GeneralNuisance

Ruko's Ruffians
Defender of Defoko
I just want to hear from some people familiar with French reclists give me their opinions on the merits of Gros Mot vs Petit Mot vs VCCV French in terms of UST availability, ease of use when making USTs, etc. I have a pretty good understanding of otos and I have been speaking French for nearly 15 years now, so fluency and difficulty of the oto isn't too much of an issue for me, so long as I'm not otoing Arpasing or stuck with a reclist that requires more than 4000 lines per pitch, though, obviously, efficiency is definitely valued by me and I don't want to do something that's overly inefficient, but I am willing to make my own VCCV French reclist if that is what kind of bank would be preferred. Hell, I'd even make the reclist public with a base oto and a pronunciation guide if that's what was wanted! I'd also like to hear from people who also speak French on whether they think VCCV French sounds clearer or more smooth than Gros Mot or Petit Mot. Or if Gros Mot sounds better or worse than Petit Mot. Basically, any tips on reclist selection for French and your preferences when it comes to French voicebanks is what I'm looking for here.

It should be noted that I have a decently strong Canadian accent when I speak French. I don't know if that would affect recording too much, but if it does, here ya go.
 

Kiyoteru

UtaForum power user
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I don't speak French, so I'm commenting as an experienced UTAU user and reclist developer.

Generally, when you see reclists labelled "VCCV" they're copying their structure wholesale from PaintedCZ's VCCV English reclist. The problem with this is that the structure of VCCV was specifically designed for the English language and its particular idiosyncrasies, like with the articulation of allophones and the structure of syllables. At that level of detail, you're much better off designing a reclist from scratch than swapping out the phonemes for whatever seems "close enough".

Petit Mot is essentially an ultra-minimalist CVVC. It should be a decent choice for recording quick test banks, and you can maybe use it for final production if you like using it in USTs or if you want to record a mega multi pitch multi expression without dying. However, the base OTO isn't ready for usage right away. You can change the preutterance and overlap to your preferred values, but the bigger problem is that the offset isn't staggered. Every sample has the exact same offset, so you'll spend a lot of time manually shifting it over to the correct syllable in the string.

I haven't personally tried Gros Mot because it's a VCV with CVVC otos. You're sure to get buttery-smooth transitions out of the list, but you should just ask yourself if that's something you're willing to multiply your recording+otoing time to get done. You might encounter the same issue with the base OTO not having offsets in roughly the right location, so it'll be more of an annoyance here than with a smaller list.

For both Petit Mot and Gros Mot, please be sure to download their files quickly and back them up safely. DynamiVox has a history of unstable web services, so it would be a shame to lose a reclist completely.

For most French reclists, I have noticed that they are typically developed by people from France. From the brief research I did, Canadian French may differ in that there are more phonemes. However, I don't know if this affects both speech and singing, or if it's a pattern of speech only. You should record yourself singing and carefully assess your pronunciation to determine if any reclist modifications are necessary.

Overall, I would rather recommend that you give all sorts of reclists a try, and then perhaps write your own thorough CVVC reclist. Usage-wise, you'll be tweaking USTs no matter what during the tuning process, so pick the type of bank that you enjoy using rather than hoping you have a chance to plug+play anything.
 

GeneralNuisance

Ruko's Ruffians
Defender of Defoko
Thread starter
Canadian French may differ in that there are more phonemes.
I did consider this lol. Thanks a *ton* for your reply. I think I'm probably going to do either Petit Mot or Gros Mot (I'm not scared of doing massive banks with massive reclists, I'm literally making a hexa-pitch VCCV lmao) and probably add on a few extra phonemes/recordings for Canadian French as necessary.

I noticed that issue with offsets on the base otos for both lists, but I think that going through and fixing it wouldn't be the worst thing on earth compared to some other reclist-related nightmares I've had to deal with in the past.

Thanks again for your reply! You helped a lot!
 
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Melomad

Ritsu's Renegades
Defender of Defoko
I know it's a bit late and Kiyoteru explained everything beautifully, but if you need additional help we have a discord server where a big chunk of the french utau community hangs out. We have experienced users and various resources such as USTs, voicebanks, translyrics etc... We mostly speak French in here though! Here's an invite if you're interested.
 

GeneralNuisance

Ruko's Ruffians
Defender of Defoko
Thread starter
Mostly speaking french shouldn't be too big of an issue for me. My French grammar is TERRIBLE but I do have a pretty good grasp on understanding what's being said to me lol. I'll join up. Sounds like a good community.
I know it's a bit late and Kiyoteru explained everything beautifully, but if you need additional help we have a discord server where a big chunk of the french utau community hangs out. We have experienced users and various resources such as USTs, voicebanks, translyrics etc... We mostly speak French in here though! Here's an invite if you're interested.
 
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