Hello everybody!
This video will show you how to convert text into a robot voice.
You will see different ways of doing it, and I’ll describe the best method in detail.
There can be all kinds of reasons why people want to have a text read in a robot voice.
Some need to read text from a webpage in their browser, others want to turn a book into a
soundtrack and listen to it, and sometimes, you may need to add a sound-track in robot
voice to a video.
Depending on what your goal is, there are three ways to turn text into voice:
• by using browser extensions that convert highlighted text in a webpage into voice;
• by using online services; • and by using special software.
Let’s begin with browser extensions.
Text-to-speech extensions for browsers will be your best choice if all that you need is
to listen to a text from the webpage.
It’s very convenient when you need to read a big article.
I’ll show it with the example of Google Chrome, but all popular browsers have similar
extensions.
Visit our channel to watch a video on top free browsers for Windows.
You will find the link in the description:
At a rough guess, I installed and tested the following extensions: Speak Text, SpeakIt,
Text Reader, Simple Text To Speech, Selection Reader (Text to speech).
They’re extremely easy to use: • Just install the extension.
You can find all the links in the description:
• Select the text with the mouse and right-click on it.
• Choose the extension from the menu, and it will read
the text.
Online text-to-speech services In most cases, online text-to-speech is quite
standard.
Besides, the free function of most online services is limited to a text of 250 to 300
characters (anyway, no more than 1,000) and you will have to pay if you want to unlock
full-scale voice engine and work with larger pieces of text.
There are lots of popular text-to-speech online services.
I’ll show you some of them: • The first one to turn text into voice
is Acapela.
Its engine provides quite a good quality sound in male or female variants.
However, for Russian there is only one voice, Alyona (female).
Free text size is limited to 300 characters, and you have to pay to work with larger texts.
• Another online service is Text-to-Speech.
It can work with pieces of about 1,000 characters.
The sound quality is also good.
To listen to a text with this voice engine, choose the language, enter the text you want
to hear, and then click on “Say it.”
• The well-known Google Translate can also be used to convert text to voice.
Talking of its advantages, it doesn’t have the text size limit and it’s free.
The disadvantage is that voice quality can be worse when compared to its paid rivals.
To listen to the text with this service, enter or paste the text into the window, and then
click on the button with the speaker symbol at the bottom of
the page.
You can find all the links in the description.
Text-to-speech software Talking about online text-to-speech services,
I can’t help mentioning similar desktop applications.
I’d like to note such products as Govorilka and Ivona.
You can find the links in the description.
Govorilka is quite good.
Its biggest advantage is being free, and the voice quality is quite good.
However, it depends on what your task is.
The settings are minimal as well as the functions.
Just paste the text into the window, set the speed rate and volume, then click the Read
button.
The one I like best is Ivona.
I even used this software to add a sound track to one of the videos in our channel.
You will find the link in the description: Watch it and check the quality - to my mind,
it’s not bad.
Ivona Reader is also easy to use: • Install and run the program - you will
see the start panel.
• You can use it to open a text document by clicking the button “Read Text Document.”
• To turn only a part of the text into voice, open a new page by clicking on “New Document.”
• Paste the necessary text there.
• Select a voice from the pop-up menu in the upper right corner of the program window,
• and click Read.
As for me, the best reading voice is Tatyana.
However, you can install other voices as well if you want.
Ivona Reader has a number of settings.
You can set up the reading voice and make special settings for this voice.
I’d like to point out a special function in Ivona Reader - reading the text right into
an audio file, which you can play on any device or use for any other purposes.
To do it: • click on the button Read to File
• Name the audio file you are going to create • Select the audio format and sound quality
• Set the partition principle (all into one file, or paragraph by paragraph)
• Specify the path to save the file • Choose the reading voice, volume and speed
• Click on the button Read to File •
Here is the file in the format you have selected.
In conclusion, I’d like to add that if you’re interested in online text-to-speech conversion,
it can be realized both by online services and particular computer programs.
At the moment, there is a lot of software to choose from.
In most cases, their free functions are limited by the length of the text they read, voice
quality or the range of voices.
Nevertheless, you can use the opportunities offered by simple software (such as the abovementioned
Govorilka or Ivona Reader) that can turn the text into voice without any problems.
That is all for now.
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Ask questions in your comments.
Thank you for watching.
Good luck.