Digital Workshop

I have to say I was blown away when I saw the examples on this website.
http://www.reallusion.com/crazytalk/
I immediately imagined a 'presenter' giving an introduction to an Opus programme, or answering questions...

If people find my off-topic posts objectionable please tell me, but I love forums that point me to new places.

very interesting!!
I have done a lot of talking applications with Opus using Text Aloud. It is excellent, but something like this would be even better, but don't suppose it would integrate with Opus, but still very interesting.

Sandy

one of the output formats is .avi, so you could include it in an Opus page...

I've been hoping to have a video actor answer questions in an Opus pub, but these animations might add a bit more of a wow factor.

I have used CrazyTalk in Opus Publications. CrazyTalk supports Sapi 5 voices and exports to different formats including MP4, AVI, WMV, RM and Flash.

There's a nice Sapi 5 voice I use a lot called "Heather". If you work in education in Scotland you can download this for free. Details at CallScotland

My applications use real-time speech. I use copy to clipboard to transfer the text to Text Aloud. Crazy talk for Skype appers to be a real-time speech application, but designed specifically for Skype. If they had a small animation engine, which opened in a standalone application and accepted text input, either via DLL or even the clipboard, it would be very useful with Opus.

I suppose the disadvantage of using TextAloud is that it needs to be installed on the client PC and I assume the same would apply to CrazyTalk for Skype but I haven't used this.

For simple animated introductions or sections in an Opus publication I have found that inserting a CrazyTalk AVI or WMV file works well - but lacks any sort of interaction.

Another application I have been looking at is Voki - but I'm still not sure how I might use this.

I have attached an Opus pub that uses a CrayTalk AVI file - the Sapi 5 voice is called "Duncan" from Cepstral (see below)

Cheers David,

But it doesn't work. Seems a little small to have an embedded video?

Speech technology is clearly becoming more mainstream being built into the OSs and part of the WPF.

My wish for Christmas is that Opus 7 allows access to managed DLLs this time around and we can start creating our own speech DLLs in C#.

Mack

Oops

Forgot to embed the video.

A new version!

I contacted RealIllusion and was sent this link, which is very interesting
http://www.reallusion.com/crazytalk/fun ... mo/tts.asp
I've asked if there are any plans to have a stand alone application driven by text from either a DLL or the clipboard. but it may not be the direction they wish to go?

Yes, text aloud has to be installed on client PC's but it's not too expensive.

Have a look at MASH - The Microsoft Agent Scripting Helper! available from http://www.bellcraft.com/mash/

I'm sure I paid a small cost years ago, but can find no current mention of purchase costs.

Works well, and because it can produce a stand-alone exe file, incorporates with Opus.

Thanks for the link - MASH looks promising and works very well.

I can't see a way of using Sapi 5 voices and it would seem that you are tied to the default ones. However, using TextAloud you can use a WAV file and therefore any Sapi voice you like - the drawback is that the balloon narration does not work in the same way.

The files are very small (very much smaller than CrazyTalk files). Brilliant!

Cheers

If you're concerned about voice types and effects, have a look at MorphVOX from Screaming Bee at
http://www.screamingbee.com/corporate/aboutus.aspx

You get unlimited voices by morphing an existing sound file. I've use the same sound bite to produce more than 10 different sounding voices.

Media semantics character builder is something you coudl look into. It produces SWF output and can be used to create some complex things.

Also another choice could be CodeBaby.

CodeBaby is a lot more expensive. We bypassed it in favor of Character Builder because it was cheapr. CB seems pretty useful to us.