text to speech

[Hondo]

I have a lot of work where I have o go in and add narration. The problem is my content changes frequently so outsourcing to "voice experts" becomes expensive and creates bottlenecks for getting stuff done.

I have done a lot of my own narration (but with a very southern accent has it slimitations) but recentlydemo'd a product which does text to speech and actually is very high quality. The best I have found is Neospeech.
Does anyone currently use them or anoteh rsimilar service where they coudl make a recommendation.

Steve

[David Anderson]

I could see using text to speech for activty feedback but anything more than that I thinkt it would create fatigue for your users. The technology is advancing but I'd take a heavy southern accent over text to speech.

One other thing you could consider would be using voice talent to record areas of your course that don't change. For example opening disclaimer screen, introduction to activities, feedback and things like that. That way when your content screens are bookended with a different voice. Just an idea on how to mix it up.

David

[3MVeach]

I like the idea of 'Vocal Bookends'. Brings back memories from days on a submarine when the alarm announcements were recordings of the officers kids and wives making the announcement (picture if you can some 3 or 4 year olds yelling "Dive, Dive Dive"). Really broke up things and got your attention.

[Jeanette]

Yah, David makes a good point about the non-human voice being hard on the ears after awhile. Steve, maybe you've already done this, but would an online voice-talent service help you minimize costs & turnaround time? I know some people use Voice123 and have found that to be a decent option.

[karimc]

Hondo, I would also like to hear more about Neospeech. I created a free account for myself on their website, but I am not a Web Developer and am not versed with the script required to make it work.

I agree that live voices are preferred, but I work for a software company where the courses change very often and my turnaround time is generally a few weeks. I can't afford time or budget that voice talent would require - it's a computer generated voice or nothing.

The Neospeech voices are very impressive, I must say. I tried a couple of sentences using all three english voices, and they are by far the "smoothest" of all the voices I've listened to.

[Hondo]

it worked great in my demo but they do not have a Spanish version and I have to translate most of my training
so I did not use it. You can buy credits and it was very cost effective
s

[Hondo]

jeannette sorry I missed this reply
I have a voiceover serice I have used webvoice which worked greta but my material is so dynamic in nature that I am constanty changing which required a lot of time and bottlenecks.

For now they are stick with a heavy southern drawl! I have had media sematics create me a custom Character that I use with my narrations that has added a lot of value

[Maggie]

Hi,

I have used NeoSpeech for the past year and have had great success with it. It's the best quality voice on the market right now. Easy to create your MP3 files and import into Articulate. Would highly recommend it. We use the Kate & Paul voices - those are the highest quality.

Yes, the voice gets tiring but we produce about 5 videos a month and they all get rewritten within a year so paying for voice talent isn't an option for us. No, they aren't thrilling but they get they accomplish the goal of getting our users up and running!

Maggie

[Jeanette]

That is great to know, Maggie - thanks for sharing! Sounds like they're providing a good option.

[symo]

Hello,
I use Loquendo TTS Software for 2 years now.
It's quite a nice package to use , you can buy multi languages voices . It helps when you have to develop multi langages courses ( you have just to translate the notes then )
more information at Loquendo: global supplier of speech recognition and speech synthesis technology and solutions.

BR

Symo