As a general rule, it’s important that there be three different people to translate, edit and proofread a document. Otherwise, it gets pretty hard to notice mistakes in the final stage. In the next section, I share some tips that might come in handy when doing the final revision.
• Read your way backward from the last paragraph of the text to the first. This may sound strange, but it’s a good exercise to “forget” a little what we’ve read and focus instead on the details that we might not notice otherwise.
• Keep a list handy of the points on which you need to zero in. Things like: running the spell checker, checking for subject-verb agreement, looking at the punctuation and confirming that the format is correct.
• Do certain tasks separately. Numbers and capitalization are detail items that can often be missed when looking at the text as a whole. However, when we look at only one kind of detail at a time, such as checking the number sequence, we can catch errors that are easy to miss.
• Take a break. What often happens when we read something over several times is that our level of attention drops somewhat. After proofing a text, it’s a good idea to put it aside and clear your head by doing some other activity—have something to eat, go for a walk or read something different. After a well-deserved break, we can take up the revision with a clear, fresh mind.
We all have our own tricks and habits when it comes to doing the final proofing of a document. What strategies do you apply to the task?
To read the original Spanish post go to https://www.trustedtranslations.com/consejos-para-llevar-a-cabo-una-buena-revision-2012-05-24.html