Mac robotic voice-over?

April 25, 2008 1:09 PM

What software do I use to create one of those "robot voice" sound-overs using a Mac?

I want to do a sound-over for a video using a Mac artificial voice. I'm sure this must be super-easy - I just want to type out a script, get Mac to speak it, and record it to a sound file. But somehow Google is failing me. What's the process; what software do I need?

posted by media_itoku to computers & internet (13 comments total)

Which "robot voice" sound-overs are you talking about?
posted by rhizome at 1:11 PM on April 25, 2008

You could use say, or do you want a more Cylonesque voice?
posted by zamboni at 1:13 PM on April 25, 2008

Easiest thing to do here is to use the built-in text-to-speech stuff on the Mac. Write up everything you want said in a text file, pop open a Terminal, and use the say command:

say -f input.txt -o output.aif

... where input.txt is the text to speak, and output.aif is file the speech will be "recorded" to (AIFF format file, editable by any sound program). This uses the settings in the Speech control panel.
posted by captainawesome at 1:13 PM on April 25, 2008 [2 favorites]

Would Dejal Narrator work? Seems overpowered for what you need but maybe worth checking out.
posted by txsebastien at 1:15 PM on April 25, 2008

If you do want a robotic voice, use the Trinoids or Zarvox voices.

e.g.
posted by zamboni at 1:16 PM on April 25, 2008

To expand on captainawesome:

say -v zarvox -f killallhumansscript.txt -o output.aif

should do what you want.
posted by zamboni at 1:20 PM on April 25, 2008

The z in Zarvox should be capitalised, apparently.

say -v Zarvox -f killallhumansscript.txt -o output.aif
posted by zamboni at 1:22 PM on April 25, 2008 [1 favorite]

Perfect -- "say" was exactly what I was looking for!
posted by media_itoku at 1:41 PM on April 25, 2008

http://www.ehow.com/how_2134806_mac-speak-any-text-want.html
posted by mds35 at 1:46 PM on April 25, 2008

Or, just type everything into a TextEdit file, then go Edit>Speech>Start Speaking

You can set which voice it uses in the System Preferences>Speech>Default Voice settings.
posted by Thorzdad at 3:20 PM on April 25, 2008

To get the mac speak any text in any application without having to past anything, you just need to set up your "text to speech" settings (and you only need to do this once).

1) Run System Prefs, select Speech, and choose the "Text to Speech" tab.

2) Next, from the pull-down select the voice you want to have as your system voice. You can adjust the speaking rate, too, using the slider.

3) Click on the "Set key" button and choose a combination of keyboard keys, when pressed, to launch your "text to speech."

4) Now go to any application where there is text (like this post!). Highlight it with your mouse and then press the key combination that you chose with the "Set Key."

Voilà! Your Mac is talking.
posted by runningdogofcapitalism at 5:45 PM on April 25, 2008

There are several voices to choose from, which you can find in the Speech pref pane. I'm not sure if you want a robotic person like Fred, or a "real" robot like Zarvox.
posted by O9scar at 6:50 PM on April 25, 2008

The general name for this software is "text-to-speech". TextAloud is the most popular program for this; you can buy multiple voices for it (male, female, different accents/languages, etc).
posted by lunchbox at 8:55 AM on April 26, 2008