Day 2: Anime Foley Translation Lab
Welcome to Day 2.
Today you'll translate Spanish, build every sound effect from scratch, and perform live to a 55-second anime clip. Three jobs. One scene. Let's go.
Every footstep, punch, and laser blast in a movie is made on a Foley stage by people with weird props. Real Foley artists at work:
What's the most surprising movie sound effect you've ever heard? What did it actually turn out to be — or what do you think made it?
Foley breaks down into three categories. Every sound a character makes falls into one of them.
- Feet — every footstep on every surface
- Moves — cloth, breath, body movement
- Specifics — every prop a character touches
You're about to watch a 55-second clip from a Japanese anime — no audio, just Spanish subtitles. Your group will:
- Translate the Spanish to English.
- Build every sound effect from scratch.
- Perform it live, all together.
Anime is dubbed and subtitled into Spanish for huge audiences across Latin America and Spain. Spanish-language voice acting (especially out of Mexico) is its own industry. Today you'll step into the role of a traductor — a translator who decides how a Japanese moment becomes Spanish, then English, for a new audience.
Every language writes sounds differently. Look at how the same sound effects get spelled in English, Spanish, and Japanese:
| Sound | English | Spanish | Japanese |
|---|---|---|---|
| Explosion | bang! | ¡pum! | ドカン (dokan) |
| Crash | crash! | ¡crac! | ガシャン (gashan) |
| Heartbeat | thump-thump | pum-pum | ドキドキ (doki-doki) |
| Whoosh | whoosh! | ¡fiu! | ヒュー (hyū) |
Discuss with your group: Which Spanish sound words feel closest to English? Which are wildly different? Why do you think that is?
You'll have a stack of vocabulary cards covering 12 Spanish words you'll see in the clip. Flip through them and try to predict which words might be tricky — especially the false friends (words that look like English but mean something different).
Sound is vibration. Vibration travels through anything it touches — air, water, metal, your eardrum, even sand on a plate.
You have a Chladni plate in the room today — a metal plate connected to a tone generator. Sprinkle sand on top, change the frequency, and watch the sand jump itself into geometric patterns. The patterns are real — that's literally what sound looks like as it bounces around a solid object.
When you get to the plate, here's what to watch for:
- At certain frequencies, the sand collects into clear lines and shapes. Those are resonance points — places where the plate is barely vibrating, so the sand settles there.
- In between those frequencies, the sand jumps around chaotically. The plate is vibrating in too many directions at once.
- Higher frequencies = more complex patterns. The plate is dividing into smaller and smaller vibrating regions.
This clip is from a Japanese anime series called Space Symphony Maetel — part of a huge sci-fi universe by an artist named Leiji Matsumoto. Same universe as Captain Harlock and Galaxy Express 999.
Setting: a space pirate ship under attack. Laser missiles incoming. We're on the bridge.
Three characters you need to know:
- Captain Harlock — tall, long coat with skull insignia. Calm. A legendary space pirate.
- Tochiro — short, at the wooden wheel, cloak and big hat. Harlock's best friend. The ship's engineer. About to do something very bold.
- Yattaran — kid in the pirate bandana. Crew member. Panicking.
What you're about to watch: Tochiro takes the helm and announces a wild plan. Yattaran panics. Harlock stays cool. Tochiro tells a story about his old cat. And then… well, you'll see.
One last thing: the original Japanese audio stays muted until the very end of the workshop. Your version is the first version any of us hears today.
Watch it through. Notice the three different energies in the voices you'll need to capture: Harlock (calm, almost amused), Tochiro (intense, dramatic), Yattaran (full panic).
Work through the 📝 Translation Worksheet with your group. Part 1 is multiple-choice on the 13 lines of dialogue. Part 2 (the Translator's Workshop) is where you defend your hardest choices.
Translation aids allowed: Google Translate, dictionary apps, group debate. Translators argue about word choices for a living — that's the job.
Watch out for:
- False cognates — Spanish words that look English but mean something different. (Example: trasero looks like "traitor" but means "rear/behind.")
- Idioms — phrases that don't translate word-for-word.
- Tone — Harlock is calm, Tochiro is intense, Yattaran is panicking. Match the energy.
Pick one line that was hardest. Be ready to share: what was hard about it, what your group decided, and why.
Three characters speak — your group decides how to cover them:
- One voice for all three
- Up to three voices (one per character)
- Anything in between
Voice actors can also do Foley at the same time, or focus only on reading. Your call.
This time, listen with your imagination. As the clip plays, call out every sound that needs to exist in this scene.
Write down every sound the scene needs. Aim for 8–12 sounds. Think through:
- Footsteps (on what kind of surface?)
- Cloth, breath, body movement
- Voices, shouts
- Mechanical sounds (the wooden wheel, buttons, alarms)
- Background battle sounds (engine rumble, distant explosions)
| Role (Spanish / English) | What they do |
|---|---|
| Las Voces (The Voices / Translators) | Reads the English at the mic during performance |
| Los Pies (The Feet) | All footsteps and floor sounds |
| Los Movimientos (The Moves) | Cloth, breath, body movement |
| Los Específicos (The Specifics) | Every prop a character touches |
| El Ambiente (Ambience) — optional | Continuous battle background sounds |
Your group's Foley kit is on the table. The Creative Bin in the middle of the room has extra props. Don't hoard — other groups need them too.
This is where it comes together. Open the silent clip on a phone or laptop. Scrub it back and forth. Try every prop. Be bold — what else could make that sound?
Don't try to be perfect yet. Play. Test the weirdest prop first — the unexpected ones are often the best.
Voices reading aloud, Foley team performing, all synced to the silent clip. Pay close attention to timing — your sound has to land at the same moment as what's on screen.
Lock in prop placement so nothing gets lost mid-performance. Run it once more clean. Be ready.
You've got this. Voices at the mic. Foley team in formation. Silent clip rolls. Bring the scene to life.
When you're not performing, you're the audience. Listen for the choices each group made. After each performance, give one short comment: "I really liked __________."
After every group performs — the original Japanese audio plays for the first time. Listen for what they did, what you did, and what changed.
Before you leave, share one word that describes today. Just one.
¡Buen trabajo! You translated. You designed sound from nothing. You performed live. Today you joined a tiny club of people who've ever made an anime scene from scratch with their own hands and voices.
Today's work — sound design, translation, performance, collaboration — is real careers. Come back to this section anytime to explore.
Robert Duncan is a four-time Emmy-nominated composer (Buffy the Vampire Slayer final season, Castle, S.W.A.T., The Night Agent). He scores with piano, trumpet, pipe organ, drums — plus experimental sounds from deconstructed pianos, submarine hulls, and discarded metal. He recorded this for you.
- Audio / Sound Engineering — building, recording, mixing
- Film / Cinema Production — sound, image, and story together
- Music Composition / Music Technology — what Robert Duncan does
- Theater / Performing Arts — voice work and performance
- Spanish / Linguistics / Translation Studies — translation and interpretation
- Animation — many anime studios hire artists who understand sound
- Acoustical Engineering — the physics of sound (where the Chladni demo leads)
Some well-known schools: Berklee, Full Sail, NYU Tisch, USC, CalArts, Belmont, Middlebury Institute. Your local state university almost certainly has versions of most of these majors for a fraction of the cost.
- Foley Artist — what you did today, full-time. Path: audio program + apprenticeship + portfolio.
- Sound Designer — designs sound for films, games, theater, podcasts. Path: bachelor's + portfolio.
- Audio Engineer — records and mixes for music, film, broadcast. Path: 2–4 year program.
- Anime / Game Localizer — translates anime, manga, games. Path: bachelor's + bilingual fluency.
- Voice Actor / Dubbing Artist — voices animated characters and dubbed films. Path: audition-based.
- Film / TV Composer — Robert Duncan's job. Path: music degree + portfolio + persistence.
- Court / Medical Interpreter — real-time translation in legal/healthcare. Path: bachelor's + state certification.
Two things worth knowing:
1. Not every path needs a 4-year degree. Audio engineers often start with 2-year programs. Voice acting is built on auditions, not diplomas.
2. If you speak Spanish, you have an edge. Localization, dubbing, and interpretation are growing — and bilingual professionals earn more. Heritage speakers especially: your Spanish is an asset, not just a class.
- Research — look up one school or career above. What's the actual day-to-day like?
- Watch — find a behind-the-scenes video on Foley, sound design, anime dubbing, or scoring.
- Try — translate a song lyric, TikTok caption, or meme. Notice what's hardest.
- Ask — talk to your school counselor about programs that connect to today.
The skills you used today are real. Treat them that way.