When to release a demo for your UTAU?

[Cosmickinsey]

Hey guys, I'm sorry if this is a dumb question. I guess I would just like some opinions.

I've been working on my current UTAU project for about a year now. If you remember me from back in the day when my handles were Jillie-chan/Markie-kun, with my UTAU's Ashlen and ROCK-L (both scrapped and no longer exist anywhere) you'd know that I used to really rush these projects lmao. I've taken this project very seriously, as I've really matured over the years (it's been at least 6 years since I've worked on anything UTAU) and I finally have the self discipline to actually create 'quality' outcomes.

I've been debating as to when I will release anything related to either of my current UTAU's, and have only shown close friends progress tracks thus far. At first I didn't want to release anything until the ENTIRE project was done, but now I'm not sure if releasing a demo for either/both banks would be the way to go as the project as a whole won't be done for a while.

I think releasing a demo before they're done would help me get feedback so that I could better polish the banks for the actual release, and it would maybe get people talking about the release which would then motivate me more.. But I'm really unsure.

When would/have you released Demo's for your voicebanks? What stage were you at? What do you suggest I do before I consider a full or demo release?

Any feedback is welcome! I don't know anyone who uses UTAU myself, my lack of commitment to the community has left me with no personal connections, so I'm really looking forward to hearing from all of you and knowing what you think

 

[Kiyoteru]

Having some publicly viewable work will be helpful in being able to talk about your UTAU with other people.
You have to think about the community not as a userbase for your product, but as, well, a community. People will talk about you and your projects if you're talking directly with them, so it's not like you can just release something into the wild and hope that people will start to talk to each other about it.
If you're still looking to get feedback on aspects to improve, it won't hurt to post some songs and specifically ask to receive feedback on the quality of the voicebanks and what changes need to be made. You might even find yourself wanting to post an unfinished beta of the voicebank itself to gain feedback from people using it.

Personally, I believe that a voicebank should primarily be made to suit your own taste and what you like to use. If you try to please as many other people as possible, you'll probably find yourself pulled in a million different directions without being personally satisfied in your own work. For most people, the #1 user of an UTAU is... the creator of the UTAU.

In terms of a final polished release, once you're completely satisfied with the state of your voicebank, you might be interested in making a video that showcases several different songs all together to show the overall style of the bank and its various capabilities. Even after the final release, you can still continue to release small updates and fixes for the bank if issues are discovered.

 

[Cosmickinsey]

That's a very good point, thank you!

I'm going to plan a demo release once I get my laptop back!