VOCALOID

Lazar Radosavljevi Matija Atanasijevi Milos Piva Sofija Petrovi

2015/0010 2015/0064 2015/0107 2015/0203
 Vocaloid is a singing voice synthesizer.
Its signal processing part was developed through a
joint research project at the Pompeu Fabra University
in Barcelona, in 2000 and originally was not intended
to be a full commercial project.

Backed by the Yamaha Corporation, it developed the

software into the commercial product "Vocaloid".

The software is available in English, Japanese,

Spanish, Chinese and Korean languages.
 The software enables users to synthesize singing by
typing in lyrics and melody. It uses synthesizing
technology with specially recorded vocals of voice
actors or singers.
It can change the stress of the pronunciations, add
effects such as vibrato, or change the dynamics and
tone of the voice. Each Vocaloid is sold as "a singer in
a box" designed to act as a replacement for an actual
singer.
Vocaloid is intended for professional musicians as well
as light computer music users and has so far sold on
the idea that the only limits are the users' own skills.
 The
The main
main parts
parts of
of the
the Vocaloid
Vocaloid system
system are
are the
the Score
Score Editor,
Editor, the
the Singer
Singer
Library,
Library, and
and the
the Synthesis
Synthesis Engine.
Engine. The
The Synthesis
Synthesis Engine
Engine receives
receives score
score
information
information from
from the
the Score
Score Editor,
Editor, selects
selects appropriate
appropriate samples
samples from
from
the
the Singer
Singer Library,
Library, and
and concatenates
concatenates them
them toto output
output synthesized
synthesized
voices.
voices.
 The Score Editor is a piano roll style editor to
input notes, lyrics, and some expressions.
When entering lyrics, the editor automatically
converts them into Vocaloid phonetic symbols using
the built-in pronunciation dictionary.
The user can directly edit the phonetic symbols of
unregistered words.
The Score Editor offers various parameters to add
expressions to singing voices. The user is supposed to
optimize these parameters that best fit the
synthesized tune when creating voices.
 Each Vocaloid license develops the Singer
Library, or a database of vocal fragments sampled
from real people. The database must have all possible
combinations of phonemes of the target language,
including diphones (a chain of two different
phonemes) and sustained vowels, as well as
polyphones with more than two phonemes if
necessary.
 The Vocaloid system changes the pitch of these
fragments so that it fits the melody. In order to get
more natural sounds, three or four different pitch
ranges are required to be stored into the library.
Number of required vocal fragements depends on the
singing language (for example Japanese requires 500
diphones per pitch, where English requires 2,500).
 The Synthesis Engine receives score information
contained in dedicated MIDI (Musical Instrument
Digital Interface) messages called Vocaloid MIDI sent
by the Score Editor, adjusts pitch and timbre of the
selected samples in frequency domain, and splices
them to synthesize singing voices
The engine smooths the timbre around the junction of
the samples. The timbre of a sustained vowel is
generated by interpolating spectral envelopes of the
surrounding samples. For example, when
concatenating a sequence of diphones "s-e, e, e-t" of
the English word "set", the spectral envelope of a
sustained at each frame is generated by
interpolating in the end of "s-e" and in the
beginning of "e-t".
 The software became very popular in Japan upon
the release of Hatsune Miku Vocaloid 2 software
and her success has led to the popularity of the
Vocaloid software in general.

Hatsune
Miku
 Japanese video sharing website Niconico played
a fundamental role in the recognition and
popularity of the software. Popular original
songs written by a users would generate
illustrations, animation in 2D and 3D, and
remixes by other users. Other creators would
show their unfinished work and ask for ideas.

Kagamine Rin
& Len
 Hatsune Miku performed her first "live" concert
like a virtual idol on a projection screen at the
Saitama Super Arena on August 22, 2009. Her
image was screened by rear projection on a
mostly-transparent screen.

Megurine
Luka
 Despite its growing popularity as a franchise, by
December 2015, Vocaloid was still struggling to make an
impact in the west. Hatsune Miku also did not make as
much of an impact.
Music producers were stating that the Vocaloid software
itself has enough imperfections to present itself as a
singer who does not sound human.