Released : AniLip [Commercial]

13

Comments

  • DobitDobit Posts: 196
    NSFW said:

    Will this program work with Ivona SAP15 voices used by TextAloud3? I have 6 licenses which I paid a lot of money for. Would be great to use them with this program.

    Not easy to answer, as this may be an licence issue with TextAloud. Some vendors bind voices to their client programs. Even if they offer SAPI interfaces, they could be hidden to other programs.

  • If TA has audiio saving, that's all you need. Type your dialog, export as audio file, copy/paste the same text into AniLip, write it to the timeline, load the TA audio file to a subtrack, and yer dun.

    It's not really all that different from pre-typing your dialog into a text editor to refine it and have a hard copy. The only extra step is exporting the audio from a different app.

     

    Anyone know anything about NeoSpeech (particularly the price for voices and their Editor)? I got a reply from them wanting to know how I intend to use it so they can calculate how much they want to sell it for. I guess they're wanting to make sure they get a cut fo whatever profits I might generate with their robot voices lol

     

  • vrba79vrba79 Posts: 1,398
    Dobit said:
    vrba79 said:

    How viable is this for projects where someone supplies their own actual voice acting, rather that TTS?

    The promo video has been done with seperate voice recordings from the cloud service acapela-box. We adjusted the voice clips with audacity. It has features to expand or shrink audio and you can easily edit the silence areas between words. 

    Does that mean I would have to adjust my voiced samples, to fit the mouth movements? Because that sounds like more trouble than it is worth, and a bit backwards from the way I'm used to doing things.

  • In your description you state that this will "Generate visemes from the sound file and write them to the timeline".  Can I safely assume that also means that, once the visemes are written to the timeline, I can then make minute adjustments to the resulting animation via keyMate and/or graphMate?  

  • DobitDobit Posts: 196
    edited January 2018
    vrba79 said:
    Dobit said:
    vrba79 said:

    How viable is this for projects where someone supplies their own actual voice acting, rather that TTS?

    The promo video has been done with seperate voice recordings from the cloud service acapela-box. We adjusted the voice clips with audacity. It has features to expand or shrink audio and you can easily edit the silence areas between words. 

    Does that mean I would have to adjust my voiced samples, to fit the mouth movements? Because that sounds like more trouble than it is worth, and a bit backwards from the way I'm used to doing things.

    There are various workflows how to synchronize existing recodings with the lip animation, generated from tts.

    1) Adjust the 'speech rate' property in anilip, to match with the speed of the recoding

    2) Anilip has a tab 'extended animation'. Here you can adjust the starttime and length of each viseme. If for example the silence period between 2 words is too short, you can extend the starttime of the the first viseme of the second word (ex. 1000ms instead of 800ms).

    3) Using animate, you can create an aniBlock and change the animation speed or do any other modifications, which are possible with animate and graphmate.

    4) Finally, if you are more audophile and skilled to work with audiosoftware you can make your adjustments in the recording.

    Post edited by Dobit on
  • DobitDobit Posts: 196
    Kaliadder said:

    In your description you state that this will "Generate visemes from the sound file and write them to the timeline".  Can I safely assume that also means that, once the visemes are written to the timeline, I can then make minute adjustments to the resulting animation via keyMate and/or graphMate?  

    Yes, you can. See explanation above.

  • I've seen something concerning TTS software that allows you to insert certain code forms to control the inflection and emphasis of words, such as a pleasant "Hell-O!" instead of a more formal "Hello". Does AniLip support these codes?

    Unfortunately I lost the link. It came up in a YouTube trail that started with a Google search for TTS voices, which led to TTS software.

    I don't know if these codes were applicable to the generic Microsoft SAPI 5 voices, however.

  • And for those who might be looking at TTS software and voices, I've recently been in contact with a sales agent for NeoSpeech, and this is where I ended the conversation:

    "Since you plan on posting your animations on YouTube, we would have to charge at our commercial rate which starts in the 4 figure range. Our commercial licenses are sold annually and our pricing is dependent on your usage and distribution, among other factors, so I have some questions I need to ask to get you a quote.
    -How many animations will you be creating over the next 12 months and what is their average length?
    -How many total views are you expecting?
    -Can you provide your YouTube channel for verification?"

    1. I don't believe in software subscriptions. 

    2. As a hobbyist, I am neither willing nor financially able to pay 4-figure commercial rates for something I hold little hope in making any money from, even ad revenue from monetized YT videos. I have not monetized a YT video of any sort, and would not seriously consider it with less than 10,000 subscribers. I don't see myself ever reaching that goal.

     

    I've since found a couple of other more agreeable alternatives:
    https://ttsreader.com/ - $10 per YT video for life, as long as you include credits to the source in the description. $20 if you don't give credit. The voices (US and UK English anyway) aren't bad at all. Somewhat glitchy in the delivery, and may require trickeration in an audio editor to tweak the final result.
    http://drivetts.ehubsoft.net/ - although it only has a scant few non-robotic voices.
     

  • yes this has been discussed ad nauseum on the iClone forum

    TTS sounds crap and they want to charge the earth for it

    honestly just use MS Anna and a voice changing software like Screaming Bee which is a reasonable price and works with Mimic live forr that matter too as well as having a TSS addon if desired

    you can match the speeds to fit your render before or after as it will change it but you can compensate for that easily enough by adjusting the TTS voice speed for your render or vis versa

  • DobitDobit Posts: 196

    I've seen something concerning TTS software that allows you to insert certain code forms to control the inflection and emphasis of words, such as a pleasant "Hell-O!" instead of a more formal "Hello". Does AniLip support these codes?

    Unfortunately I lost the link. It came up in a YouTube trail that started with a Google search for TTS voices, which led to TTS software.

    I don't know if these codes were applicable to the generic Microsoft SAPI 5 voices, however.

    We do not support these control codes at the moment, because some are dependent from the voice and not all voices support all codes. We think about enabling this in an upcoming update release.

  • Thanks for the reply.

  • DobitDobit Posts: 196
    th3Digit said:

    yes this has been discussed ad nauseum on the iClone forum

    TTS sounds crap and they want to charge the earth for it

    honestly just use MS Anna and a voice changing software like Screaming Bee which is a reasonable price and works with Mimic live forr that matter too as well as having a TSS addon if desired

    you can match the speeds to fit your render before or after as it will change it but you can compensate for that easily enough by adjusting the TTS voice speed for your render or vis versa

    The advantage of using AniLip in such a scenario is, that the text input to MS Anna or any other voice is used to produce phonemes and visemes. That is much more accurate than intepreting recordings. I did not get the point, why TTS is crap. Because some vendors earn money with voices? If you produce for non private use, you must observe licence terms. Even for MS Anna and all other media you use in your production. We paid in the last years much more licence fees for images and video, music and other sound clips than for TTS voices.

  • KaliadderKaliadder Posts: 69
    edited February 2018

    Sorry ... double posted ....

    Post edited by Kaliadder on
  • Dobit said:
    Kaliadder said:

    In your description you state that this will "Generate visemes from the sound file and write them to the timeline".  Can I safely assume that also means that, once the visemes are written to the timeline, I can then make minute adjustments to the resulting animation via keyMate and/or graphMate?  

    Yes, you can. See explanation above.

    Awesome.  Thanks!

  • Dobit said:

    I've seen something concerning TTS software that allows you to insert certain code forms to control the inflection and emphasis of words, such as a pleasant "Hell-O!" instead of a more formal "Hello". Does AniLip support these codes?

    Unfortunately I lost the link. It came up in a YouTube trail that started with a Google search for TTS voices, which led to TTS software.

    I don't know if these codes were applicable to the generic Microsoft SAPI 5 voices, however.

    We do not support these control codes at the moment, because some are dependent from the voice and not all voices support all codes. We think about enabling this in an upcoming update release.

    I believe you're talking about the ability to edit the voice to make it go up or down.  This is a very important ability, and would put your product out in front of the pack.  I say, forget about if they're not perfect yet.  Put 'em in there.  Let the user decide whether to use them or not.  Speech simulation is overdue for a shot in the arm.  It is being held back not by tech, but by perception.

  • Dobit said:

    I did not get the point, why TTS is crap.

    Voco and Lyrebird are not crap. Everyday TTS compares poorly with these. As long ago as 1980, I could always get a laugh by making Speak and Spell sound out curse words. It was cool 35 years ago, but today it is...well...you know.

    I can use Lyrebird to sample my own voice. I can offer it for others to use, free, or on any terms I name. IP and EULA issues fade away. The artist regains control.

    Don't get me wrong, Dobit. I'm glad to see some life in the world of DAZ lipsync. I hope to see more.

  • Rottenham said:
    Dobit said:

    I did not get the point, why TTS is crap.

    Voco and Lyrebird are not crap. Everyday TTS compares poorly with these. As long ago as 1980, I could always get a laugh by making Speak and Spell sound out curse words. It was cool 35 years ago, but today it is...well...you know.

    I can use Lyrebird to sample my own voice. I can offer it for others to use, free, or on any terms I name. IP and EULA issues fade away. The artist regains control.

    Don't get me wrong, Dobit. I'm glad to see some life in the world of DAZ lipsync. I hope to see more.

    oh yes no doubt there are very good speech softwares but Microsoft Anna in Narrator is not as Rottenham points out exactly one of them cheeky

    I agree your plugin usefull and the resulting viseme animation may be good but the youtube videos using Anna's robotic voice are cringeworthy to say the least

    I should know, I uploaded hundreds of them!

    I am not dissing your plugin just the TTS engine and the companies that charge a fortune for their voices

     

  • I did notice that when you export your DS animation as a movie, the voice track is not written to the AVI. Is this something I'm doing wrong, a DS issue, or how AniLip behaves? I spent 3 days rendering about 450 of 2200 frames, and finally stopped the process, so that may be it as well. 

    Just wondering if maybe I can skip the inclusion of the audio track to reduce filesize, since it looks like I'll have to patch the audio in later anyway.

     

  • Dobit said:
    th3Digit said:

    I did not get the point, why TTS is crap. Because some vendors earn money with voices? If you produce for non private use, you must observe licence terms. Even for MS Anna and all other media you use in your production. We paid in the last years much more licence fees for images and video, music and other sound clips than for TTS voices.

    If I were buying pre-recorded dialog, that's one thing. Paying for a sample library from where MIDI notes trigger tones is fine. I have bought audio sample libraries for musical instruments. 
    The problem here is that these voice sample libraries are on a subscription plan, some going up to $200 a month. I am not charged royalties or public performance license fees on the audio sample libraries I use, because it's understood that these are merely libraries, and I have to trigger them to make them do what they do. Voice samples are the same thing. The end-user/artist has to trigger them, they are not pre-recorded cohesive strings as with a pre-recorded music track that an artist put together and require no more effort on the part of the end-user than pressing a Play button. 

    I do know there are instances of music audio sample libraries on a subscription, such as East/West, and I'm not entirely sure they incur an additional fee/charge if I distribute compositions I make with them, as is the case with these voice data samples if you use them in YT videos. I do know that would be an instant "No thanks" from me, no matter how good those samples are. I have microphones and pro-level recording gear and digital audio workstations and an Autotune plugin so I can change the pitch of the voice, and I still have a DS3 installer and I bought the standalone Mimic Pro many years ago, so I can definitely record custom dialog and edit it in any way, shape, or form imaginable.

    These vendors charging outrageous "commercial license" fees for mere sample libraries doesn't fly.

     

  • wolf359wolf359 Posts: 3,828

    I can use Lyrebird to sample my own voice. I can offer it for others to use,
     free, or on any terms I name. IP and EULA issues fade away. 
    The artist regains control.".........................................
     I can change the pitch of the voice, and I still have a DS3 installer 
    and I bought the standalone Mimic Pro many years ago, 
    so I can definitely record custom dialog and edit it in any way, shape,
     or form imaginable.

    These vendors charging outrageous "commercial license" fees for
     mere sample libraries doesn't fly.

    I Agree completely My advice is to invest in MorphVOX Pro,
    learn to fake some different dialects and record your own Dialogs
    that is how I am doing all of the voice work for my films

  • wolf359 said:

    I Agree completely My advice is to invest in MorphVOX Pro,
    learn to fake some different dialects and record your own Dialogs
    that is how I am doing all of the voice work for my films

    Yes, I'm coming to see it that way myself, at least for the present. Male and female, they will all sound like me, but this cannot be helped. It might even be good for a laugh.

    Adobe is certain to ruin Voco by making it corporate rentware.  Lyrebird's future is unclear, but they don't seem interested in small-time animators.  Both are proceeding at glacial speed.

    What is needed is an Open Source version of this software.  Will we live long enough to see it?  Mebbe yes, mebbe no.  Meanwhile, we have the voiceover cast of the Simpsons as inspiration.  :-)

  • DobitDobit Posts: 196
    Rottenham said:
    Dobit said:

    I've seen something concerning TTS software that allows you to insert certain code forms to control the inflection and emphasis of words, such as a pleasant "Hell-O!" instead of a more formal "Hello". Does AniLip support these codes?

    Unfortunately I lost the link. It came up in a YouTube trail that started with a Google search for TTS voices, which led to TTS software.

    I don't know if these codes were applicable to the generic Microsoft SAPI 5 voices, however.

    We do not support these control codes at the moment, because some are dependent from the voice and not all voices support all codes. We think about enabling this in an upcoming update release.

    I believe you're talking about the ability to edit the voice to make it go up or down.  This is a very important ability, and would put your product out in front of the pack.  I say, forget about if they're not perfect yet.  Put 'em in there.  Let the user decide whether to use them or not.  Speech simulation is overdue for a shot in the arm.  It is being held back not by tech, but by perception.

    Support of the W3C Standard SSML is on our todo list.

  • laststand@runbox.com[email protected] Posts: 866
    edited February 2018
    Dobit said:

    Support of the W3C Standard SSML is on our todo list.

    I will keep AniLip on my ToDo list.

    Post edited by [email protected] on
  • DobitDobit Posts: 196

    I did notice that when you export your DS animation as a movie, the voice track is not written to the AVI. Is this something I'm doing wrong, a DS issue, or how AniLip behaves? I spent 3 days rendering about 450 of 2200 frames, and finally stopped the process, so that may be it as well. 

    Just wondering if maybe I can skip the inclusion of the audio track to reduce filesize, since it looks like I'll have to patch the audio in later anyway.

     

    Yes, DS writes the sound to the AVI as the last step of the production. If you break the process, you have a silent movie. I would recommend to choose 'Image Series' as 'Render Type' and create the AVI  with video editing software as vsdc or virtualDub. Going this way, you do not need to insert the audio in DS.

  • Hi there!

    After installing anilip through the DAZ install manager I cannot find the plugin within DAZ studio. Probably I'm doing something wrong - however I've already checked for all windows and tabs to be shown - and still nothing. So I am somewhat lost right at the moment and perhaps somebody can help. I am using DAZ 4.10 64 bit / Windows 8.1 

    Thanks for any help!

  • DobitDobit Posts: 196
    edited February 2018
    nobbe42 said:

    Hi there!

    After installing anilip through the DAZ install manager I cannot find the plugin within DAZ studio. Probably I'm doing something wrong - however I've already checked for all windows and tabs to be shown - and still nothing. So I am somewhat lost right at the moment and perhaps somebody can help. I am using DAZ 4.10 64 bit / Windows 8.1 

    Thanks for any help!

    Did you register the plugin? Choose Help/About Installed Plugins and enter the registration key. After that, the plugin is visible in Windows/Panes.

    Post edited by Dobit on
  • Thanks for the quick reply.

    Ah - o.k. - did not know that I had to register the plugin. I bought the Plugin directly from DAZ and installed it with the install manager. However I do not find any key. 

    Only thing that comes close to a key is when I look inside my DAZ account and go to "Serial Numbers" I can find AniLip and a corresponding serial number. Is this the key you are referring to?

  • DobitDobit Posts: 196
    nobbe42 said:

    Thanks for the quick reply.

    Ah - o.k. - did not know that I had to register the plugin. I bought the Plugin directly from DAZ and installed it with the install manager. However I do not find any key. 

    Only thing that comes close to a key is when I look inside my DAZ account and go to "Serial Numbers" I can find AniLip and a corresponding serial number. Is this the key you are referring to?

    Yes, this is the key. You should be able to register the plugin with this number.

  • O.K. - thanks a lot    :)

  • Dobit if you could do one or two add-ons for more english voices would help a lot. Any language can be recreated with english tricks but we need easier to find commercial narrator voices. Thanks

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