Does anyone know how the translations of the different characters in animations like Starwars Clonewars are handled?
When the sound designers are using software like Kyma to process voices, are the different dubstages from around the world forced to have the same software or are the files sent away for processing?
I've been involved in this kind of work , albeit for videogames localisation. Basically I've been hired a number of times by a games localisation firm to process translated dialogue recordings with various effects to get it as close as possible to how the English processed VO sounded like.
The process is a bit different every time, it really depends on the games developer. In a few occassions, the developer simply sent Pro Tools sessions which we could use to process the voices. In those cases we needed to have exactly the same plugins installed as they did. If we couldn't buy these, we'd rent them - and if that wasn't an option, we had to be a bit more creative and find alternative tools, after discussing with the client of course.
It has also happened that there weren't any Pro Tools sessions at all, and even though that was far more interesting for myself, because it was much more creative, it was much less efficient as well. We'd simply have the English VO as reference and it was down to us to figure out what processes had been applied and how to mimic those. The developer would usually tell though what plugins had been used, so that made it a bit simpler.
In other occassions, we didn't do any fx processing at all - we'd simply just record and post-produce the dialogue and send it off to the developer, and their internal audio team would apply the effects.
So yeah it really depends on the situation what works best. In case of Kyma... you'll probably be hard pressed to find a localisation or dubbing outfit that owns this system or is willing to buy one for a single project. If it's involving more general plugins, it will of course be much easier to manage.
I don't know which side you are on (the original content producer, or working on the foreign language dubs) but a very important aspect to think about is the organisation of it all. Sending over Pro Tools sessions and letting the outsourcer deal with it sounds straightforward enough, but it does involve some organising and planning to make sure this goes smoothly. Especially when your VO uses various stages / Pro Tools sessions of processing - this needs to be well documented. If you opt to give an outsourcer not the exact files and info on how you did things, then be prepared to expect a bit of creative freedom.
This video should answer your question (towards the end of the interview) :
http://hdfilmtools.com/2008/10/matthew-wood-supervising-sound-editor-skywalker-sound/
