Singing Computers

     I was looking for blog post ideas for today, and I decided to look at my old Vocaloid Doc. First, wow, I have improved so much at writing since I last edited that. Second, most of the sections have been posted on my blog already- except the Glossary. That just defined a bit of Vocaloid jargon that I was confused about when I first joined the fandom. I decided to define it for the readers of this blog as well. Enjoy.      Fanloid/Derivative: The official description on the wiki is this: "FANLOID (commonly abbreviated from Fanmade Vocaloid) are VOCALOID inspired characters, created by the Vocaloid fandom." These can range from  IO  to  Yowane Haku  to  Shiteyan'yo . Here's a Wiki page explaining them .      MMD: Standing for MikuMikuDance, MMD is a 3D modeling program specifically focusing on creating music videos for Vocaloid songs (although they're sometimes used for talkloids as well). There are a ton of mode...

     (Note: Sorry for the late release, I'm on vacation. It's worth it for Al though lol) Big Al's official boxart, illustration by Ash Big Al's Taiwan boxart Big Al's original boxart (my morality what is this Elvis monster morph thing)       Big Al Voice donor: Frank S. Engine: V2 Company: Made and sold by PowerFX Release date: December 2009 Updates and/or additional voicebanks: Nope :( Language: English Voice type: Baritone-tenor, American accent Weaknesses: V2 isn’t very inherently realistic, and it’s discontinued. V2 can’t do low notes well either, so he has some distortion in his lower range. He also croaks at the start of words. Strengths: His voice type in general is quite unique. He has the lowest recommended range of all the Vocaloids. Big Al is the clearest English V2 and can even drown out some other Vocaloids sometimes. Examples: Breaking Point , Rinse, Repeat , Viva ...

     I have been reading a lot. If you know me at all, this should not surprise you. As a result, I have a recommendation. Actually several, but this is one of the best:      I highly recommend the Temeraire series by Naomi Novik. The best phrase to describe the genre is probably historical fantasy. Starting with His Majesty's Dragon , it is an account of the Napoleonic Wars- except everyone has dragons. What, you expected something not about dragons? Anyway, the plot is that Will Laurence, captain of the British ship Reliant, captures a French ship and along with it, a valuable dragon egg. To prevent it going feral, as hatched dragons do without masters, he hatches, harnesses, and raises the dragon, and joins the British Air Force. What follows are his many and exciting adventures with his dragon, Temeraire.      The general mood/vibe of the book is, as a quote on the back of the book from Time magazine says, "Like Jane Austen playing Du...

     Do you remember my post about UTAU? Well, it was about several related programs to Vocaloid, but it included UTAU. If you don't, here's the post link:       Related Software      Since I now know more about UTAU, I'll remake that description a bit.      UTAU was first released in March 2008. It is shareware, if you know what that is. If you don't, it's basically watered-down open source software. If you don't know what open source software is, shame on you. Um, anyway, some of the differences between it and Vocaloid are: -It is free to download, -.wav files can be imported into the program, so you can make your own voicebank, -The core engine hasn't been worked on since 2013, and -The core engine stinks.      Well, that's a bit of a frank way to put it, but it's honestly accurate. The average UTAU (colloquially UTAUloid) sounds a bit like this:  Sugarvine, sung by Crecia Selestewa . Even with tu...

     (Note: I have nothing to say except "Wow, I'm so glad I got this done.)      This is an analysis by yours truly on the shifting popularity of Vocaloids throughout the years, from its development to now.      When it was first being developed, Vocaloid was... Hmm. It was certainly groundbreaking technology- LEON and LOLA even won a couple of awards. However, it was really expensive, hard to use, and didn't sound very good. Additionally, LEON and LOLA missed their audience, American DAW Producers, with their British accents, plus the fact that they were sold by a British company. MIRIAM failed because of competition with Cantor, a rival software to Vocaloid at the time. Kaito failed, again, because of a missed audience (I'll elaborate more on Kaito's popularity on his description). Meiko was the first Vocaloid to actually do well.      Then V2, a vastly improved version of the software, released, a bit before the first V2...

     Recently, my younger brother has been making frozen lemonade. The results are... well, this: I had to take a picture, not just for the blog post, but because it looked absolutely beautiful.      It was also delicious. So, of course, we did it again the next day, with raspberry puree instead of strawberry (I helped a bit this time):      It was even more delicious.      Would you like the recipe?      Actually, it doesn't matter, because I'll give it to you anyway. What did you think this blog post was for?      Homemade Frozen Lemonade/Sorbet:      Microwave one cup sugar and one cup lemon juice and stir till the sugar is completely dissolved. Pour the syrup into a 1-quart tupperware container* and add water until tupperware is nearly full, then put it in a freezer. When the mixture is mostly frozen, blend it, then put back in freezer and repeat until satisfied with ...

     I was writing an Analysis of Vocaloid Popularity post, but several factors prevented me from posting it today. These factors included but were not limited to: procrastination, Drivers Ed, and books. As a result, I'll post it on Saturday, along with the regular Saturday post.      Writing a blog in summer is surprisingly difficult. Heck, just writing a blog in general is hard. But I am determined to not give up.

     Remember how in Fanart and My Musical Ear I recommended something called a Webtoon to y'all? Well, I'm at it again.     I just finished reading a Webtoon called Live With Yourself! . The official description is:      "An explosive time-space accident leaves happy-go-lucky 20-something Todd living with himself, and himself, and himself. You get to watch the struggle."      That says it all (although I don't know why it uses so many dashes in the process), but I suppose I should elaborate a little bit. The first "himself" he calls Tomo, who is the future Todd from a few hours to a day later. The second "himself" is Oldie, Todd as an old man. The final one is Babs, him as a baby.      It's a light comedy story that I devoured in a few hours. Not only that, but it makes you think of your future self as more of a person- they are you, after all. For example, I was procrastinating on writing this ...

     (I thought this was scheduled for last Friday, but I forgot to push the Publish button. Oops.) SONiKA's boxart SONiKA's Taiwan boxart Some other official boxart? I honestly have no idea. Looks hideous though.       SONiKA      Voice donor: No information except her age, 17, and her description: a “virtual vocalist modeled on the voice of a young girl pop singer.”      Engine: V2      Company: Made and sold by Zero-G      Release date: July 14, 2009      Language: English      Voice type: Young-sounding voice with a British accent. Sounds kind of like a glitchy Olivia, but with her own distinctive tone.      Weaknesses: Ummm… In terms of quality, Sonika is a mess. She mumbles, mispronounces, and in general you can’t understand her. This is mainly because of bad samples.      Strengths: Because of her unique setup, howe...

     I did one of these a while ago, except in two separate posts, so that was weird, and I put my Vocaloid music in an unusual format, and I have more music I like now, so in summary, I'm doing another one. Wow, that was one sentence. Anyway, let's get started.      I like most electronic music in general, although I don’t like songs with nothing going on in them, musically, like this one . It’s just boring and harsh. That’s probably a result of my extremely classical/folk musical ear.      I like the music labels Monstercat (especially Tristam): Disconnected , Saturday Morning Space Ride , Frame of Mind , Bone Dry , Till It's Over      ...and The Arcadium. Luminous , Until We Fall , Sugar High , The New Beginning , Levitation , Delphinium , Ball Bounce , Around You , Flute Gamer , Lights , Awe , Our Last Time , Never Let Me Go , Keystone      I got into JJD and Skylike from The Arcadium. I haven’t listened...