VCV?

[UtauYork]

As someone who wants to make and release a really, really nice VCV bank (or at the least, not one that totally sucks), I've been trying to see what would be the best way to oto it and record it.

I keep seeing different opinions and ways to do it. What's the best reclist? What's the best way to record it? To oto it? And what's with the set numbers that some people use? (I honestly don't understand that; I guess your recordings would have to be really uniform.)

I'm just curious about the different ways to do things and the opinions of it. Because it's complexity compared to CV kinda leaves me (and most likely other people too) in the dark.

And I apologize if this discussion has already been done. I looked and I didn't see anything. ono

 

[Cheese]

I dont think it matters really; atleast when it comes to reclist.  Oto wise, I would suggest uniform, so there will be less slurring.

 

[UtauYork]

I dont think it matters really; atleast when it comes to reclist.  Oto wise, I would suggest uniform, so there will be less slurring.

Hm. Uniform otos are something I never got. I guess it really is the best way to do it?

To me, it just doesn't make sense. Although everyone says it's amazing.

 

[KitWistful]

I say record whatever way is comfiest for you. The less time you spend struggling with a reclist, the better your samples will be. If it's a full list, then it's all the same in the end, anyways.

Uniform OTO is an oto with a constant overlap, right? I like those because they behave predictably, and you rarely have issues with squished envelopes =w=

In-editor, I think VCV is easier to do than CV. Wellllll having to set up the VCVs before previewing can sometimes be a pain...but I do lots of engrishing, so in those cases it's legitimately easier : P

 

[shinami]

Hah, I feel the opposite of you - even though I've made CV banks before, I've never really understood it, but as soon as I started toying around with VCV it was the clearest, easiest thing I've ever done. I think the reason that's so is because with CV everything is ALWAYS changing, people say different things and have different styles...I could never find a solid way to do them. But VCV has a solid pattern and you only move one line around that moves the pattern, so it makes perfect sense.

I made a VCV tutorial a long time ago. Everything I say about reclists was very novice, but everything behind recording and otoing is correct.
http://utaforum.net/index.php?topic=121.0
I personally prefer 7-mora, but you're free to use whatever mora you like. However as of late I've just been doing it by myself, no reclist. Because Ritsu's is flawed with uneccesary extra parts, like instead of just doing "sa sa si sa su se sa" it'd be "sa sa shi sa su se sa" AND "za za si za zu ze za", then messing up the Z strings too, when you could just do the former and save time. And it makes more sense.

Now, with numbers if you want to go the very standard route I suggest ____ 450 -_____ 300 100. First blank changes per note, and the minus value can vary depending on how fast you record; if you go fast, do -600, if you go slow, -700, etc. You can make it slightly more custom by following Halo's tutorial I link to in the description of the tutorial, it's a bit more advanced though and since the regular numbers work fine for me I don't bother.

If you want to just to record your own reclist and avoid silly Ritsu issues that nearly all 7-mora banks follow, these are the vowel patterns:

a a i a u e a
e e u o e o o
i i u a e i e
u u i o a o i
o u n a n u
n i n e n o

(In the base vowel recordings, "n i n e n o" becomes "n i n e n o n n" so you get "o n" and "n n")
Seriously, all you do now is put on every consonant you need. So get all the CV consonants, put them with the vowels in the strings (Like for SH, "sha sha shi sha shu she sha"), and record! No reclist needed!


VCV...I don't feel like it's complcated at all. It just takes time.

 

[kirrinx]

^^^^^^^  Yes everything Shinami said  ~

And I definitely would not recommend doing custom oto's unless you know what you're doing which a few of VB's I've downloaded :c don't seem to have gotten the hang of doing custom oto's which makes the banks slurr and are only usable with ridiculous amounts of consonant velocity like 180+(which makes it sound really choppy and makes their consonants sound really awkard ; x; )

and VCV isn't anymore complicated than CV it just takes more time and patience to make one of these banks u3u//+ the end result is really worth it

And as the past post have stated the best recording recording method/reclist is one in which you are 100% comfortable with :3 the most common ones are 5 and 7 mora

Since Shinami posted the 7 mora vowel pattern I guess ouo I'll post the 5 mora one just in case you're more comfortable doing less syllables per recording ~ ( though the only con you'd realy get out of using a smaller mora reclist is that the amount of recordings would increase)

a a i a u
i i u i e
u u e u o
e e o e n
o o n o a
n n a n i
a o i n u
u a e i o
o u n e a

 

[shinami]

Oh, there is one thing about doing reclists and otos yourself that you should know. It's something you learn by observing other VCV banks.

All "n i n e n o" strings will start with "n", but you only need one "- n", which you'd probably do on the original vowel string of that pattern. And this idea that you only need one of that syllable is applicable to other strings. Since syllables like "kyi" and "byi" and such don't exist, you will have two strings that are capable of making the same "_ i" on occassion. Only one is needed.

For example, with K you will have "ka ka ki ka ku ke ka" AND "kya kya ki kya kyu kye kya". Both can make "a ki", and I advise just doing whichever one you think sounds better; you don't need both. Saves a moment of otoing.

 

[Halo]

My tutorial is old and dumb and I have to update it, but generally Shinami is correct!

Tips to make VCV easier-
-Record to a tempo; open up an online metronome and record to that.
-Remember that "300,100" is only optimal for a tempo of 120. If you choose a different tempo, you can use a VCV auto oto tool (there's one built into setparam, but it's in JP and only works on hiragana) to figure out around what yours should be. Eg, I record at 112, so my set numbers are 270, 90.
-Preutterance goes right where the consonant ends. This is really important.

If you choose to only follow two instructions from me, I'd tell you to triple check that your preutterance is right were the consonant ends, and that your overlap is uniform. Non-uniform overlap results in envelope glitches, while preutterance being in the wrong place results in offtime-ness and slur.

Good luck!

 

[UtauYork]

Oooh, wow. That's a lot of information. And I'm glad to say that I finally get what everyone's talking about when it comes to uniform otos and such. It was actually really hard to comprehend. I figured doing it the custom way made more sense seeing as the way you recorded isn't going to remain the exact same way throughout every recording. But that's not exactly the case.

In the case of 7-mora or 5-mora I think I'll go with the 7. =v= I'd rather record more than oto more. Thanks for putting the vowels down, both of you.

And thanks for the opinions and helpfulness. Now when I'm off to rerecord a VCV bank in the near future, I won't feel like an idiot who only knows half of what they're doing. See what happens when you ask about everyone's opinions on things? Recording with a metronome; wow I never thought of that, that's amazing.