| Current location: | Japan, Yo! |
| Current mood: |  sleepy |
| Current music: | AI - Story |
| Entry tags: | conan |
Quitting sometimes solves something.
Greetings, fellow readers! It is I, Sleepy Janitha, posting something random as usual. It's straight up eleven in the evening on Tuesday night here, and I just finished up my cooking lesson and subsequent conversation with my neighbor Etsuko Kaneko about an hour and a half ago. Before my lesson, however, I was gifted with a initially puzzling and then a faint yada (don't wanna~!), "gag-me" feeling. Let me elaborate.
So this afternoon, I got an email on my phone from this young man whom I used to work with on subbing Detective Conan (I was an editor). Around the end of May, he announced that he was quitting the fansubbing community for the pursuit of something else that might interest him more. I thought that this was perfect for me, because I was steadily feeling pressure to crank out an episode that I wasn't that interested in editing. For example, I'd take longer and longer (two or three weeks at most) to send back a script that might take all of three hours to work the main kinks out of. If that's not a sign that I wasn't "feeling" the whole editing gig much anymore, i don't know what is.
Anyway, at the time, I gave him my diplomatic fairwells and wished him luck in real life and all that. I said nothing about wanting to pick up where we left off because the group was basically finished. If I had wanted to keep editing stuff, I would have joined up with another Conan group, say, DCTP, the Detective Conan Translation Project. I've enjoyed my free time since the beginning of June when I turned in my last script. I like coming home and staring off into space if I want to. In the end, I was so disinclined to to work on editing scripts (that required more time than usual to get through because of issues with the translator/translation) that I would only really get to work when my supervisor boss guy asked, "How's 156 coming?" And working under DCTP was more nerve-wracking than ever working for this other group. They were crazy and wanted edits of scripts within a couple of days of them being sent to me.
Well, that was actually for a special project where there was a new, plot-driven episode aired every week (in place of a one-time, two-hour special like they usually do), but I didn't enjoy the four weeks of feeling overworked when I got home from school, which usually landed on my English conversation class day, which is a busy ass night already for me. Nope, didn't enjoy it at all. Even on a good, leisurely day of editing, I like to watch a show at least twice after the first actual editing session. There's always something you don't catch the first, second, even third time. So I'm a perfectionist in a way. So sue me. In general, I don't like to have my name attached to crap.
Um...where was I? Oh, yes. Today. So, when I got an email about "Conan news" from an excited Supervisor Boss Guy, I actually thought that it had something to do with the actual series. I hadn't heard from the guy in several weeks, save for random spam-like messages stating unwarranted information about his cable bill and other things I've since blocked from my mind/deleted from my message history. So I fell for the bait and asked, "What Conan news?" Foolish move, J. He eventually goes on to say that the group has decided to do episodes "205+" and that he's sent several scripts to my gmail account already.
Dang. I didn't know that there was still a group. I thought it was over. I thought I didn't have to worry about starting to dislike editing fansubs anymore. But when I read that email, I didn't feel excitement over the thrill of a challenge (that is, making sense of possibly disjointed translations). I just felt tired. You know how your lips move a bit to the side in a kind of "hmph" expression when you don't really like what you're hearing? Well, that's about all the emotion I could muster.
After being spammed with two or three more messages asking me why I wasn't answering (maybe because the I was away from my phone doing work for once?), I got ready to leave for home and told him that I'd respond with my answer after I got back from my night class. I had Vanessa help me pen a terse (for me, at least) email back to my boss guy and tell him my thoughts about working on a seemingly infinite project. I know that I was able to get through the ones I did while I was over here in Japan because I could see the light at the end of the tunnel. But to sign on to more of the same stuff without a goal in sight is beyond me right now. I've gotten used to having other things occupy my time other than subbing Conan. Not to say that I dislike the show or anything. I just don't want to work behind the scenes right now anymore.
Blah. So, anyway, I basically said that I'd thought that he'd retired and that he'd gotten over his burnout quicker than I had. I told him that I wanted to stop fansubbing while I still liked it, not when I detested it. I also said that I'd feel pressured if I signed on to do more than one episode. Then I said that I was sorry I couldn't help, but I just didn't want to do it. Then I wished him well. That succinct reply was all thanks to Vanessa. She helped me keep it short, and not ramble on, trying to explain my actions. (I continued to do the same with her on the phone as she said, "I know. I know." Thanks, Vanessa!)
Mmm... That's been about an hour ago. I feel bad for turning someone down (not that I was officially asked if I was on board until my boss guy was somewhat affected by my not answering his summons immediately). But I know that I'd feel worse for getting involved in editing again and not being completely gung-ho about it. I think that someone else who's still passionate about the editing job should take it over. I hope he's able to find someone good to work on it. I won't complain to anyone if I don't like the edits, though. I'm not such a Conan editing snob that I can't watch episodes that I haven't edited myself. However, if it were some kind of movie (say, the Lovely Complex movie that I recently watched with Vanessa two Saturdays ago), I wouldn't have a problem with fixing that up. And, you know, that's what I did. I was finished with it in about a hour and a half, tops. The grammar was already pretty good. Some lines were just kinda awkward. But I fixed it. For my benefit and for Vanessa's.
Shoot, this got really long. I'm totally going to bed now. It's like ten till midnight. I'll continue my complaining later. Later.
G'night, all!!!
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haibarasan) wrote,
