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I'm going to argue yours is not better. I preferred the AWS example, which was no doubt cherry picked, over all of your voices. Especially during the transition

I'm going to argue yours is not better. I preferred the AWS example, which was no doubt cherry picked, over all of your voices. Especially during the transition between sentences there is an audible glitch in the audio, whereas AWS transitioned smoothly.

jazz3020 4y ago
Sure, that's why I put "arguably" as I honestly know that AWS is really good. But I did pick the best AWS voice which is the most popular one amongst many read aloud apps, though! Anyways, I'll try to implement speaker selection for AWS so that the comparison is more fair. I barely finished our multi-speaker feature before launching on PH.
- pvg 4y ago
  You should probably edit the title - some amount of puffery is reasonable when showcasing one's own work but if you're so wide of the mark, the only feedback you'll get is about how your representations are inaccurate. Which is what's happening.
  - jazz3020 4y ago
    The title has been edited (I think by a yc moderator) which I think is a good move.
- smoe 4y ago
  I think both are pretty good, but to my ears the UnrealSpeech ones all have very sharp, grating "s" sounds. The AWS voice is much smoother in this regard. Is this something that can be configured to a degree or would you have to post-process it with an de-esser? Because I can't imagine listing to those voices for anything longer than the example text.
  - jazz3020 4y ago
    Yup, trying to fix this
- asxd 4y ago
  I like the character of the voices, especially Male B. Sounds a little like Brokaw, maybe. But yeah sometimes I'd have to regenerate before I got non-glitchy audio. Still though, very cool.
nyadesu 4y ago
Especially considering other languages, AWS is pretty good at both Spain and latin american Spanish.
ratww 4y ago
I'm gonna agree with you. I get lots of weird random artifacts in Unreal. Sometimes it's a weird "vibrato" on some words, some words are unrealistically raspy. Plus it's a bit too sibilant in general compared to AWS. Clicking the "Redo" button fixes it but then other artifacts crop up in other places, which leads me to believe this is completely fixable. And what do you mean by cherry-picked? I don't think the Amazon example is cherry picked, you can type your own custom text there! They're just using the AWS API themselves. Maybe I misunderstood you. Anyway, it's a bit unfair because Amazon probably spent millions in their product, but I wouldn't exactly call it better...
yurymik 4y ago
Just copy-pasted a piece from the other HN tread (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31630193 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31630193) and it's not even close to AWS: https://unrealspeech.com/k6g8a https://unrealspeech.com/k6g8a
spywaregorilla 4y ago
The unreal guy sounds really nervous to me. Or like constipated or something. His random energy across sentences makes him seem uncomfortable.

jazz3020 4y ago

Sure, that's why I put "arguably" as I honestly know that AWS is really good. But I did pick the best AWS voice which is the most popular one amongst many read aloud apps, though! Anyways, I'll try to implement speaker selection for AWS so that the comparison is more fair. I barely finished our multi-speaker feature before launching on PH.

pvg 4y ago
You should probably edit the title - some amount of puffery is reasonable when showcasing one's own work but if you're so wide of the mark, the only feedback you'll get is about how your representations are inaccurate. Which is what's happening.
- jazz3020 4y ago
  The title has been edited (I think by a yc moderator) which I think is a good move.
smoe 4y ago
I think both are pretty good, but to my ears the UnrealSpeech ones all have very sharp, grating "s" sounds. The AWS voice is much smoother in this regard. Is this something that can be configured to a degree or would you have to post-process it with an de-esser? Because I can't imagine listing to those voices for anything longer than the example text.
- jazz3020 4y ago
  Yup, trying to fix this
asxd 4y ago
I like the character of the voices, especially Male B. Sounds a little like Brokaw, maybe. But yeah sometimes I'd have to regenerate before I got non-glitchy audio. Still though, very cool.

nyadesu 4y ago

Especially considering other languages, AWS is pretty good at both Spain and latin american Spanish.

ratww 4y ago

I'm gonna agree with you. I get lots of weird random artifacts in Unreal. Sometimes it's a weird "vibrato" on some words, some words are unrealistically raspy. Plus it's a bit too sibilant in general compared to AWS. Clicking the "Redo" button fixes it but then other artifacts crop up in other places, which leads me to believe this is completely fixable. And what do you mean by cherry-picked? I don't think the Amazon example is cherry picked, you can type your own custom text there! They're just using the AWS API themselves. Maybe I misunderstood you. Anyway, it's a bit unfair because Amazon probably spent millions in their product, but I wouldn't exactly call it better...

yurymik 4y ago

Just copy-pasted a piece from the other HN tread (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31630193 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31630193) and it's not even close to AWS: https://unrealspeech.com/k6g8a https://unrealspeech.com/k6g8a

spywaregorilla 4y ago

The unreal guy sounds really nervous to me. Or like constipated or something. His random energy across sentences makes him seem uncomfortable.