Arabic Localization, How it All Started!

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History of Arabic Localization

Through history, both human communication and the evolution of Arabic Localization using expression and dialogue were regarded as the main trigger for the elevation of human civilization. The use of writing through newspapers followed by photography, enabled communication to shift beyond. Reaching the 20th century, which was the dawn of media after the invasion of radio and film (TV) where people had the chance to see what others across the world looked like. Both, considered the most powerful aids of communication, source of information and entertainment. They made their way into homes becoming immensely a major component in everyone’s daily life routine. With a late, came the Internet, the latest assertive of all mass media linking the globe.

Globalization vs Arabic Localization

In today’s world of globalization, and with the expansion of broadcasting audiovisual sector. People are on daily basis coming in contact with films, TV programs, music and video games, many of which originated in foreign countries and with different languages. To make this contact possible and efficient, screen translations were used. Later on, came dubbing, one of the screen or audiovisual forms of translation, which involves the replacement of the original speech by a voice track. It attempts to follow as closely as possible the timing, phrasing and lip movement of the original dialogue. This became the upcoming trend. Pushing thus, translation, adaptation and localization in the US and Europe to their highest apex for the good of global interaction.

The Ages of Localization

Meanwhile, in the late 70s, the Middle East, distant from localizing foreign content, came Nicolas Abu Samah, a renowned Lebanese film director, introducing “Arabic dubbing” and establishing his own company FILMALI in Lebanon to eventually become the first entity of the region that kick-started the industry of dubbing in Arabic to the Arab world. Hence, and for the past four decades, FILMALI, followed by DeafCat Studios, a company established in 2006 due to the expansion of services offered. Hence, fully determined to provide consistently the highest quality of localized productions and services. Deafcat Studios, specialized in Arabic VO recording, Arabic translations, dubbing into Arabic, Arabic voice over, music production, 2.0 and 5.1 mixing as well as mastering. More recently, a boom of the video game industry, DeafCat Studios positioned itself to be one of the top companies to offer Arabic video game localization services to the biggest developers in the world.