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For anyone wanting to use this in a project, it seems to be a bit behind Vocaloid. Vocaloid's Hatsune Miku is pretty impressive. "She" has even done "live" sh

For anyone wanting to use this in a project, it seems to be a bit behind Vocaloid. Vocaloid's Hatsune Miku is pretty impressive. "She" has even done "live" shows in Japan and has opened for Lady GaGa in the US. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FoTd918zhZc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FoTd918zhZc

ekianjo 12y ago
Well the phonetics of Japanese are, by definition, pretty simple, compared to most other languages out there. There are actually very few sounds and they are clearly detached when you speak. It's one of the easiest languages to "vocalize".
- e12e 12y ago
  But speech and singing are quite different? I don't know, but I'm a little surprised if the vocaloid engines(?) wouldn't be easier to "tune" to Spanish than to English. Also, while "Chinese" (Cantonese or Mandarin) are quite complicated (especially considering the fact that they are(?) old languages) -- I'm not sure if they're particularly complicated from the point of view of emulating singing?
  - ekianjo 12y ago
    Singing is probably harder to mimick than speech, because words need to be pronounced according to a melody and not just their standard pronunciation. > Also, while "Chinese" (Cantonese or Mandarin) are quite complicated Not sure what you refer to in terms of how complicated is the language. Phonetics? Grammar? Vocabulary ? > I'm not sure if they're particularly complicated from the point of view of emulating singing? The pronunciation in chinese is not as detached/split as in Japanese, that's for sure. This being said, it's certainly possible if you put sufficient effort into it.
    - e12e 12y ago
      >> Also, while "Chinese" (Cantonese or Mandarin) are quite complicated > Not sure what you refer to in terms of how complicated is the language. Phonetics? Grammar? Vocabulary ? I meant that Chinese have many phonemes, but part of that comes from being a tone language -- and if you're going to emulate singing, you already have to deal with tone change. However when I think more about it, I really have no idea how phonemes are "tuned" when singing a melody. For a language where tone doesn't carry meaning[1] (or hardly ever does) I would think we simply change tone according to the tune we sing. But what happens if changing the tune of the phoneme changes it meaning? I suppose it is a little like how we must fit the words to the rhythm... [1] By "carry meaning" I mean in the phoneme sense: how in British English you can have "red" and "read" both be pronounced /red/ -- and there would be no way to answer the question: "Is /red/ a verb or a colour?" (without context). Well you could of course answer "both"...
e12e 12y ago
Hatsune Miku is quite fascinating. She/it also sort of puts William Gibson's "Idoru" in perspective -- the book came out in 1997: http://www.amazon.com/Idoru-William-Gibson/dp/0425158640 http://www.amazon.com/Idoru-William-Gibson/dp/0425158640 Relevant clip from wikipedia's summary: "In the post Tokyo/San Francisco earthquake world of the early 21st century, Colin Laney is referred to agents of the aging mega-rock star Rez of the musical group Lo/Rez for a job using his peculiar talent of sifting through vast amounts of mundane data to find "nodal points" of particular relevance. Rez has claimed to want to marry a synthetic personality named Rei Toei, the Idoru (Japanese Idol) of the title, which is apparently impossible and therefore questioned by his loyal staff, particularly by his head of security, Keith Blackwell." [edit: While Hatsune Miko's first release was in 2007, although she is portrayed as being 16 years old]

ekianjo 12y ago

Well the phonetics of Japanese are, by definition, pretty simple, compared to most other languages out there. There are actually very few sounds and they are clearly detached when you speak. It's one of the easiest languages to "vocalize".

e12e 12y ago
But speech and singing are quite different? I don't know, but I'm a little surprised if the vocaloid engines(?) wouldn't be easier to "tune" to Spanish than to English. Also, while "Chinese" (Cantonese or Mandarin) are quite complicated (especially considering the fact that they are(?) old languages) -- I'm not sure if they're particularly complicated from the point of view of emulating singing?
- ekianjo 12y ago
  Singing is probably harder to mimick than speech, because words need to be pronounced according to a melody and not just their standard pronunciation. > Also, while "Chinese" (Cantonese or Mandarin) are quite complicated Not sure what you refer to in terms of how complicated is the language. Phonetics? Grammar? Vocabulary ? > I'm not sure if they're particularly complicated from the point of view of emulating singing? The pronunciation in chinese is not as detached/split as in Japanese, that's for sure. This being said, it's certainly possible if you put sufficient effort into it.
  - e12e 12y ago
    >> Also, while "Chinese" (Cantonese or Mandarin) are quite complicated > Not sure what you refer to in terms of how complicated is the language. Phonetics? Grammar? Vocabulary ? I meant that Chinese have many phonemes, but part of that comes from being a tone language -- and if you're going to emulate singing, you already have to deal with tone change. However when I think more about it, I really have no idea how phonemes are "tuned" when singing a melody. For a language where tone doesn't carry meaning[1] (or hardly ever does) I would think we simply change tone according to the tune we sing. But what happens if changing the tune of the phoneme changes it meaning? I suppose it is a little like how we must fit the words to the rhythm... [1] By "carry meaning" I mean in the phoneme sense: how in British English you can have "red" and "read" both be pronounced /red/ -- and there would be no way to answer the question: "Is /red/ a verb or a colour?" (without context). Well you could of course answer "both"...

e12e 12y ago

Hatsune Miku is quite fascinating. She/it also sort of puts William Gibson's "Idoru" in perspective -- the book came out in 1997: http://www.amazon.com/Idoru-William-Gibson/dp/0425158640 http://www.amazon.com/Idoru-William-Gibson/dp/0425158640 Relevant clip from wikipedia's summary: "In the post Tokyo/San Francisco earthquake world of the early 21st century, Colin Laney is referred to agents of the aging mega-rock star Rez of the musical group Lo/Rez for a job using his peculiar talent of sifting through vast amounts of mundane data to find "nodal points" of particular relevance. Rez has claimed to want to marry a synthetic personality named Rei Toei, the Idoru (Japanese Idol) of the title, which is apparently impossible and therefore questioned by his loyal staff, particularly by his head of security, Keith Blackwell." [edit: While Hatsune Miko's first release was in 2007, although she is portrayed as being 16 years old]