| EPSRC Reference: |
EP/E031447/1 |
| Title: |
Automatic target cost and database design for unit-selection speech synthesis |
| Principal Investigator: |
King, Professor S |
| Other Investigators: |
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| Project Partners: |
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| Department: |
Centre for Speech Technology Research |
| Organisation: |
University of Edinburgh |
| Scheme: |
Standard Research |
| Starts: |
01 April 2007 |
Ends: |
31 March 2010 |
Value (£): |
280,478
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| EPSRC Research Topic Classifications: |
| Artificial Intelligence |
Information & Knowledge Mgmt |
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| EPSRC Industrial Sector Classifications: |
| No relevance to Underpinning Sectors |
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Summary on Grant Application Form |
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We propose to replace three components of a typical concatenativespeech synthesiser: the text selection algorithm (what to record forthe database), the target cost function (which units to select fromthe database) and the backoff strategy (what to do when the databasedoes not contain the desired unit).These components are currently designed independently using humanintuition. This is very hard, can only be done by experts, and meansthat each component is unlikely to be optimised with respect to theothers. We propose to base these three components on a singleunderlying model. The model will learn, from data, which speech unitsare perceptually interchangeable. This information will then be usedby the target cost function / backoff strategy, and when selecting thetext to be recorded. The proposed techniques will be implemented inthe Festival 2 speech synthesis system and evaluated using formallistening tests.We break down the research programme into three phases. In Phase 1, wewill gain a deeper understanding of current techniques. In Phase 2, wewill examine techniques for learning just the target cost/backoffstrategy, given an existing voice, then for learning thetext-selection algorithm for a given target cost/backoffstrategy. Finally, in Phase 3, we will devise a method for jointlylearning both together.
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Key Findings |
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This information can now be found on Gateway to Research (GtR) http://gtr.rcuk.ac.uk
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Potential use in non-academic contexts |
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This information can now be found on Gateway to Research (GtR) http://gtr.rcuk.ac.uk
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Impacts |
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| Description |
This information can now be found on Gateway to Research (GtR) http://gtr.rcuk.ac.uk |
| Summary |
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| Date Materialised |
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Sectors submitted by the Researcher |
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This information can now be found on Gateway to Research (GtR) http://gtr.rcuk.ac.uk
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| Project URL: |
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| Further Information: |
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| Organisation Website: |
http://www.ed.ac.uk |