A Guide to Machine Translation Post Editing (MTPE)
Machine translation post-editing (MTPE), is the process whereby machine translated output is revised, or post-edited, by a human translator.
It helps to produce more accurate, high-quality translations than would otherwise be possible using purely machine translated content, at a lower cost than human translation services.
The Importance of MTPE
Though machine translation (MT) techniques have come a long way, its accuracy is not guaranteed, and therefore cannot be relied upon for commercial use without trusted human post editing.
Machine translation post-editing offers organisations without in-house native speakers the confidence that your machine translations are accurate, having been thoroughly edited by experienced native-speaker linguists you can trust.
Our Approach to Machine Translation Post-Editing
At Andiamo, MTPE is an integral part of our machine translation service to ensure output is accurate and reliable.
Though, if your organisation has in-house teams able to edit the machine translated content, we can provide raw professional MT output, and pass the savings onto you.
We only recommend using machine translation (and therefore MTPE) when it’s most effective, which we believe is for large volume, technical, informative content, and short turnaround projects. However, it may be the best option for low budget projects, or in instances where you don’t require the quality of human translation from scratch.
When it comes to nuanced or creative texts, we recommend human translation services, and for medical or legal content, our gold service, which offers ISO 17100:2015-compliant human translations, a three-stage checking process (first by an experienced medical/legal specialist translator, a further revision by a second medical/legal specialist, and a third by an in-house graduate linguist) and a letter of authenticity for total peace of mind.
We are always transparent about whether our quotes are based on human or machine translation, and can offer a quote for each service, to help you decide which level of service you’d like.
Light vs Full Post-Editing
There are two levels of MTPE: light post-editing and full post-editing.
Light post-editing (as the name suggests) offers a light, or basic revision of the machine translated output. This generally includes editing any mistranslations, correcting any content omitted by the software, and correcting major spelling and grammar errors.
Full post-editing refers to a thorough revision process, where a human translator works to improve the quality of machine translated output to be as close to purely human translated content as possible.
This form of MTPE includes correcting all spelling and grammar errors, restructuring sentences where necessary, ensuring terminological consistency with your previously translated content, and editing output to reflect your style guidelines.
At Andiamo, we can provide quotes for both kinds of post-editing, to offer you the transparency to make an informed choice based on your specific project requirements.
Our MTPE Process
- After receiving a request for machine translation with post-editing, we first assess the content to ensure it’s suitable.
- Suitable content is analysed in our translation memory (TM) software, utilising any memories we have for your organisation.
- We then conduct the initial pre-translation of the content via machine translation, and with the use of translation memory software. Our TM software enables us to leverage your previously translated content, to support the consistency of terminology, and to minimise the amount of translation required, for which we can offer discounts.
- The machine translated content is then sent to our professional freelance translators to be post-edited.
- The post-edited translation is then checked in-house by skilled linguists before being delivered to you.
MTPE vs Human Translation
We believe that human translation is always better than machine translation, even with MTPE, because the output is only as good as the content that goes into it (for example the quality of machine translation output will vary depending on the data the engine was trained on) and because machines can’t respond to nuance and context like skilled, human translators like ours can.
Both machine translation, MT with post editing, and pure human translation each have their place, so be sure to speak to your Andiamo! project manager to help identify the perfect approach for your project.
Contact our team today to discuss your machine translation projects, and post-editing requirements.
