What is a video maker doing in Qabiria?

After the fantastic welcome given to the previous interviews, we continue the series of meetings with our most faithful contributors, to show the reality of the translator profession and the other profiles that contribute to the frenetic activity of an agency.

Stefano Iuliani, originally from Cerreto Sannita (Benevento, Campania), is a translator, subtitler, and videomaker. Despite a Master’s degree in Translation Technology, he began his career as a video maker in 2009, then merged his passion for cinema into the translation industry, becoming a subtitler and technical translator since 2013. He often gives in to the temptation to discover new disciplines and thus is the author of an essay on media manipulation (Non tutte le vittime sono uguali), a webzine on music (Spacebar), and a project on augmented reality and 360-degree immersive video (Reality Telling). His multifaceted mind is alternated with a visceral and timeless passion: football. The role he plays, right half-wing, best expresses his professional character: quiet action, dirty work and building up the action behind a play.

Let’s start from the beginning: how long have you been translating?

For as long as I can remember, considering that at home my parents spoke two different dialects, to which Italian was also added 😁. For companies, on the other hand, I have been translating for more or less ten years.

And how did you start?

Can I say it? My first cheque for a translation arrived in Paris, while I was on Erasmus, for translating several soft porn videos. After a few years, I attended the Master in Tradumática (technologies of translation) at UAB in Barcelona, which was a real springboard for my entry into the professional field.

Since when have you been collaborating with Qabiria?

Qabiria is the first translation agency I worked with and have been working with for 9 years now. I still remember the first meeting with Marco. We met in a bar in Badalona to talk about a potential collaboration on making a corporate video for Qabiria. The love flourished thanks to my second passion, audiovisual production, but then materialised through translation. At the end of the meeting, Marco, who had recently become a father for the second time, felt mortified because he had forgotten his wallet at home. So although I was penniless, I also had to pay 😉.

Quite typical of us in Qabiria: great in words, but then in deeds.... Joking aside, what do you appreciate about this collaboration?

The collaboration with Qabiria has been, and still is, a milestone in my career because for me Marco is an important reference point whenever I have a doubt of a technical nature or, in general, of managing my career as a translator. If I have a problem to solve, Marco is the first person I turn to. So in essence, of Qabiria I appreciate the possibility of being able to go beyond mere professional collaboration made up of deliveries and tight deadlines. Qabiria is a safe haven.

And what would you improve?

Marco and Sergio are both from northern Italy. So, quoting Luciano De Crescenzo, they are “men of freedom”, they lack that touch of love that instead characterises southern people and that would probably do Qabiria good too. I am obviously joking 😉.

What is the most interesting project you have worked on?

Definitely a content translation project for the e-learning of a Dutch company. His approach to localisationis totally different, because he does not consider you a mere translator, but a real content re-creator, creating a working environment in which the translator acts in close contact with all the other professionals involved in the business processes, including actors, dubbers, computer technicians, content creators and, finally, localisers. This experience also gave me the opportunity to travel for work and meet amazing colleagues.

What is your typical work day like?

I have to admit that I represent the exact opposite of what one of the many gurus would advise about the optimal management of one’s work:

• Create a routine
• Schedule regular breaks
• Organise your workspace
• Silence your smartphone

That’s not who I am. I never get up at the same time and try to avoid the suggestions of gurus in any field. Definitely, though, I prefer working in a coworking space rather than from home. I believe that contact with other people and professionals from other fields is the basis for doing one’s job to the best of one’s ability and, why not, to open the window to other collaborations or fields.

What is currently the biggest challenge for a translation professional like you?

Although I am a freelancer, I believe that long-term partnerships are essential, and unfortunately, there are many of us in this field, and we often tend to scramble in order not to lose a client, and I never knew how to do that. Another difficulty is certainly related to falling rates and the use of online tools that are less effective and practical than traditional CAT tools.

“My goal is and always will be to explore as many roads as possible, not because of the possibility of earning enough money, but because of the richness inherent in the journey itself”

Besides translating, how do you spend your time?

I am dedicated to the production and editing of 360-degree immersive videos. Specifically, with three other partners, I founded an audiovisual production company in Barcelona (Reality Telling) and work with a number of health facilities to improve the health status of medium or long-stay patients through this technology. The idea is that virtual reality can reduce the time of medical treatment and, more importantly, can itself become a real medical device.

One of the projects I am very proud of we started during the lockdown. Patients hospitalized due to COVID-19 did not have the opportunity to receive visits from their family members. For this reason, we would go to family members’ homes and doctors would show them to the patients through Oculus visors. The results were outstanding. One of the patients, Ana, interviewed by a well-known Catalan television network said: “This is the best medicine I have received in these three months.” For us this is priceless.

How do you see your future? Will you continue to translate or devote more time to your passion? Among the most beautiful things I have ever read is a sentence by Frantz Fanon, the French psychiatrist and anthropologist: “O my body, make of me always a man who questions!”. So, I believe my goal is and always will be to explore as many roads as possible, not for the possibility of earning enough money, but for the richness inherent in the journey itself, without ever losing sight of the needs of my body, which is the first warning light to go on if something is wrong or, on the other hand, if it is going great.