad Italian. I suppose we get the gist, at least. [ ♠ ]

まるでお城に幽閉されたプリンセ— marude o-shiro ni yuuheisareta purinse—

Other translations said "prince" or "prisoner" here, but he doesn't get cut off until we get that se at the end there, which narrows it down to"princess". There's a long folkloric history of royal maidens getting locked away for their own supposed protection, so you should definitely be picturing Komupunzel here. [ ♠ ]

Ohhhh boy here's one I've been excited to get to. Fandom spent years chewing on this, myself very much included, but I'm quite certain I have the correct answer now: this is not a badly drawn or incomplete Sanskrit "om", but a complete and perfect Siddhaṃ "om".

Siddhaṃ is a modified abugida based on Sanskrit, hence the resemblance. (An abugida is something like an alphabet wherein each symbol represents a syllable rather than a sound, ie "si" vs. "s".) It forms the basis of modern-day Nepalese script, among others, and was introduced to Japan in 806 by a travelling monk trained in Mantrayana Buddhism. Japan took to it as a method of writing out mantras and sutras neither the Chinese nor Japanese syllabaries were phonetically suited to, and became deeply intwined with the institution of Japanese esoteric Buddhism, represented by its foremost rival sects: Shingon ("mantra") and Tendai (named for its Chinese parent Tiantai).

If you've ever watched an anime in which some character chants something that sounds like "on san zan saku sowaka" or "on amirita teisei kara un" or suchlike, those were Shingon mantras. The nine hand signs in Naruto are Shingon mudras. Once you know what you're looking at, it's everywhere.

When it comes to Kanda, the "om" (or, transliterated in an older, less common way which will see again later, "aum") on his chest could indicate a wealth of meanings. Going back to the roots, "om" is a sacred word composed of the first and last letters of the Sanskrit alphabet, of a full opening ("o"/"au") and full closing ("m"). It thus encompasses everything in between the beginning and the end of anything. You've probably heard the Christian term "the alpha and the omega", which is a translation of a similar concept into Greek. You may also have heard the Japanese term "ah-un" , which is a straight transliteration of "om". "Ah" is the opening, the inhale, the beginning, while "un" is the closing, the exhale, the end. It is usually, at its heart, an affirmation and encompassing of all existence, though each sect has its own additional meanings and interpretations.

If we take into account what this tattoo is a seal upon — the core in Kanda's chest where his heart should be, which renders him incompletely immortal — we might be able to get a glimpse of what it's meant to represent in this context. Perhaps the drawing (inhalation) and expenditure (exhalation) of his pooled life force, to which he has access because the spell structure has essentially tied one end of his life to the other, the beginning devouring the end like an orobouros? That would be my first guess, personally, but I think there's lot of room for fandom-wide meta on the possibilities thereof, especially in light of the later introduction of Helix magic on top of the esoteric Buddhist magic we already knew. [ ♠ ]

Once again footnoting just to tell you which term got translated to "love" this time: 大好き daisuki, "big-like". Suki alone can mean anything from "I've taken a liking to you" to "I'm interested in you romantically/sexually" to "I love you", but daisuki pretty much always means "love" in one way or the other. [ ♠ ]

#dgm #dgm translations #dgm meta #kanda yuu #d.gray-man #re.gray #guess who's got two thumbs and is learning to clean and typeset #i draw the line at redrawing though #i have very unsteady hands #i would not have fun #but eventually i aim to put out at least a passable scanlation #even a very rough one would be an improvement over script-only

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