Vocaloid 2

Vocaloid 2

Original author(s)	Yamaha Corporation
Developer(s)	Yamaha Corporation, Bplats
Initial release	June 29, 2007
Stable release	2.0.12 / November 6, 2010
Development status	Retired
Operating system	Microsoft Windows
Available in	English and Japanese
Type	Vocal Synthesizer Application
License	Proprietary
Website	www.vocaloid.com/en/lineup/vocaloid2/

Vocaloid 2 is a singing voice synthesizer and successor to Vocaloid in the Vocaloid series. It gained unexpected success and cultural impact following its release.

History

Vocaloid 2 was announced in 2007. Unlike the first engine, Vocaloid 2 based its results on vocal samples, rather than analysis of the human voice. Due to time constraints, unlike the previous engine version, it did not have a public beta test and instead the software was updated as users reported issues with it. The synthesis engine and the user interface were completely revamped, with Japanese Vocaloids possessing a Japanese interface. New features such as note auditioning, transparent control track, toggling between playback and rendering, and expression control were implemented. One's breath noise and husky voice can be recorded into the library to make realistic sounds. This version is not backward compatible and its editor cannot load a library built for the previous version. Aside from the PC software, NetVocaloid services are offered. Despite this, the software was not localized and Vocaloids of either English or Japanese would only possess that language version, so although Megurine Luka had an English library included, as a Japanese Vocaloid she only had access to the Japanese version of the software. In total, there were 17 packages produced for Vocaloid 2 in the Japanese version of the software and five in the English version; these packages offered 35 voicebanks between them in either English or Japanese.

Yamaha announced a version of the Vocaloid 2 software for the iPhone and iPad, which exhibited at the Y2 Autumn 2010 Digital Content Expo in Japan. Later, this version of the software was released using the voice of Yamaha's own Vocaloid called VY1. These products were launched as iVocaloid and i-Vocaloid, though the latter was later renamed to VocaloWitter.

The Hatsune Miku product in particular went on to win several awards including;

• She was nominated for and won an award in the "All About" awards of 2007.
• Crypton Future Media picked up an BCN award in 2008 for their productions, with their sales reaching a 211% increase thanks to several products (One of which being Hatsune Miku).
• In March 2008, Hatsune Miku won the "Digital Content" AMD award.
• In June, she picked up the 2008 MM Research Institute award.
• At the DaiKon7 in August 2008, she received another award.
• She was awarded the "Good Design Award 2008".
• She won the Grand Prize at the BCN AWARD 2009.

Unlike the original Vocaloid software, Vocaloid 2 vocals could be imported into Vocaloid 3. However, because they lacked a Mac version entirely, it was not possible to import any Vocaloid 2 vocal into either the Vocaloid Neo or any of the Vocaloid Editor for Cubase Mac adaptions. Importation into Vocaloid 4 was also possible by either importing into Vocaloid 3 then Vocaloid 4 or via use of the Vocaloid 2 import tool. Also while VSTi plug-in support for the software was provided, Vocaloid 2 would not work with digital audio workstations such as Sonar and had trouble with others such as Fl Studio.

Support for the Vocaloid 2 software, and the distribution of the import tool is due to end in March 2016.

Products

Sweet Ann

Released by PowerFX, Sweet Ann was released on June 29, 2007 as the first vocal for Vocaloid 2, she was sold as "Space lounge vocal sensation".

Sweet Ann's most notable use was in the anime Nichijou.

Hatsune Miku

Main article: Hatsune Miku

Released on August 31, 2007 as the first of the "Character Voice Series", her codename was "CV01" and she was designed to sound cute. She was the first vocal not based on a professional singer results and based on the voice of Saki Fujita. She was the first vocal to be developed and distributed by Crypton Future Media and sung in Japanese. Her instant success is owed to Vocaloid being a cultural hit in Japan and she reportedly sold 40,000 units by July 2008, selling on average 300 units a week. By Jan 2011, she had sold 60,000 units. Due to the success of the product, a later expansion pack was released on April 30, 2010 called "Hatsune Miku append" which added 6 new voices ("dark", "soft", "solid", "light", "vivid" and "sweet") for the Miku vocal.

Kagamine Rin/Len

Main article: Kagamine Rin/Len

Released on December 27, 2007, Kagamine Rin and Len are a pair of Japanese vocals based on the voice of Asami Shimoda and codenamed "CV02", being the second package for the Character Voice series. They were created to be a male and female pair of vocals that could fulfill a variety of roles within music. They did not fare as well as Hatsune Miku before them, selling 20,000 units by July 2008. Due to numerous complaints about the quality of their vocals in comparison to the Hatsune Miku vocal, a second package called "Act2" was released to replace the original Kagamine Rin/Len voice on July 18, 2008. The Crypton Future Media end-user agreement was also updated with the Act2 release to make it more easily understood. Like the Hatsune Miku vocal, they too received an expansion pack titled "Kagamine Rin/Len Append," adding 3 voices each for Rin ("power", "warm", "sweet") and Len ("power", "cold" and "serious"), a total of 6 altogether.

Prima

Prima was a female English vocal released by Zero-G Ltd. She possessed the voice of a female Soprano opera singer and sang in English. She was released on January 14, 2008. Prima was noted for having a customized English library with a few extra phonetic sounds more than the standard English vocal contained.

Gackpoid

Main article: Gackpoid

See also: Vocaloid 3 § V3 Gackpoid

Based on the voice of Gackt, the package was released on July 31, 2008 by Internet Co., Ltd. The mascot for the package was called "Camui Gackpo" and was a male singer.

Megurine Luka

Main article: Megurine Luka

The third and final member of the Character Voice series, and the first vocal capable of both English and Japanese. She was released on January 30, 2009, her codename was "CV03". Her English vocal did not have a full library and was capable of only 2,200 words, though was later updated to fix the problem. It is notable that her package was originally going to be called "Hatsune Miku", designed when Vocaloid 2 was first announced to be a bilingual English and Japanese vocal, being the first planned member of the Character Voice series. Her provider is Yū Asakawa.

Megpoid

Main article: Megpoid (software)

Megpoid was the second Artist vocal developed by Internet Co., Ltd. Based on the voice of Megumi Nakajima she was released on June 26, 2009, she sings in Japanese. The mascot of the package is called "Gumi".

Sonika

File:VocaloidSonika.jpg

Package for Sonika

Sonika was the second voice released on July 14, 2009 by Zer0-G Ltd. She has a cute sounding English voice and was the first Zero-G vocal to be based on an amateur singer's voice rather than one of a professional.

SF-A2 Miki

See also: Vocaloid 4 § SF-A2 Miki V4

Designed to be a professional product, she was one of three products released on December 4, 2009 by AH-Software. She was based on the voice of Miki Furukawa and sings in Japanese.

Kaai Yuki

See also: Vocaloid 4 § Kaai Yuki V4

The second vocal released on December 4, 2009 by AH-Software. She is designed to be a Japanese vocal with human characteristics. Her voice is based on a child's voice and she is not meant to be a professional singer.

Hiyama Kiyoteru

See also: Vocaloid 4 § Hiyama Kiyoteru V4

Hiyama Kiyoteru was the third product released on December 4, 2009 by AH-Software. He is a male voice with humanistic qualities to it. He was designed to be Kaai Yuki's school teacher. The voice is based upon the voice of Kiyoshi Hiyama and sings in Japanese.

Big Al

Released by PowerFX as their second vocal, Big Al is a deep toned masculine vocal and the complimentary vocal to Sweet Ann, and he sings in English. He was released on December 22, 2009.

Tonio

A male voice that was designed to be a complimentary voice to Prima, he is also from Zero-G Limited. Like Prima he is also a opera based vocal and covers the ranges from baritone to tenor. He was released on July 14, 2010.

Lily

See also: Vocaloid 3 § V3 Lily

Lily was released by Internet Co., Ltd. as their 3rd Vocaloid product; like previous vocals she sang in Japanese. Unlike the previous two vocals, Lily's product did not have a separate name for both product and mascot. She was a promotional product produced with Avex Management. She is based on the voice of Yūri Masuda from Japanese band m.o.v.e. and was released on August 25, 2010.

VY1

See also: VY1v3 and VY1v4

VY1 was developed under the codename of "Mizki" as a professional Japanese female vocal with no mascot, designed to fulfill any role and head any Yamaha Vocaloid product. It was released on September 1, 2010 by Bplats and designed to act as a "Standard" vocal of noted quality for the Vocaloid software. It was released on September 1, 2010. It handled samples differently to previous Japanese vocaloids. It sold with a standard and a "deluxe" version, the deluxe version came with a CD called "feat.VY1". The CD featured various songs and producer made content and was designed to display the creative freedom that VY1 brought. This was due to it having no official set mascot, leaving her appearance, age and even gender be up to the producer.

Gachapoid

See also: Vocaloid 3 § V3 Gachapoid

Gachapoid was the third and final "Poid" product released by Internet Co., Ltd. for the Vocaloid 2 engine. He sang in Japanese and was meant to be based on the character of Gachapin. The mascot of the product is "Ryūto" and is based upon the Gachapin voice of Kuniko Amemiya. It was released on October 8, 2010.

Nekomura Iroha

See also: Vocaloid 4 § Nekomura Iroha V4

Nekomura Iroha was the 4th product by AH-Software released for the Vocaloid 2 engine and was a deep but cute Japanese female voice. she was released on October 22, 2010.

Utatane Piko

A high pitched male Japanese vocal. He is based on Piko he was released for download only on December 8, 2010.

VY2

See also: VY2v3

VY2 was the second addition to the "VY" series, after VY1 and was design to compliment the VY1 voice, its codename is "Yūma". The voice of VY2 is masculine and sings in Japanese. It was released on April 25, 2011. VY1 it also was designed to be unbound by having no set avatar allowing it to take any appearance, sex or age. Effort was made to disassociate VY2 with anything personal, bares a sword on the boxart because they felt items such as clothing would be too personal but chose its codename to help direct producers to the direction the voice was heading for of a handsome young male. A producer working with the VY2 found when he wrote a song that VY2 was the only male Japanese vocal that could produce a quality of vocal good enough for the song and he labelled the vocal as the best Japanese male. When producing this vocal, the developers had compare it also with other masculine vocals within the series (excluding Ryuto and Kagamine Len, both of which are voiced by female vocalists), with only the Gackpoid software coming close to VY2.

Azuki Masaoka/Matcha Kobayashi

Only usable in 575 Utami, these two voices are based on Yuka Ōtsubo (Azuki Masaoka) and Ayaka Ohashi (Matcha Kobayashi). They are a pair of female vocals produced by Sega to sing within the game in Japanese.

Luka Append, Meiko V2, Kaito V2 and Miku English

Crypton Future Media had produced vocals for this version of the software Renders of the beta vocals could be heard in various mediums. Meiko was used in the song "Piano × Forte × Scandal" (ピアノ×フォルテ×スキャンダル) on the album Oster-san no Best (OSTERさんのベスト). Originally, the song used Meiko's original Vocaloid vocal. Luka's Append vocal was used on the album Vocaloid Minzoku Chō Kyokushū (VOCALOID民族調曲集) for the song "Hoshizora to Yuki no Butōkai (Zeal mix)". The promotional album Vocalo Append used a beta of Luka's "Soft" Append. Miku's English vocal in particular was low quality and was not released in the engine for this reason. The vocals were announced to have been dropped in favor of Vocaloid 3 productions on December 1, 2011. Songs using the beta versions also featured in Hatsune Miku and Future Stars: Project Mirai.

With the exception of the Luka Append, which was later released for Vocaloid 4, all vocals were later released as Vocaloid 3 products.

A 7th Hatsune Miku Append vocal "Falsetto" was also created but never released due to its limited usefulness.

Megpoid Extend

Was a "Append-like" vocal package designed for Megpoid. It was later change to the V3 Megpoid package.

Critical Reception

Reception to Vocaloid 2 was generally better. When Sweet Ann was first released, John Walden of Sound on Sound had reviewed Leon, Lola and Miriam and noted that Vocaloid itself had no previous rival technology to contend with, and praised Yamaha for their efforts as Vocaloid was an ambitious project to undertake, considering the human voice was more complex to synthesize than instruments such as the violin. In reviewing Vocaloid 2, he referred to the original software engine in a passing comment stating, "Undoubtedly a remarkable and innovative product and, with experience and patience, was capable of producing results that could be frighteningly realistic." While he congratulated the improvements made in Vocaloid 2, he noted the software was still far from being regarded as a top rate singer. Particularly what makes Vocaloid difficult to sell as a product is the notion that the human ear can pick up faults in vocal speech. When reviewing Tonio, Sound on Sound writer Tom Flint argued that in the amount of time it takes to understand and learn how to use the software, it would be easier to hire a singer for half an hour to do the recording session. He, along with fellow writer John Walden during a review on Sonika, both stated singers don't have to fear losing their jobs just yet.

The Vocaloid 2 software was a instant success in Japan upon the release of the Hatsune Miku product. Bil Byrant of PowerFX, in an interview after the release of Big Al, noted that when they released Sweet Ann that they expected the electronica based music producers to use Vocaloid and were surprised that they were reluctant to embrace the software. At this point, the huge Japanese producer base had become noticeable and a large number of videos were being posted on YouTube. Hatsune Miku's success at selling 60,000 copies was also a noteworthy number, as at the time of Miku's release selling 1,000 copies of a software synthesizer was considered "a commercial success".

As reported in 2014 by Crypton Future Media's website "Sonicwire", Vocaloid2 was able to compete against the sales of Vocaloid3 vocals even as late as 2014, both Crypton themselves and fellow developer PowerFX vocaloids saw sales from both versions despite the improvements to Vocaloid3 vocals..