3 ms·

Anybody else notice how that Scottish male reference voice sounds considerably more English in the synthesized versions.

by werds 7y ago

VBprogrammer 7y ago
Yeah, maybe it's just having a more sensitive ear to the Scottish accent but that to me was the furthest from the reference by far.
- luxpir 7y ago
  I heard that too; being a Brit (and working in languages) probably helps. It did pick it up occasionally though, which gives hope that increased sampling and training could fix the slight miss there. It was that and the Swedish-accented English ("Sentence in Different Voices" section, middle recording) made it struggle. No traces of the Scandi-lilt were left in the synth version. Final note would be the French speaker at the bottom of the page seems to be English first language, despite having very good spoken French. Not quite as pure a test of that last part as I'd have liked, despite the ability for the speaker to perhaps read the synthesized version in English back in English. That could be fun.
  - seszett 7y ago
    I can't hear any hint of an English accent in the French-language recordings, they just sound like regular Québec French to me. However, I'm not convinced at all by these voice transfers across language. I can imagine the second Chinese one being the same speaker in both languages, but not the three others.
    - luxpir 7y ago
      That's no Quebecois I've ever heard. Sounds like a Brit who picked it up as a second language in the home or soon after. Even struggles to finish the sentence due to the effort of reading in the 2nd to last one. Struggles with an extremely common word, 'grand', as well as stumbling over a simple sentence. To be fair, he has heard enough French (i.e. lived and studied there most likely) to get the intonations mostly right but there are a few other giveaways too... it's just not natural or native from where I'm sitting.

3 ms·

Anybody else notice how that Scottish male reference voice sounds considerably more English in the synthesized versions.

by werds 7y ago

Anybody else notice how that Scottish male reference voice sounds considerably more English in the synthesized versions.

VBprogrammer 7y ago
Yeah, maybe it's just having a more sensitive ear to the Scottish accent but that to me was the furthest from the reference by far.
- luxpir 7y ago
  I heard that too; being a Brit (and working in languages) probably helps. It did pick it up occasionally though, which gives hope that increased sampling and training could fix the slight miss there. It was that and the Swedish-accented English ("Sentence in Different Voices" section, middle recording) made it struggle. No traces of the Scandi-lilt were left in the synth version. Final note would be the French speaker at the bottom of the page seems to be English first language, despite having very good spoken French. Not quite as pure a test of that last part as I'd have liked, despite the ability for the speaker to perhaps read the synthesized version in English back in English. That could be fun.
  - seszett 7y ago
    I can't hear any hint of an English accent in the French-language recordings, they just sound like regular Québec French to me. However, I'm not convinced at all by these voice transfers across language. I can imagine the second Chinese one being the same speaker in both languages, but not the three others.
    - luxpir 7y ago
      That's no Quebecois I've ever heard. Sounds like a Brit who picked it up as a second language in the home or soon after. Even struggles to finish the sentence due to the effort of reading in the 2nd to last one. Struggles with an extremely common word, 'grand', as well as stumbling over a simple sentence. To be fair, he has heard enough French (i.e. lived and studied there most likely) to get the intonations mostly right but there are a few other giveaways too... it's just not natural or native from where I'm sitting.