Anime Foley Translation Lab
Over two days you'll translate a Spanish-subtitled anime scene, build every sound effect from scratch, and perform it live.
Today: learn the craft, translate the scene, build your first sounds, and stage a rough cut. The premiere — and one big secret — wait for Day 2.
Every footstep, punch, and laser blast in a movie is made by hand on a Foley stage by people with weird props. Watch them work.
Foley breaks into three pillars:
- Feet — every footstep on every surface
- Moves — cloth, breath, body movement
- Specifics — every prop a character touches
From the anime Space Symphony Maetel (Leiji Matsumoto — the Captain Harlock universe).
Setting: a space pirate ship under attack. Laser missiles incoming. We're on the bridge.
Three characters — three energies:
- Captain Harlock — tall, long coat, skull insignia. Calm.
- Tochiro — short, at the wooden ship's wheel, cloak and hat. About to do something bold. Intense. (Spelled "Toshiro" in the Spanish subtitles.)
- Yattaran — the kid in the bandana. Panicking.
Out loud as a group, say "¡Prepárense!" (Get ready!) three ways: calm like Harlock, intense like Tochiro, panicked like Yattaran. Same words, totally different sound. That's the whole job today.
Sound is vibration. Vibration travels through anything it touches — air, metal, a tabletop, your bones.
Salt sits on a real metal plate. As the pitch changes, the salt leaps away from the loud spots and draws a pattern. That pattern is what sound looks like.
When it's your group's turn at the plate, sweep the tone-generator app from low to high and watch the pattern change shape with the pitch.
- Stretch plastic wrap tight over your aluminum pie plate. The tighter, the better.
- Sprinkle a pinch of salt on top.
- Open a free Tone Generator app on a phone. Rest the phone speaker-up next to the aluminum pie plate and sweep from low to high.
- Find the pitch where the salt jumps and clumps. That's resonance — you found it.
The clip plays silent, with Spanish subtitles. Your job: get it into English. Today is the first pass — get the meaning and pick your voices. You'll polish the tricky lines on Day 2.
Pull it up on your phone to translate, build, and rehearse at your group's pace.
False friends — Spanish words that look English but aren't:
- confiar = to trust (NOT "confide")
- trasero = rear / behind (NOT "traitor")
Tone matters. A panicked line and a calm line read totally differently. Match the speaker's energy as you translate.
Use the Translation Worksheet with your group. Get every line into English you'd actually say out loud. Star (★) any line that feels hard — those are your Day 2 targets.
As a group, write down every sound in the 55 seconds — footsteps, the creaking wheel, the ship rumble, the panic, the cannon. Don't skip the small ones.
Open your Foley kit. Next to each sound on your list, write the prop you'll try. Not sure? Grab from the shared Creative Bin and test it.
Assign roles: voices (Harlock, Tochiro, Yattaran), Foley artists (the props), and one director who calls the cues. Everyone has a job.
Experiment with your props. Crumple, tap, scrape, shake. When something sounds right, lock it in and decide who makes it and when.
Play the muted clip and run your sounds + voices along with it. It'll be messy. Run it twice. Note what's off — that's tomorrow's to-do list.
Each group performs once to the muted clip. Rough is the goal today — nobody's polished yet.
Same gear as the premiere: the clip plays through the class speaker, and your voice actors share the two microphones. Practice passing the mic between speakers now so it's smooth on Day 2.
After each group, give them one thing to keep and one thing to try. Quick, kind, specific.
That's a wrap on Day 1. You learned the craft, translated the scene, and staged a rough cut. Day 2: sharpen the hard lines, level up your sound, run a real rehearsal — then premiere, with one last surprise.
Day 2
Yesterday you built a rough cut. Today you sharpen it into a premiere — sharper voices, layered sound, a full rehearsal, and the live show.
And at the very end: the secret you've been waiting for.
Get back with your group and grab yesterday's worksheet and prop list. Then reload the scene.
Pull it up on your phone to translate, build, and rehearse at your group's pace.
What were the two "try this" notes your group got after the rough cut? Say them out loud. That's your starting point today.
Yesterday you got the gist. Today you wrestle the lines that fought back.
Tochiro tells a story about a scarred old cat that never turned its back on an enemy. Don't translate it word-for-word — capture the attitude.
Ask your group: why tell a cat story in the middle of a battle? (Hint: it is the plan — never back down, hit them head-on.) Watch the false friend: trasero = rear / behind, not "traitor."
a estas alturas looks like "at these heights" — it actually means "at this point." Idioms almost never translate literally.
Now polish every line you starred (★) yesterday until it sounds like something you'd actually say out loud.
Match each line's tone to the character — calm Harlock, intense Tochiro, panicked Yattaran — and hit your cue on the picture, not a beat early. Say the line, watch the mouth, land together.
Pros don't make every sound at once. Decide what's loud and close (the cannon, a slam) and what's quiet and constant (the ship's hum, distant rumble). Build the scene in layers — a bed underneath, big hits on top.
Work the two fixes from your huddle plus anything from the master class. Lock every sound to a person and a moment.
Director calls the cues. Run the whole thing to the silent clip start to finish, no stopping — then do it once more. If you can survive a mistake without stopping, you're ready.
This is the show. Each group performs their finished version live to the muted clip. Voices at the front, Foley team in formation, director on cues.
The silent clip plays through the class speaker. Your voice actors share the two microphones, passing a mic as the speaker changes — calm Harlock, intense Tochiro, panicked Yattaran. The Foley team works live right beside them.
Audience: full attention, big applause. Hold your notes until after — right now you're watching a premiere.
Every group has performed. Now — for the first time in two days — here's the original Japanese audio.
- Best Footstep — most convincing movement sound
- Best Surprise — most creative prop-to-sound trick
- Best Sync — sound landed perfectly on the picture
- Best Translation Choice — a line that nailed the meaning and the tone
Share one word for the whole experience — and name one job from these two days you could picture yourself doing.
¡Buen trabajo! Over two days you translated a scene from Spanish, built every sound from nothing, premiered it live, and finally heard the original. That's real translation, real sound design, real performance — done with your own hands and voices.