Emotional voice from Loquendo

[Dr.Benway]

Very cool emotional synthetic voice.

http://actor.loquendo.com/actordemo/default.asp?voice=Simon



Download Attachment: 2005526947_emotional_voice.zip

[freddy888]

nice.  The english female is nice and clear too.  They advertise TTS 'pay as you go', so I guess it must be expensive. TTS pay as you go - does that seem a bit crazy?!

I'm trying to figure out (amongst other things) how to get Hal to use .ogg with lipsync.  I tried that file you posted and it worked but any ideas on how to get the ogg files encoded in the first place?

[Dr.Benway]

You mean converting any .wav to .ogg?

Doesn't the link later on in the thread solve that problem?

http://www.zabaware.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=2196&SearchTerms=ogg

There must be some freeware converters available.

[FuzzieDice]

Remarkable! I wish I could afford a TTS voice like that and put it in HAL. Looks like their "pay as you go" only lets you do canned phrases from their web site. :/

I'd love to have one that sounds like K.I.T.T. or K.A.R.R. from Knight Rider. :)

[freddy888]

Dr Benway, that software on the other link you were refering to does work apparently, but not with lipsync.
I got some help from Haptek, they suggest their HapAudioFactory, which sorts out the lipsync data for the Hap Engine...

FuzzieDice-- have you heard BrightSpeach demo on:

http://www.brightspeech.com/

also a very good TTS?

[Art]

The Brightspeech is now from Acapela (formerly Babel) and quite expensive to lease. Yes lease!!

The last time I corresponded with the rep from there I was quoted a lease price somewhere near the cost of an entire new computer system!

You might want to check out some sites from a previous post of mine at:
http://www.tmaa.com/tts/companies.htm

Regards...

[FuzzieDice]

That's the thing. I wish there were natural sounding voices that one could customize the tone/sound of and could buy outright for less than $150. There just isn't. :(

[Art]

Fuzz,
The AT&T voices sound pretty good for about $35 USD.
Don't know about customizing them. Cepstral voices
come with a utility that allows one to adjust pitch,
speed & volume. They're not perfect but they are
pretty nice and work well with HAL or any other
SAPI compliant program.

[Dr.Benway]

Art, what do you think is the best female voice that is available right now for under $100? I have Neospeech Kate 16k.

[FuzzieDice]

quote:Originally posted by Art


The AT&T voices sound pretty good for about $35 USD.

Just $35? That's IT? Damn, I gotta check those out! Thanks! :)

quote:Originally posted by Art


Don't know about customizing them. Cepstral voices
come with a utility that allows one to adjust pitch,
speed & volume. They're not perfect but they are
pretty nice and work well with HAL or any other
SAPI compliant program.

Well, I'm wanting to give my car an AI and a specific voice unique to him. I did start an interface for an AI engine I was kicking around in my head, but I'm also considering seriously using HAL. I'm not even near getting a computer in the car though. Maintenance needs come first, plus now I have to move soon, and tons of other things coming up. So money IS tight. But I'm still planning this stuff. :)

I would love to know how they make these voices. I bet it'd be some really interesting stuff to program. :)

[NIGE]

G'Day all,
I have a text to speech program from Nextup.com, through them i have got voices of at&t and neo speech.
I heard on this forum somewhere about the babel voices, so went looking and heard the one of Heather.
I wanted it, so i got in touch with babel and was told that they do not sell for public use.
What else they said was that Nextup.com had signed with them to use their voices.
I have been pestering them for over a month now for a release date and price.
So far release could be who knows, price maybe around the at&t price.
I told them that i had another program that i wanted to use the voices in and was that possible.
All i was told on that matter was they would check it out and let me know, Seems that the voices could be encrypted to only work with that program, but not sure yet.
I am still pestering them, so as soon as i find out anything i will post it here.
FuzzieDice=Just $35? That's IT? Damn, I gotta check those out! Thanks! :)
You are getting off cheap, down here it would be around $60
Neil.

[Dr.Benway]

Nige, can I get better than Neospeech Kate 16k for an affordable price?

[NIGE]

quote:Originally posted by Dr.Benway

Nige, can I get better than Neospeech Kate 16k for an affordable price?

http://www.tmaa.com/tts/companies.htm
I'm buggered if i know what i am doing,
Doc, check out the site above that Art put to the forum and you should hear Heather.
I have Kate, but from what i have heard Heather is a lot better.
About the price, as i said in my last post. i do not know.
Pardon the french above, but i was trying to add a zip file of her voice, but it would not work????
Neil

[Dr.Benway]

I am experiencing the same trouble with uploading right now, Nige...

Hurrah! Heather sounds great! [:D][:D][:D]
Thanks for the tip. I want to buy her when she gets available.
Please keep us informed.

[Art]

Raymond,

That's really a pretty speculative question. Sort of like asking,
"Which is the best dog to own?"
There are many choices available and yes, there are quite a few
good TTS voices in the under $100 category.

Some of the TTS companys do not list the prices of their voices
which tends to make me a bit aprehensive regarding their pricing.

A few of the voices I've tested have marked inflection, nasal tones,
trouble with double L's like "Jill" (sounds like a slight skip between
the first and second L. A couple actually sounded like the female was
in a drug induced state or at least extremely mellow and some were
sort of muffled and not clearly distinct in their pronunciation.

I do have some info regarding a few companys:
ScanSoft has acquired Rhetorical
Acapela has acquired Babel
The NeoSpeech voices are the same as the ones from Voiceware although
the ones I previewed from voiceware sounded clearer.

I do know that some companys will have background sounds , music or
noise playing to keep some people from using their voice demo for
commercial purposes. For instance...Type your text in their demo,
play it and record it for your own use, perhaps on a web site., etc.

Usually the purchased voice will be much clearer than the on screen
demo of that voice due to the above noise, bandwith considerations,
speaker quality, etc.

There are a number of Free voices available and sometimes one does get
what one pays for. The free L&H British Female voice is pretty good and
if one downloads the L&H voices one can get 10 variations of Mary, Mike
and Sam although theirs is not the best quality.

Cepstral offers 10 different US English voices for $29.95 (most are at age
30 except for one 9-10 year old child and one 12-13 year old child),
2 UK, 2 Canada, 2 German, 2 Americas Spanish voices.

AT&T offers Mike & Crystal with the purchase of their Speech Engine for
$35.00 USD.

NeoSpeech offers Kate & Paul for $35.00 plus a lot of nice support products.

So which is the best voice? That, my friend depends on what you're looking
for in a voice. There are many from which to choose and like dogs, they're
a matter of personal preference.

I've also compiled a critique of the various TTS voices I've tried which I'll
post later.