I used to be a decent vocalist, but I lost this to cancer. I have had SOME luck finding vocalists to work with, but various obstacles limit this. Mostly "attitude" gets in the way. Can't blame them for what they do or want or don't want. So I have been using MIDI to come up with melody and harmony scales.

I have always considered vocaloid to not be an option, but recently I have realized it has improved. So I have been exploring this. I think with some studying, and some editing, it has become useful for me. I still will be seeking the real thing, but I can see this being used to demo for the singers, and can help me move my ideas along.

So let's talk. Talk about configurations, applications, editing, just in general what you have experienced with this. I have had SOME success creating backing vocals with this. Just by typing in the lyrics and editing the pitch, timing, and duration of the phrase words. I have had some problems with what I consider artifacts. Maybe there is something I am missing. Maybe we can post exerpts of our work in case someone can help? I will post an exerpt of what I have achieved so far. It's not half bad for demos of vocal parts. I think it could easily serve to show vocalists what to sing.

 

This was my very first attempt at using "Amy" to sing backing vocal ideas. Here is an excerpt of this attempt. It's not terrible. I just started with a clean slate, and typed in some lyrics and then moved things to fit pitch, duration, and timing of the mix I was working against. V-5 Amy is doing the half time backing singing the words "Try To Keep A Heart Of Gold". Please note this is in arrangement and testing mode so don't worry about mix. I will keep my concerns about how well V-5 rendered the phrase to myself for now. See if you pick up what I heard in my DAW. Mix sometimes hides problems, but we'll consider that in our favor.

 

I love vocaI emulators
this is a vocaloid 80's italo disco tune from my soundcloud:


Singer is Bruno (spanish voice) singing in italian language

 

Last edited by a moderator: Jul 24, 2018

I had some time to work a little more on this today. I tried to make a high harmony scale for my excerpt above. Here is the harmony alone. This could actually be good if I could figure out how to tame the bending. It almost sounds like someone is playing with the mod wheel while she sings. This is on several of the words, but is especially true of the word "heart".

 

Interesting thread: I had no idea that you could achieve that level of realism. I will have to check this Vocaloid thing.

 

Well that is why we watch and monitor things. Up until recently when I saw someone else saying how it has improved, I pretty much ignored vocaloid. If I can tame this "bending" aspect of this, or even just edit it out, I would be much happier. Even with these obstacles, it is totally amazing that all I had to do was type in lyrics and then do a little editing to get this. It is not half bad. I need to get a handle on editing the parameters. I found a video on youtube that made my work easier.

 

You're not missing anything. Artifacts are by far the biggest problem of Vocaloid. Feature-wise is excellent as you may already know.
I'm eager to try the new v5 voices and very interested in sharing tips.

I'm not an expert but I think the vibrato/bending could be improved.

 

I don't really have the patience to use it, I install the v5 from the sister site, and got some issue when uninstall it, it delete all my vst3 folder.

For vocalist, when I need stuff for commercial or stuff that just need a voice, I go on fiver. There is lot of vocalist from different country that can sing your text with your melody, or even write on your music. There is option for every budget, and you can find some little gem if you put enough time.
It can be a better option than Vocaloid, even with the improvment, it still sounds like a machine (but can give really nice effect with vocoder like on the recyle track shared before)

 

I can see the bend on this line that the arrow points to. I want to figure out how to manipulate that line, and hopefully tame the bend.

 

There's three pages of support videos here kooper.

 

Thank you I will check these.

 

This is so funny man!

Even though Vocaloid 5 now comes bundled with an English language singer, it still sounds like some Japanese girl trying to sing in English...In a karaoke pub!

 

But it is a step up from demoing my ideas for a singer, using only MIDI. I can actually put the lyrics and phrasing in now. I used to have to use a MIDI trumpet to demo. Like I said, I am still seeking real vocalists, and if I could still sing I would need none of this. I have had friends and acquaintances make fun of my methods, over the years, but that soon stopped when I began getting very real results. I will use these as a template for real vocalists.

 

In my opinion, we shouldn’t consider vocal emulators as a surrogate of a human singer. Any machine has a personality of his own, that sometime could not even match with the human character, nevertheless fullfilled of emotions. In science fiction, this is a widely discussed concept: see authors like Isaac Asimov, Philip K. Dick, Arthur C. Clarke to name the most popular. These novelists considered all the philosophical implications of an artificial intelligence, and their interaction with the human being. In the music, this idea is deeply elaborated from the early 80’s by the Kraftwerk.

Getting back on the OP, when I deal with Vocaloid, I try to get the best out of it, looking for an empathy with the machine. Vocaloid is not and won’t ever be a human voice

 

Exactly, but if I wait for real vocalists there are lots of ideas I will loose. Humans are best singers, and also worst attitudes. This plugins has no attitude for us to deal with.

 

I have pretty much killed the bending using the "emotion" control slider. How "bending" a note is equated with "emotion" I don't get, but it does give us control over this. This is good enough now that it can serve as backing vocals and demo. The videos @Thankful pointed to show a lot of different controls. If a person took some time with this it gets better and better.

 

If you look at and listen to the excerpts and photo earlier in this thread you compare to this last one and hear a big difference in the "bending". This picture shows a lot of difference in the line in the parts and points to the control the did this for me. I brought the slider downward and it did it. I see there is control of the attack and release, so I think a lot of this could be altered. It has "growl".

 

I found a guy to sing these for me, so I ultimately end up with the real thing. This app came in handy to demo for him.