Vocaloid

Voice model behind the Vocaloid, Excitation plus Resonances (EpR) model,[11] is a combination of:

• Spectral Modeling Synthesis (SMS)
• Source-Filter model

(based on Fig.1 on Bonada et al. 2001)

Vocaloid's singing synthesis technology is generally categorized into the concatenative synthesis[12][13] in the frequency domain, which splices and processes the vocal fragments extracted from human singing voices, in the forms of time-frequency representation. The Vocaloid system can produce the realistic voices by adding vocal expressions like the vibrato on the score information.[14] Initially, Vocaloid's synthesis technology was called "Frequency-domain Singing Articulation Splicing and Shaping" (周波数ドメイン歌唱アーティキュレーション接続法, Shūhasū-domain Kashō Articulation Setsuzoku-hō) on the release of Vocaloid in 2004,[15] although this name is no longer used since the release of Vocaloid 2 in 2007.[16] "Singing Articulation" is explained as "vocal expressions" such as vibrato and vocal fragments necessary for singing. The Vocaloid and Vocaloid 2 synthesis engines are designed for singing, not reading text aloud,[17] though software such as Vocaloid-flex and Voiceroid have been developed for that. They cannot naturally replicate singing expressions like hoarse voices or shouts.[18]

System architecture

Vocaloid system diagram
(based on Fig.1 on Kenmochi, Ohshima & , Interspeech 2007)

The main parts of the Vocaloid 2 system are the Score Editor (Vocaloid 2 Editor), the Singer Library, and the Synthesis Engine. The Synthesis Engine receives score information from the Score Editor, selects appropriate samples from the Singer Library, and concatenates them to output synthesized voices.[3] There is basically no difference in the Score Editor and the Synthesis Engine provided by Yamaha among different Vocaloid 2 products. If a Vocaloid 2 product is already installed, the user can enable another Vocaloid 2 product by adding its library. The system supports three languages, Japanese, Korean, and English, although other languages may be optional in the future.[2] It works standalone (playback and export to WAV) and as a ReWire application or a Virtual Studio Technology instrument (VSTi) accessible from a digital audio workstation (DAW).

Score Editor

Score Editor (example)

Song example: "Sakura Sakura"

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.[3] The user can directly edit the phonetic symbols of unregistered words.[13] 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.[12] This editor supports ReWire and can be synchronized with DAW. Real-time "playback" of songs with predefined lyrics using a MIDI keyboard is also supported.[3]

Synthesis Engine

Vocaloid Synthesis Engine
(based on Fig.4 on Kenmochi, Ohshima, & Interspeech 2007 harvnb error: no target: CITEREFKenmochiOhshima,Interspeech_2007 (help))

The Synthesis Engine receives score information contained in dedicated MIDI 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.[3] When Vocaloid runs as VSTi accessible from DAW, the bundled VST plug-in bypasses the Score Editor and directly sends these messages to the Synthesis Engine.[13]

Timing adjustment

In singing voices, the consonant onset of a syllable is uttered before the vowel onset is uttered. The starting position of a note ("Note-On") must be the same as that of the vowel onset, not the start of the syllable. Vocaloid keeps the "synthesized score" in memory to adjust sample timing so that the vowel onset should be strictly on the "Note-On" position.[13] No timing adjustment would result in delay.

Pitch conversion

Since the samples are recorded in different pitches, pitch conversion is required when concatenating the samples.[3] The engine calculates a desired pitch from the notes, attack time, and vibrato parameters, and then selects the necessary samples from the library.[13]

Timbre manipulation

Spectral Peak Processing (SPP) for timbre manipulation (based on Fig.3 on Bonada & Loscos 2003)

Spectral envelope interpolation between samples

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 ē at each frame is generated by interpolating ē in the end of "s-e" and ē in the beginning of "e-t".[3]

Transforms

After pitch conversion and timbre manipulation, the engine does transforms such as Inverse Fast Fourier transform (IFFT) to output synthesized voices.[3]

Though developed by Yamaha, the marketing of each Vocaloid is left to the respective studios. Yamaha themselves do maintain a degree of promotional efforts in the actual Vocaloid software, as seen when the humanoid robot model HRP-4C of the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST) was set up to react to three Vocaloids—Hatsune Miku, Megpoid and Crypton's noncommercial Vocaloid software "CV-4Cβ"—as part of promotions for both Yamaha and AIST at CEATEC in 2009.[59][60] The prototype voice CV-4Cβ was created by sampling a Japanese voice actress, Eriko Nakamura.[61]

Japanese magazines such as DTM magazine are responsible for the promotion and introduction for many of the Japanese Vocaloids to Japanese Vocaloid fans. It has featured Vocaloids such as Miku, Kagamine Rin and Len, and Luka, printing some sketches by artist Kei and reporting the latest news on the Vocaloids. Thirty-day trial versions of Miriam, Lily and Iroha have also contributed to the marketing success of those particular voices. After the success of SF-A2 Miki's CD album, other Vocaloids such as VY1 and Iroha have also used promotional CDs as a marketing approach to selling their software. When Amazon MP3 in Japan opened on November 9, 2010, Vocaloid albums were featured as its free-of-charge contents.[62][63]

Crypton has been involved with the marketing of their Character Vocal Series, particularly Hatsune Miku, has been actively involved in the GT300 class of the Super GT since 2008 with the support of Good Smile Racing (a branch of Good Smile Company, mainly in charge of car-related products, especially itasha (cars featuring illustrations of anime-styled characters) stickers). Although Good Smile Company was not the first to bring the anime and manga culture to Super GT, it departs from others by featuring itasha directly rather than colorings onto vehicles.

Since the 2008 season, three different teams received their sponsorship under Good Smile Racing, and turned their cars to Vocaloid-related artwork:

• Studie, which participated in the 2008 and 2009 seasons with BMW Z4 E86, and BMW Z4 GT3 in the 2011 season.[64] Their car was painted in official Hatsune Miku art in 2008 season, but started using fan-derivative versions of Hatsune Miku in some races since the 2009 season.[65][66] The team was crowned as 2011 Super GT season GT300 Champion by winning in three out of eight rounds (Sepang, Fuji 250km, as well as Motegi), which are all from pole to checkered flag.
• Team MOLA, using a Nissan Fairlady Z, and they received sponsors on the final race in Fuji in the 2008 season. Images of Kagamine Rin and Len was added on their original colorings. The Fuji round, in fact, is the first FIA race to feature two unique itasha cars competing in a single race.[67][68]
• Team COX, participating in the 2010 season, which used a Porsche 996 GT3 RSR and a Porsche 997 GT3-R. Their car used Racing Miku (an official Hatsune Miku derivative, wearing an orange race queen suit) as their image.

As well as involvements with the GT series, Crypton also established the website Piapro.[69] A number of games starting from Hatsune Miku: Project DIVA were produced by Sega under license using Hatsune Miku and other Crypton Vocaloids, as well as "fan made" Vocaloids. Later, a mobile phone game called Hatsune Miku Vocalo x Live was produced by Japanese mobile social gaming website Gree.[70] TinierMe Gacha also made attire that looks like Miku for their services, allowing users to make their avatar resemble the Crypton Vocaloids.[71][72]

Two unofficial manga were also produced for the series, Maker Unofficial: Hatsune Mix being the most well known of the two, which was released by Jive in their Comic Rush magazine; this series is drawn by Vocaloid artist Kei. The series features the Crypton Vocaloids in various scenarios, a different one each week. The series focuses on the Crypton Vocaloids, although Internet Co., Ltd.'s Gackpoid Vocaloid makes a guest appearance in two chapters. The series also saw guest cameos of Vocaloid variants such as Hachune Miku, Yowane Haku, Akita Neru and the Utauloid Kasane Teto. The series comprises the original 28 chapters serialized in Comic Rush and a collection of the first 10 chapters in a single tankōbon volume.[73] A manga was produced for Lily by Kei, who also drew the mascot.[74][75] An anime music video titled "Schwarzgazer", which shows the world where Lily is,[76] was produced and it was released with the album anim.o.v.e 02, however the song is sung by Move, not by Vocaloids. A yonkoma manga based on Hatsune Miku and drawn by Kentaro Hayashi, Shūkan Hajimete no Hatsune Miku!, began serialization in Weekly Young Jump on September 2, 2010.[77] Hatsune Miku appeared in Weekly Playboy magazine.[78] However, Crypton Future Media confirmed they will not be producing an anime based on their Vocaloids as it would limit the creativity of their user base, preferring to let their user base to have freedom to create PV's without restrictions.[79]

Initially, Crypton Future Media were the only studio that was allowed the license of figurines to be produced for their Vocaloids. A number of figurines and plush dolls were also released under license to Max Factory and the Good Smile Company of Crypton's Vocaloids. Among these figures were also Figma models of the entire "Character Vocal Series" mascots as well as Nendoroid figures of various Crypton Vocaloids and variants. Pullip versions of Hatsune Miku, Kagamine Len and Rin have also been produced for release in April 2011; other Vocaloid dolls have since been announced from the Pullip doll line.[80][81] As part of promotions for Vocaloid Lily, license for a figurine was given to Phat Company and Lily became the first non-Crypton Vocaloid to receive a figurine.[82]

With regard to the English Vocaloid studios, Power FX's Sweet Ann was given her own MySpace page and Sonika her own Twitter account. In comparison to Japanese studios, Zero-G and PowerFX maintain a high level of contact with their fans. Zero-G in particular encourages fan feed back and, after adopting Sonika as a mascot for their studio, has run two competitions related to her.[83][84] There was also talk from PowerFX of redoing their Sweet Ann box art and a competition would be included as part of the redesign.[85] The Vocaloid Lily also had a competition held during her trial period.[86] English Vocaloids have not sold enough to warrant extras, such as seen with Crypton's Miku Append. However, it has been confirmed if the English Vocaloids become more popular, then Appends would be an option in the future. Crypton plans to start an electronic magazine for English readers at the end of 2010 in order to encourage the growth of the English Vocaloid fanbase. Extracts of PowerFX's Sweet Ann and Big Al were included in Soundation Studio in their Christmas loops and sound release with a competition included.[87]

Crypton and Toyota began working together to promote the launch of the 2011 Toyota Corolla using Hatsune Miku to promote the car. The launch of the car also marked the start of Miku's debut in the US alongside it.[88] Crypton had always sold Hatsune Miku as a virtual instrument, but they decided to ask their own fanbase in Japan if it was okay with them to market her to the United States as a virtual singer instead.[89]

Hatsune Miku is partly responsible for Vocaloid's success.

The software became very popular in Japan upon the release of Crypton Future Media's Hatsune Miku Vocaloid 2 software and her success has led to the popularity of the Vocaloid software in general.[117] Japanese video sharing website Niconico played a fundamental role in the recognition and popularity of the software. A user of Hatsune Miku and an illustrator released a much-viewed video, in which "Hachune Miku", a super deformed Miku, held a Welsh onion (Negi in Japanese), which resembles a leek, and sang the Finnish song "Ievan Polkka" like the flash animation "Loituma Girl", on Nico Nico Douga.[118] According to Crypton, they knew that users of Nico Nico Douga had started posting videos with songs created by the software before Hatsune Miku, but the video presented multifarious possibilities of applying the software in multimedia content creation—notably the dōjin culture.[119]

As the recognition and popularity of the software grew, Nico Nico Douga became a place for collaborative content creation. Popular original songs written by a user would generate illustrations, animation in 2D and 3D, and remixes by other users. Other creators would show their unfinished work and ask for ideas.[120] The software has also been used to tell stories using song and verse and the Story of Evil series has become so popular that a manga, six books, and two theatre works were produced by the series creator.[121][122] Another theater production based on "Cantarella", a song sung by Kaito and produced by Kurousa-P, was also set to hit the stage and will run Shibuya's Space Zero theater in Tokyo from August 3 to August 7, 2011.[123] The website has become so influential that studios often post demos on Nico Nico Douga, as well as other websites such as YouTube, as part of the promotional effort of their Vocaloid products. The important role Nico Nico Douga has played in promoting the Vocaloids also sparked interest in the software and Kentaro Miura, the artist of Gakupo's mascot design, had offered his services for free because of his love for the website.[124]

In September 2009, three figurines based on the derivative character "Hachune Miku" were launched in a rocket from the United States state of Nevada's Black Rock Desert, though it did not reach outer space.[125][126] In late November 2009, a petition was launched in order to get a custom made Hatsune Miku aluminum plate (8 cm x 12 cm, 3.1" x 4.7") made that would be used as a balancing weight for the Japanese Venus space probe Akatsuki.[127] Started by Hatsune Miku fan Sumio Morioka that goes by chodenzi-P, this project received the backing of Dr. Seiichi Sakamoto of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA).[128] The website of the petition written in Japanese was translated into other languages such as English, Russian, Chinese and Korean, and, the petition exceeded the needed 10,000 signatures necessary to have the plates made on December 22, 2009.[129] On May 21, 2010 at 06:58:22 (JST), Akatsuki was launched on the rocket H-IIA 202 Flight 17 from the Japanese spaceport Tanegashima Space Center, having three plates depicting Hatsune Miku.[130][131]

The Vocaloid software has also had a great influence on the character Black Rock Shooter, which looks like Hatsune Miku but is not linked to her by design. The character was made famous by the song "Black Rock Shooter",[132] and a number of figurines have been made. An original video animation made by Ordet was streamed for free as part of a promotional campaign running from June 25 to August 31, 2010.[133] The virtual idols "Meaw" have also been released aimed at the Vocaloid culture. The twin Thai virtual idols released two singles, "Meaw Left ver." and "Meaw Right ver.", sung in Japanese.[134][135]

A cafe for one day only was opened in Tokyo based on Hatsune Miku on August 31, 2010.[136] A second event was arranged for all Japanese Vocaloids.[137] "Snow Miku" was also featured on an event as a part of the 62nd Sapporo Snow Festival in February 2011.[138] A Vocaloid-themed TV show on the Japanese Vocaloids called Vocalo Revolution began airing on Kyoto Broadcasting System on January 3, 2011.[139][140] The show is part of a bid to make the Vocaloid culture more widely accepted and features a mascot known as "Cul", also mascot of the "Cul Project".[141] The show's first success story is a joint collaboration between Vocalo Revolution and the school fashion line "Cecil McBee" Music x Fashion x Dance.[142][143] Piapro also held a competition with famous fashion brands with the winners seeing their Lolita-based designs reproduced for sale by the company Putumayo.[144] A radio station set up a 1-hour program containing nothing but Vocaloid-based music.[145]

The Vocaloid software had a great influence on the development of the freeware Utau.[146] Several products were produced for the Macne series (Mac音シリーズ) for intended use for the programs Reason 4 and GarageBand. These products were sold by Act2 and by converting their file format, were able to also work with the Utau program.[147] The program Maidloid, developed for the character Acme Iku (阿久女イク), was also developed, which works in a similar way to Vocaloid, except produces erotic sounds rather than an actual singing voice.[148] Other than Vocaloid, AH Software also developed Tsukuyomi Ai and Shouta for the software Voiceroid, and the sale of their Vocaloids gave AH software the chance to promote Voiceroid at the same time. The software is aimed for speaking rather than singing. Both AH Software's Vocaloids and Voiceroids went on sale on December 4, 2009.[149] Crypton Future Media has been reported to openly welcome these additional software developments as it expands the market for synthesized voices.

During the events of the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami, a number of Vocaloid related donation drives were produced. Crypton Future Media joined several other companies in a donation drive, with money spent on the sales of music from Crypton Future Media's KarenT label being donated to the Japanese Red Cross.[150] In addition, a special Nendoroid of Hatsune Miku, Nendoroid Hatsune Miku: Support ver., was announced with a donation of 1,000 yen per sale to the Japanese Red Cross.[151]

In 2012, Vocaloid was quoted as one of the contributors to a 10% increase in cosplay related services.[152] In 2013, the Vocaloid 3 software Oliver was used as the voice of Cartoon Hangover character Puppycat from their web series Bee and Puppycat.[153][154]

Music

Vocaloid Miriam Stockley

Thingymajigtus

The earliest use of Vocaloid-related software used prototypes of Kaito and Meiko and were featured on the album History of Logic System by Hideki Matsutake released on July 24, 2003, and sang the song "Ano Subarashii Ai o Mō Ichido". The first album to be released using a full commercial Vocaloid was A Place in the Sun, which used Leon's voice for the vocals singing in both Russian and English.[155] Miriam has also been featured in two albums, Light + Shade[10] and Continua.[156] Japanese progressive-electronic artist Susumu Hirasawa used the Lola Vocaloid in the original soundtrack of Paprika by Satoshi Kon.[157][158] The software's biggest asset is its ability to see continued usage even long after its initial release date. Leon was featured in the album 32bit Love by Muzehack and Lola in Operator's Manual by anaROBIK; both were featured in these albums six years after they were released.[159] Even early on in the software's history, the music making progress proved to be a valuable asset to the Vocaloid development as it not only opened up the possibilities of how the software may be applied in practice, but led to the creation of further Vocaloids to fill in the missing roles the software had yet to cover. The album A Place in the Sun was noted to have songs that were designed for a male voice with a rougher timbre than the Vocaloid Leon could provide; this later led to the development of Big Al to fulfill this particular role.[160]

Some of the most popular albums are on the Exit Tunes label, featuring the works of Vocaloid producers in Japan. One of the Vocaloid compilations, Exit Tunes Presents Vocalogenesis feat. Hatsune Miku, debuted at No. 1 on the Japanese weekly Oricon albums chart in May 2010, becoming the first Vocaloid album ever to top the charts.[161] The album sold 23,000 copies in its first week and eventually sold 86,000 copies. The following released album, Exit Tunes Presents Vocalonexus feat. Hatsune Miku, became the second Vocaloid album to top the weekly charts in January 2011.[162] Another album, Supercell, by the group Supercell[163] also features a number of songs using Vocaloids. Upon its release in North America, it became ranked as the second highest album on Amazon's bestselling MP3 album in the international category in the United States and topped the store's bestselling chart for world music on iTunes.[164]

Other albums, such as 19's Sound Factory's First Sound Story[165] and Livetune's Re:Repackage, and Re:Mikus[166][167] also feature Miku's voice. Other uses of Miku include the albums Sakura no Ame (桜ノ雨) by Absorb and Miku no Kanzume (みくのかんづめ) by OSTER-project. Kagamine Len and Rin's songs were covered by Asami Shimoda in the album Prism credited to "Kagamine Rin/Len feat. Asami Shimoda".[168] The compilation album Vocarock Collection 2 feat. Hatsune Miku was released by Farm Records on December 15, 2010,[169] and was later featured on the Cool Japan Music iPhone app in February 2011.[170] The record label Balloom became the first label to focus solely on Vocaloid-related works and their first release was Unhappy Refrain by the Vocaloid producer Wowaka.[171][172] Hatsune Miku's North American debut song "World is Mine" ranked at No. 7 in the iTunes world singles ranking in the week of its release.[173] Singer Gackt also challenged Gackpoid users to create a song, with the prize being 10 million yen, stating if the song was to his liking he would sing and include it in his next album.[174] The winning song "Episode 0" and runner up song "Paranoid Doll" were later released by Gackt on July 13, 2011.[175] In relation to the Good Smiling racing promotions that Crypton Future Media Vocaloids had played part in, the album Hatsune Miku GT Project Theme Song Collection was released in August 2011 as part of a collaboration.[176]

In the month prior to her release, SF-A2 Miki was featured in the album Vocaloids X'mas: Shiroi Yoru wa Seijaku o Mamotteru as part of her promotion. The album featured the Vocaloid singing Christmas songs.[177] Miki was also featured singing the introduction of the game Hello Kitty to Issho! Block Crash 123!!. A young female prototype used for the "project if..." series was used in Sound Horizon's musical work "Ido e Itaru Mori e Itaru Ido", labeled as the "prologue maxi". The prototype sang alongside Miku for their music and is known only by the name "Junger März_Prototype β".[178][179] For Yamaha's VY1 Vocaloid, an album featuring VY1 was created. The album was released with the deluxe version of the program. It includes various well-known producers from Nico Nico Douga and YouTube and includes covers of various popular and well-known Vocaloid songs using the VY1 product.[180] The first press edition of Nekomura Iroha was released with a CD containing her two sample songs "Tsubasa" and "Abbey Fly", and the install disc also contained VSQ files of the two songs for use with her program.[181] A number of Vocaloid related music, including songs starring Hatsune Miku, were featured in the arcade game Music Gun Gun! 2.[182] One of the rare singles with the English speaking Sonika, "Suburban Taxi", was released by Alexander Stein and the German label Volume0dB on March 11, 2010.[183]

To celebrate the release of the Vocaloid 3 software, a compilation album titled The Vocaloids was released. The CD contains 18 songs sung by Vocaloids released in Japan and contains a booklet with information about the Vocaloid characters.[184] Porter Robinson used the Vocaloid Avanna for his studio album Worlds.

Yamaha utilized Vocaloid technology to mimic the voice of deceased rock musician hide, who died in 1998, to complete and release his song "Co Gal" in 2014. The musician's actual voice, breathing sounds and other cues were extracted from previously released songs and a demo and combined with the synthesized voice.[185] Kenji Arakawa, a spokesman for Yamaha, said he believes this to be the first time a work by a deceased artist is commercially available and includes the dead person singing lyrics completed after their death.[186]

For illustrations of the characters, Crypton Future Media licensed "original illustrations of Hatsune Miku, Kagamine Rin, Kagamine Len, Megurine Luka, Meiko and Kaito" under Creative Commons-Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported ("CC BY-NC"), allowing for artists to use the characters in noncommercial adaptations and derivations with attribution.[187][188]

According to Crypton, because professional female singers refused to provide voice samples, in fear that the software might create clones of their singing voices, Crypton changed their focus from imitating certain singers to creating characteristic vocals. This change of focus led to sampling vocals of voice actors and the Japanese voice actor agency Arts Vision supported the development.[189] Similar concerns are expressed throughout the other studios using Vocaloid, with Zero-G refusing to release the names of several of their providers.[190] PowerFX only hinted at Sweet Ann's voice provider, and Oliver's voice provider is still unknown. AH Software named the voice providers for Miki, Kiyoteru, Yukari, Zunko and Iroha, but for legal reasons cannot name Kaai Yuki's voice provider as a minor was the subject of the recordings.

Any rights or obligations arising from the vocals created by the software belong to the software user. Just like any music synthesizer, the software is treated as a musical instrument and the vocals as sound. Under the term of license, the mascots for the software can be used to create vocals for commercial or non-commercial use as long as the vocals do not offend public policy. In other words, the user is bound under the term of license of the software not to synthesize derogatory or disturbing lyrics. On the other hand, copyrights to the mascot image and name belong to their respective studios. Under the term of license, a user cannot commercially distribute a vocal as a song sung by the character, nor use the mascot image on commercial products, without the consent of the studio who owns them.[191]

Employees working within the studios are bound by legal implications not to repeat any details given to them from Yamaha on Vocaloid development without Yamaha's permission. They are also not allowed to disclose details of upcoming Vocaloids without permission of the Vocaloid studio nor reveal the identity of the singer if the studio does not make it public.

On November 29, 2010, Crypton started an independent music publication for seeking copyright royalties if songs are used for commercial purposes such as karaoke, because Vocaloid users hardly used the copyright collective Japanese Society for Rights of Authors, Composers and Publishers (JASRAC).[192] Due to the fact songs using the software are made by independent users, the act of plagiarism has remained a highly controversial issue among Vocaloid users and their published works. This has been a heated issue on both illustrative and musical levels with songs and their publishers being targeted by allegations of stealing the works of others.[193] In January 2011, Japanese boyband KAT-TUN were forced to admit plagiarism against their song "Never×Over~「-」Is Your Part~", after the producer of the song admitted it was influenced by the Vocaloid song "Dye" produced by AVTechNO, fans having expressed their outrage over the similarities of the two songs.[194][195][196] However, AVTechNO also released a statement explaining that the members of the band were not to blame for this incident.[197]

Despite the success of the software in Japan, overseas customers have been largely reluctant to embrace it. When interviewed by the Vocaloid producing company Zero-G, music producer Robert Hedin described how the software offered creative freedom. He compared it to auto-tuning software, stating the Vocaloid software itself has enough imperfections to present itself as a singer who does not sound human. However, he states that Vocaloid also does not "snap into tune" like auto-tuning software, which the music industry seems to favor these days.[201] Giuseppe, who had produced demo songs for both Zero-G and PowerFX Vocaloids, and is aided in the production of Spanish-based Vocaloids, had noted that each Vocaloid package worked the same way. However, each vocal has its own unique personality to it, so choosing one vocal over another is not easy. He hoped that the Vocaloid software will continue to progress forward so long as its userbase continues to push it forward. He also noted that the software's slow start and its early bad reputation was the hardest part for the software to overcome regarding its success, and like any commercial product, a decrease in sales would result in a decrease in development. However, focus had switched from focusing on the vocals to focusing on the boxart character mascot itself at this point.[202]

The CEO of Crypton Future Media noted the lack of interest in Vocaloids overall was put down to the lack of response in the initial Vocaloid software. With regard to the development of the English version of the software specifically, many studios when approached by Crypton Future Media for recommendations towards developing the English Vocaloids had no interest in the software initially, with one particular company representative calling it a "toy". A level of failure was put on Leon and Lola for lack of sales in the United States, putting the blame on their British accents.[189] Crypton praised the value of the English Vocaloids and what they offered to the Japanese users for their capability of offering the English language to them, when it would otherwise be off limits. As Hatsune Miku was responsible for making the software famous, her voice has become the most commonly associated with the Vocaloid software and divides opinions of critics both overseas and within Japan on their opinions towards her and the software.[203][204] Crypton blamed a fear of robots on part of the lack of response on the sale of the software overseas and expressed that there was also a general "anti-Vocaloid" point of view amongst some cultures and communities, although he also noted that he hoped in the future this would change as the software continued to be developed.[205] Prior to the release of the Hatsune Miku product, Crypton Future Media had also noted there was some criticism at choosing to release the original Vocaloid engine as a commercial licensing product, although felt that the choice was for the better of the engine. Furthermore, it was noted that the original Vocaloid engine felt more like a prototype for future engine versions.[206]

Even with the lack of success for the English version of the software in the United States, Crypton Future Media reported that about half of music downloads at the iTunes Store for songs of Crypton's label KarenT, published by Japanese producers, have been from overseas purchases, with sales from American consumers making up the majority of percentages of overseas sales.[207] Despite experiencing good sales in Europe, it was reported the software is failing to attract a satisfactory level of attention, and software developers are now setting their sights on trying to overturn the lack of interest in the software in Europe.[208]

Hatsune Miku picked up second place in a 2010 Japanese Yahoo! poll on Japanese gamers' favorite characters, owed to her starring role in Hatsune Miku: Project DIVA 2nd.[209] CNN's website CNNGo declared Hatsune Miku as one of Japan's best in their "Tokyo best and worst of 2010", listing her as the "Best new virtual singer for the otaku generation".[210] Clash magazine labeled Hatsune Miku and the Vocaloid software as the future of music.[211]

Vocaloid was sold as a product for professional musicians, and although there were many producers using the software within Japan by 2011, a report was released detailing the true reflections of the Vocaloid craze. It was conducted independently by fans of the Vocaloid software and detailed the popularity of certain Vocaloids over others. Most Vocaloid related videos struggled to get over 5,000 views and the most popular producers gaining the most interest over lesser popular producers. In order of the most video uploads were Hatsune Miku (first), Kagamine Rin (second), Gumi (third), Megurine Luka (fourth), Kagamine Len (fifth) and Kaito (sixth) had the most videos uploaded related to them, while all other Vocaloids had less than 1,000 uploads related to them. This was not true for all the calculations they ran to determine the popularity, including average and mean views and mylists. In the end, only Gumi and the Kagamine software packages managed to stay on the top six lists of all their calculations, with popular Vocaloid Hatsune Miku failing to make it on the mean average top six list calculations for the study period.[212] In 2013, it was estimated that about 30% of all videos updated each month on Niconico were Vocaloid related.[213]

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. Concerns were mostly focused on Vocaloid itself at this point. It was also reported that more Japanese companies were growing protective of their properties, with Hatsune Miku: Project DIVA X, which was released at the time, being the center of one such conflict of copyright interest. The market for such games was described as a "niche audience in the west".[214]

• Auto-Tune
• Cantor
• Computer music
• Dōjin music
• Hatsune Miku
• List of Vocaloid products
• Macne series
• Kagerou Project
• Nyan Cat
• Software synthesizer
• Speech synthesis
• Utau
• Virtual idol
• Voiceroid

Technologies

• Bonada, Jordi; et al. (2001). "Singing voice synthesis combining Excitation plus Resonance and Sinusoidal plus Residual Models" (PDF). Proc. Of ICMC. CiteSeerX 10.1.1.18.6258.
• Bonada, Jordi; Loscos, Alex (2003). "Sample-based singing voice synthesizer by spectral concatenation". Proc. Of the Stockholm Music Acoustics Conference (SMAC) 03: 439–442.
• Kenmochi, Hideki; Ohshima, Hayato. "VOCALOID - Commercial singing synthesizer based on sample concatenation" (PDF). Interspeech 2007. Archived from the original (PDF) on March 15, 2012. Retrieved January 9, 2011.
• "Interview of Hideki Kenmochi". DTM magazine (January 2008 Special ed. The Vocaloid CV01 Hatsune Miku) (in Japanese). Vol. 15 no. 2. Terajima Joho Kikaku. January 2008. pp. 36–39. ASIN B000YKXQTI.
• Kenmochi, Hideki; Ohshima, Hayato (February 8, 2008). "Singing synthesis system "Vocaloid" Current situation and todo lists" (PDF). IPSJ SIG Notes (in Japanese). SIG Music and Computer (SIGMUS), Information Processing Society of Japan (IPSJ). 2008 (12): 51–56. ISSN 0919-6072. 2008-MUS-74-(9).
• Kenmochi, Hideki (March 2008). "第III章 歌唱合成システムVOCALOIDと初音ミク [Part 3. Singing Synthesis System VOCALOID and Hatsune MIKU]" (PDF). デジタルコンテンツの知的財産権に関する調査研究：進化するコンテンツビジネスモデルとその収益性・合法性—VOCALOID2、初音ミク、ユーザ、UGMサイト、権利者—報告書 [The Research and Study about the Intellectual Property Rights of the Digital Contents: Developing Content Business Models and these Profitabilities and Legalities—Vocaloid 2, Hatsune Miku, Users, UGM Sites and Rightful Claimants—The Report] (in Japanese). Digital Content Association of Japan (DCAJ). pp. 33–50. Retrieved January 16, 2011.
• Kenmochi, Hideki (May 25, 2008). "Singing Synthesis : VOCALOID and its Technologies". Journal of the Human Interface Society (in Japanese). 10 (2): 161–164. ISSN 1344-7254.
• "The Making of Vocaloid". Red Bull Music Academy. November 2014. Retrieved November 12, 2014.

Derivative products

• Ameya/Ayame (2008). "歌声合成ツールUTAU" [Vocal Synthesis Tool UTAU] (in Japanese). Vocal Synthesis Tool UTAU. Retrieved July 9, 2010.
• Higuchi, Masaru (Yu) (2008-02-24). "MikuMikuDance". Vocaloid Promotion Video Project (powered by GeoCities). Retrieved July 9, 2010.
• Nakano, Tomoyasu; Goto, Masataka (July 6, 2009). "VocaListener: A Singing-to-Singing Synthesis System Based on Iterative Parameter Estimation". Retrieved July 27, 2011.
• Nakano, Tomoyasu; Goto, Masataka (2008). "VocaListener（ぼかりす）: ユーザ歌唱の歌い方を真似る歌声合成パラメータを自動推定するシステム" [VocaListener (Bokarisu): A system for automatic parameter estimation of the singing voice synthesis, for imitating the user's singing style.] (in Japanese). Retrieved July 9, 2010. (redirected to Nakano & Goto 2009 harvnb error: no target: CITEREFNakanoGoto2009 (help) after 7 October 2010)

• Kenmochi, Hideki; Fujimoto, Ken (2014). ボーカロイド技術論: 歌声合成の基礎とその仕組み [Vocaloid Technological Theory - Foundation and mechanism of singing voice synthesis]. Tokyo, Japan: Yamaha Music Media. ISBN 978-4-636-89996-2.
• Kenmochi, Hideki (August 2009). "Singing Synthesis and its Application (<Special Feature>Frontiers of Music Information Processing Technologies)". IPSJ Magazine (in Japanese). Vol. 50 no. 8. Information Processing Society of Japan (IPSJ). pp. 723–728. ISSN 0447-8053.
• "DTM MAGAZINE 音楽情報処理最前線!" [Frontiers of Music Information Processing! on DTM magazine] (archive) (in Japanese). Terajima Joho Kikaku / IPSJ SIG Music and Computer (SIGMUS).
• Nakano, Tomoyasu; Goto, Masataka (August 2008). "音楽情報処理最前線!VOCALOIDに歌を真似させるVocaListener" [Frontiers of Music Information Processing! VocaListener to make the Vocaloid imitate a given song] (PDF). DTM magazine (in Japanese). Vol. 15 no. 9. Terajima Joho Kikaku. pp. 72–73. ASIN B001B7MJR8.

Feature article

• Santos, Carlo (July 15, 2011). "The World Is Hers: How Hatsune Miku Is Changing Everything". feature article. Anime News Network.
• Whiteley, Sheila; Rambarran, Shara, eds. (2016-02-11). "Vocaloids, Holograms, and Virtual Pop Stars". The Oxford Handbook of Music and Virtuality. Oxford University Press. pp. 97–166. ISBN 978-0-19-932128-5. .

Review

• Santos, Carlo (May 14, 2013). "Mikunopolis in Los Angeles Blu-Ray" (review). Anime News Network.

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Vocaloids.

• Official website
• Vocaloid Wiki
• Y2 Project (in Japanese)