i want more voices!

November 24, 2006 5:21 PM

can i get more voices for my mac?

a couple of months ago i started copying good new yorker/harpers/other articles on the internet into text edit and using the speech function to read them to me. it makes for a good long daily informational bath time.

my only problem is this: i'm tired of the voices which come standard in tiger. vicki is a good voice for this kind of thing, but she gets old. the rest of the voices are so annoying to me that i cannot even concentrate on the article.

so i'm wondering if there are any extra voices, preferably free, that a person could download for mac osx. and, if not, how are these voices created?

posted by localhuman to technology (11 comments total)

I haven't seen any free ones (doesn't mean they're not out there). You might want to look at Cepstral. Not free, but not ridiculously expensive.
posted by veggieboy at 5:46 PM on November 24, 2006

Looks like I botched the link: It's here. Also, I think I remember seeing that Leopard (aka 10.5) would have voice improvements. Apple's site isn't loading for me right now so I can't point you to a page.
posted by veggieboy at 5:53 PM on November 24, 2006

are any extra voices, preferably free, that a person could download for mac osx

According to Apple, they're going to introduce a new voice, called Alex, as part of Leopard (10.5).

I am not aware of any third party voices for Apple's speech synthesis framework. Apple has not publicly released documentation on how to create new ones that are compatible with their framework.

They've been using the same voices since, what? MacOS 7.5?

Vicky, the highest quality voice, was added in Mac OS X 10.3.
posted by RichardP at 6:00 PM on November 24, 2006

Vicky, the highest quality voice, was added in Mac OS X 10.3.

She isn't based on Victoria?
posted by Deathalicious at 6:07 PM on November 24, 2006

thanks veggieboy. i just tried out their quote unquote hot voice 'david'. he's okay. just too bad he'll cost 29.99 to have as my own. maybe we could band together and purchase them all, share the costs and keys and... and... um, have some new voices go into our heads. or something like that p2p-ish like that.

/goes to isohunt in search of/
posted by localhuman at 6:16 PM on November 24, 2006

Here's a preview of "Alex", the new voice coming with 10.5.

Otherwise, you've got the choice of the aforementioned Cepstral at $30 per voice, which sound kind of similar to the standard Mac ones, or iVox, which has much better voices, but it's $199 for the package (though that does get you a range of voices, including one called Graham who sounds like a BBC announcer, so if it's variety you're after, it might be worth the cash).
posted by jack_mo at 6:17 PM on November 24, 2006

Oop, should've previewed.

I am not aware of any third party voices for Apple's speech synthesis framework.

iVox works with VoiceOver, so it'll work wherever the stock Apple voices work.
posted by jack_mo at 6:20 PM on November 24, 2006

She isn't based on Victoria?

It what sense to do you mean "based on" Victoria? All of the Voices in a default install of Mac OS X are voice profiles for Apple's MacinTalk speech synthesizer, so they're all generated by the same engine. Of these voices Victoria is by far the largest (about 28 MB). The next highest quality ones are Agnes, Bruce, and Victoria (each around 1.5 MB). All the rest are much lower in quality, weighing in no more than about 50 KB.

jack_mo: Yeah, I meant to say I am not aware of any free third party voices.
posted by RichardP at 6:52 PM on November 24, 2006

Argh... that should have been:

Of these voices Vicky is by far the largest (about 28 MB).

posted by RichardP at 6:54 PM on November 24, 2006

She isn't based on Victoria?

The speech samples were recorded by the same person, whose name is actually Victoria. The "Victoria" voice uses single phonemes; "Vicky" contains a sound sample for every "diphone," or combination of two phonic sounds. There are hundreds of these.

There is an interesting interview with the real Vicky somewhere on the Web in which she talks about the recording process, but I can't find it at the moment.
posted by ikkyu2 at 10:24 PM on November 24, 2006

Did anyone else notice that the Alex voice on the apple site takes a breath before starting a new sentence?
posted by jeversol at 8:28 PM on November 26, 2006