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contributing:guide:title

Title

Used in: Movie, TV show, Episode

The title field must contain the English title of the movie, TV show or episode (no matter in what country or language the media was produced). Only if there is no (official!) translation available, the title should be in its original (native) language. However, if the media is marketed with a translated title in a very limited number of anglophone countries only, while most English speaking countries keep its original title, the original title is used. The other titles can be added as an alternative title. In addition, we never translate movie titles ourselves, as we only want the official data in the OFDb.

Examples

  • The Killing: English title alongside original title
  • Fascht e Familie: Original title because no English translation exists
  • Caché: Regular title alongside alternative title

Stylised titles and Capitalisation

The official spelling of the title is added to the OFDb. If the title is stylized, we add the stylized version.

If, for some reason, it's unclear what words/letters in the title are capitalised, we follow Grammarly's suggestion: nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs are capitalised.

Examples

  • CHiPS: Stylized title is added to the database
  • EO: Stylized title is added to the database
  • Nest: While the title is all uppercase on the film poster, the movie appears to be marketed as “Nest”. Due to the inconsistency, the regular spelling is added

Title & sub title

Some movies, TV shows and episodes contain a title, and what can be considered a sub title. A sub title is not to be confused with the tagline. We want the title and sub title in the OFDb, both in the title field.

When adding a title that consists of a title and sub title, we add a colon (:) between them and write the first letter of the subtitle's first word uppercase. However, when a movie, TV show, or episode is marketed with a different character to separate them, we use the character of the official spelling.

Some titles or sub titles already contain a colon. If that is the case, we separate them with a hyphen (-).

Some episodes titles include some version of “Episode 1: Episode title” or “Chapter 1: Episode title”. If that is the case, we add the the first part to the episode title as well, except if it is “Episode 1:”—in that case, we drop it, but simply add the episode title itself.

Examples

Company name in title

Sometimes it appears like the production company's name is part of the movie title, i.e. Disney's Mighty Ducks. We only include the company's name to the movie/tv show title if it's part of the official title.

If it's not clear whether this part should be added, we only add the company's name if appears to be intended in that way. Meaning: “Disney's Mighty Ducks” would be added like this to the database because of the “'s”, indicating a proper formulation. However, “Disney Aladdin”, as the movie's poster might indicate, won't be added like this to the database, because it just sounds wrong.

Multiple Parts

Sometimes a movie or an episode has more than one part, and both parts share the same title. If that is the case, we add an appendix to differentiate the parts. If the title already contains something to differ both parts, the official title is added to the OFDb. However, if this is not the case, we simply add “Pt. n” (where “n” is the part number) after the title, separated by a comma.

Examples

  • the adventures of PETE & PETE: S02 E10 and S02 E11 are two parts, where the official title adds a “Part II” for the second part (but no addition for the first part). Since this is the official naming, we add the title just like this to the OFDb.
  • Friends: S01 E16 and S02 E17 consists of two parts, where the DVD booklet differentiates them by adding “(1)” and “(2)” after the title. Since this is the official naming, we add the title just like this to the OFDb.
  • A Touch of Cloth: Every season consists of two parts with the exact same title and no addition to make them stand out individually. Hence for each part we add a “, Pt. 1” and “, Pt. 2”.
contributing/guide/title.txt · Last modified: 2025/01/16 07:29 by me