AdamStanislav

Of course, if it is already scanned, just apply my invert.cube LUT.

Well, according to Wikipedia, fuchsia is a quintary color 7.5° away from magenta on the color wheel. I mean, I know where magenta is on the wheel, I just never knew what it was called in Slovak.

Wait, it is magenta now? I actually had to look it up in my dictionary. I always assumed magenta was what we call fialová in Slovak, but that is purple in English, or perhaps violet. But magenta is purpurová. Hmmm... I guess I learn something every day.

What size film? And what kind of positive? Film, paper, digital?

Yes, I saw that and stopped after seeing it called the cauldron a pot. What next? Calling the kettle black?

Well, since you said it was based on something children might recite, here is something I came up with. It does not make much sense, but it is very rhythmic, so children would probably like it: Čierny kotlík, biela kaša, farba nášho mecenáša. Keď sa dobre napapkáme, potom si aj pospinkáme. Biela, modrá, červená, kam sa skryla zelená? Translation? Well, the online services failed royally on this one, so here is just a literal translation: Black cauldron, white porridge, our patron’s color. After we eat well, we shall sleep. White, blue, red, where did green hide? For the record, white, blue and red are the colors of the Slovak flag (also used by most Slavic countries).

Thanks. The Slovak j is also like the English y, as was its original meaning. It was created during the Renaissance to replace the consonant i in Latin words, such as maior. The Italians still refer to it i lunga (long i).

Well, in my home country people would just write their own lyrics to foreign songs, sometimes completely unrelated to the original lyrics. They just made sure their lyrics matched the music. I just thought the idea of two strangers wandering (and wondering) at night would give it away. Clearly, I was wrong about that. Heck, they even do it to the titles of plays and movies. I was about twenty when I was waiting in front of the Opera House in Bratislava for my mom to come out (she was an opera singer), and someone asked me what was playing that night. Well, it was As You Like It, but the Slovak title was Čo len chcete, which means Whatever You Want. So I said, Čo len chcete. He gave me an annoyed look and said, oh come on, what’s on tonight. And I just repeated, Čo len chcete. And he raised his voice, telling me he had an important guest from the Soviet Union, so tell me what’s on! And I growled and pointed at the poster he was standing in front of all this time and which said Čo len chcete was on, and I said, Čo len chcete, by Shakespeare. He then sighed and apologized for yelling at me.

And here I found the original song on YouTube:

Oh boy. I am not much of a poet. I would definitely need some time for that. And it would probably only relate to the original in a marginal way. But the first thing that popped to my mind when I saw that French version were the first four lines of a Czech song that was popular back when I still lived in Czechoslovakia: Zelená je tráva, fotbal to je hra. A ten míč kulatý věc je záludná. It is actually about what is called soccer in the US and football in the UK and many other countries. Only the first word in the first verse is the name of a color. Green is the grass, football, what a game! The ball, oh so round, shall put you to shame. Not a literal translation, but it captures the idea.

What does a soft g sound like? I am aware of three different languages that have a different idea of what it should sound like. The Magyars pronounce it as what in Slovak is ď (they even use it in the name of their own language), the Italians as what in Slovak is dž, and the French as what in Slovak is ž (at least I think that is how they pronounce it). How do Slovaks pronounce soft g? We don’t even have a concept of a soft g. G is a guttural sound, not sure how to soften it. If anything, we might pronounce it as K at the end of a sentence, but I don’t think we would call that soft.

Well, in my version they are. Actually, the Slovak word blúďme is the imperative first person plural of blúdiť, which the online Slovak-English dictionary lists as meaning - meander - ramble - roam - rove - saunter - schloomp - stray - vagabond - wander - bat around - drag tail - to meander - to stray - to wander - volatilise - wandering around Though the main meaning is moving around aimlessly.

Do you want a poetic translation or just word for word? If you just want word for word, I will skip any repetitions and go to the last two stanzas (or whatever they are called in English): Farba je čierna. Farba je biela. Farba je červená. Farba je tyrkysová Farba je čierna. Farba je biela. Farba je červená. Farba je zelená. Farba je modrá. That is from the French you showed.

Wow, live and learn. Thanks, I appreciate it.

Interesting. I think that is good because it confirms my lyrics as being more than a translation but an actual original poem about two strangers at night.

Thanks. I have never heard of DeepL, so it is nice to have an alternative to Google.

Oops, sorry. The strangers are wandering in the night.

Wow, I have just run my text through Google translate, and it gave me a nice poetic translation. Here is the original in plain text: Spolu blúďme tmou, kým sme tu sami. Nočnou hodinou, dvaja neznámi. V tento tichý čas chcem navždy ľúbiť vás! Mesiac svieti nám na cestu pod hviezdami. Nikto nie je sám, on je tu stále s nami. Jeho bledý jas, i váš tichý hlas, dávajú mi vidieť jasne, že budeme žiť vždy šťastne. Spolu blúďme tmou, kým sme tu sami. Nočnou hodinou, dvaja neznámi. V tento tichý čas smiem navždy ľúbiť vás. And here is Google’s translation: Let's wander the darkness together, while we are here alone. At night, two unknowns. In this quiet time I want to love you forever! The moon shines on us on a journey under the stars. No one is alone he is still here with us. Its pale brightness, even your quiet voice, they make me see clearly that we will always live happily ever after. Let's wander the darkness together, while we are here alone. At night, two unknowns. In this quiet time may i love you forever.

Well, it is here now:

Since we are posting poems lately, here is one I wrote about half a century ago (in my twenties). It is a Slovak translation of a famous American song. I submitted it to the CEO of the then only Slovak music publishing company. He happened to be my older brother. He liked my version but said that unfortunately the song had already been recorded in Slovak years earlier with different lyrics (obviously). I said, so what? But he insisted it would not work. Years later he told me he did get my version recorded but had to pretend it was his lyrics because by then I had fled from Communist Czechoslovakia and so the government would never allow any of my work published. Anyway, here it is as done in Affinity Designer: If I should translate it back into English, though literally from my text, I am sure you will know which song it was. I cannot give you the original for copyright reasons, but the translation of my version should be fine: Together wondering in the dark, while we are alone In the night hour, two strangers. In this quiet time, I want to love you forever. The Moon shines for us, on the path beneath the stars. No one is alone, he is always with us. His pale shine, and your soft voice, make me see clearly, that we will live always happy. Together wondering in the dark, while we are alone In the night hour, two strangers. In this quiet time, I may love you forever.

But it was not a new sentence, only a new line. At any rate, @John Rostron had the right idea. Thanks anyway, though.

Thanks. I have to go now, but when I come back, I will try that.

I should add that when I clicked on Minion for the font, it decided to give me Minerva instead.

I just tried to write a poem in Slovak using Affinity Publisher. I gave up after several lines, when the software insisted in changing the first letter of each line into a capital letter. What on Earth?!

We can also change orazur in the spirit of a chiaroscuro woodcut. This turns out fairly hard because the result depends highly on the original image, so whichever way I adjusted it, it looked great with some images and quite bad with others. But eventually I came up with a happy medium in Chiaroscuro.cube.