The Advancement In Voice Cloning And The Growing Interest Of Industry Players

By Stephen M

Voice cloning technology has over the years improved to the surprise of many industry players. Actors, voiceover artists, and even cybercriminals have taken a keen interest in the development. The advancement in this technology is mind-blowing as the level of accuracy is very high.

What is Voice Cloning

Photo credit: Soundtrap/Unsplash

Voice cloning is the act of using a computer program to develop an exact copy of a person’s voice. The software program studies a recording of a person’s voice and then replicates the same as you type a sentence or words into the system.

Voice cloning is becoming somewhat scary as technology zooms forward. The level of precision at which the software can pick accents, breathing space, pace, pitch, and flow is phenomenal. That aside, it can be altered to reflect a particular emotion, which affects our inflections and tone. It can depict happiness, sadness, fear, love, and anger, among others.

Photo credit: @TimHellerVO/Twitter

Actor and voiceover artist Tim Heller is currently harnessing the potential of voice cloning. The 29-year-old Texas resident says the level of accuracy of his first cloned voice was intriguing. VocaliD, a Boston-based business, the company runs such services for people with speech impairment. According to Heller, the turn to voice cloning enables him to have more work. He currently does documentaries, audiobook narrations, and other voiceover works.

Advancement in Voice Cloning

Rupal Patel, a professor of communication sciences and disorders at Northeastern University, says voice cloning has advanced over the years. Professor Patel, who is also the chief executive of VocaliD- VocaliD is an expert in cloning, says she established the business as an extension of her clinical works. She creates artificial voices with patients with speech difficulty and others unable to talk without assistance. Prof Patel says the technology is based on artificial intelligence, which learns and adapts as programmed.

Some film companies are using the technology to make dubbed versions of movies. That is, they can now translate an actor’s words into other languages without hiring translators. The Canadian-based company Resemble AI has taken the lead in that venture. They can now translate cloned English voices into 15 different languages.