Voice-Actor Application - Miles B. Huff (Sweyn78)

[quantumstate]

Another thing if you are recording outside is a windshield. Even the very cheap ones (< £5) make quite a big difference.

[Sweyn78]

I'm sorry it's been so long since last I replied!

A lot has happened that prevented me from being able to record sounds for you guys, most notably:

* I had a bunch of essays to write for school again

* It took us a while to get a microphone

*Skyrim came-out (a three day (weekend-only) distraction from recording things)

* [immediately after that] A cold knocked-out my voice for about a week, so I wasn't able to record.

* [immediately after that] My family and I for Thanksgiving were in Indiana for an entire week with my grandparents who have a weak internet-connection and underpowered computers running Windows 98 (plus, I didn't want to risk travel-damage to my new Logitech microphone (I would have gotten one of the ones you guys suggested, but this was the only microphone available at the BestBuy near where I live (if it still isn't on-par with what you're looking-for, I suppose I can always return it and look-for a different one))). Consequently, I wasn't able to record.

I have run some preliminary tests on the new microphone, and its noise-cancelling technology is working quite nicely.

I'll hopefully get some sound-files to you all by tomorrow.

Edited November 27, 2011 by Sweyn78

[Android_]

Sweyn78 I really like your samples, keep up the great work!

[Sweyn78]

Sweyn78 I really like your samples, keep up the great work!

Thanks!

[feneur]

I'm sorry it's been so long since last I replied!

A lot has happened that prevented me from being able to record sounds for you guys, most notably:

* I had a bunch of essays to write for school again

* It took us a while to get a microphone

*Skyrim came-out (a three day (weekend-only) distraction from recording things)

* [immediately after that] A cold knocked-out my voice for about a week, so I wasn't able to record.

* [immediately after that] My family and I for Thanksgiving were in Indiana for an entire week with my grandparents who have a weak internet-connection and underpowered computers running Windows 98 (plus, I didn't want to risk travel-damage to my new Logitech microphone (I would have gotten one of the ones you guys suggested, but this was the only microphone available at the BestBuy near where I live (if it still isn't on-par with what you're looking-for, I suppose I can always return it and look-for a different one))). Consequently, I wasn't able to record.

I have run some preliminary tests on the new microphone, and its noise-cancelling technology is working quite nicely.

I'll hopefully get some sound-files to you all by tomorrow.

Looking forward to hearing your new recordings And I'm sure almost any microphone is better than a webcam microphone, so hopefully it should be more than good enough

[fcxSanya]

I'm sorry it's been so long since last I replied!

A lot has happened that prevented me from being able to record sounds for you guys, most notably:

<...>

It is good that after all these distractions/delays you managed to come back. And I second what Erik said

[iap]

Just to add few notes:

* It is better to record inside your room, and not outside, because outside you have to consider so many different aspects to get a good recording that it doesn't worth it

* If you want to clean the sound recorded in your room from echos, I recommend not doing it with digital effects, but by taking care of the room acoustics

* The acoustic (easy) way to clean a room from echos is to hang blankets or sheets on the walls, and to have a carpet on the floor

* Off course an expensive microphone will give the best results, however if money is an issue, you can do it with cheaper one

* Well, even a desk microphone can give you better results then a webcam's

* The result sound should be EQ'd to correct the frequency response of the microphone - but NEVER compress them

Other then this, I like your original talks

[Sweyn78]

Alright, another week of way too much homework. I promise I'll get the files up by the end of the day tomorrow; it's the start of the weekend -- plenty of time to record.

Oh, and thanks iap for the advice!

UPDATE: Currently recording.

Edited December 2, 2011 by Sweyn78

[Sweyn78]

Here they are!

WFG_Latin_2.zip

[iap]

Here they are!

WFG_Latin_2.zip

"My lord" and "Destroy charthage" is recorded pretty well (did you use any of my advice?)

in the long Latin you sound a little distant, but this can easily be fixed with the right filters.

[Sweyn78]

"My lord" and "Destroy charthage" is recorded pretty well (did you use any of my advice?)

in the long Latin you sound a little distant, but this can easily be fixed with the right filters.

That's because I didn't edit the Long Latin one.

* It is better to record inside your room, and not outside, because outside you have to consider so many different aspects to get a good recording that it doesn't worth it

* If you want to clean the sound recorded in your room from echos, I recommend not doing it with digital effects, but by taking care of the room acoustics

* The acoustic (easy) way to clean a room from echos is to hang blankets or sheets on the walls, and to have a carpet on the floor

* Off course an expensive microphone will give the best results, however if money is an issue, you can do it with cheaper one

* Well, even a desk microphone can give you better results then a webcam's

* The result sound should be EQ'd to correct the frequency response of the microphone - but NEVER compress them

I recorded inside in a room with a rug on the tile floor (we don't have any carpet in the house; mom and iIwould have have bad allergies if we did). I didn't hang any blankets on the walls this time because doing so in this room would be quite difficult and I wasn't such if with this microphone I'd need them (and apparently, I didn't). I used a $30 Logitech desktop microphone with noise-cancelling. It records 16-bit PCM's at a rate of 48000 Hz. I did not compress anything.

Edited December 2, 2011 by Sweyn78

[Pureon]

Here they are!

Sounding a lot better buddy

My Lord.wav - This recording has a sound click near the beginning, when you say the letter 'D'. Audacity's effects like 'Click Removal' may help, but I suggest you re-record it.

Carthage Must Be Destoyed.wav - Sounds good. You may want to say it with more emotion to emphasis it's a strong call to action.

Your new microphone has definitely helped remove the sound errors I noted a few weeks ago. Very impressive

[quantumstate]

This is much cleaner, they sound great. I will look forward to having them in game.

[Sweyn78]

Sounding a lot better buddy

My Lord.wav - This recording has a sound click near the beginning, when you say the letter 'D'. Audacity's effects like 'Click Removal' may help, but I suggest you re-record it.

Carthage Must Be Destoyed.wav - Sounds good. You may want to say it with more emotion to emphasis it's a strong call to action.

Your new microphone has definitely helped remove the sound errors I noted a few weeks ago. Very impressive

I couldn't hear any clicking noises in "My Lord" (no matter how many times I played it on WMP/Winamp/Audacity... Are you sure it was that audio file which was causing that problem for you? I haven't tried playing it on my Linux's media-players, but I don't see why they would be any different (except perhaps driver-differences than my Windows' media-players).

I'll work on Carthage.

I will try to get more stuff to you guys this week. I should be able to finish all the sounds you need for the Romans over Christmas break (well, hopefully, anyhow -- at this point, I don't see why not).

This is much cleaner, they sound great. I will look forward to having them in game.

Thanks! Me, too.

It'll be nice not to have to hear "Pranto" all the time anymore (or whatever it is they're saying).

Edited December 4, 2011 by Sweyn78

[Sweyn78]

...So, may I have a list of what all you'd like me to say for the game?

[Pureon]

...So, may I have a list of what all you'd like me to say for the game?

We'll probably ask you to start work on the Greek voice list as that's already partly implemented into the game. I've posted the list here in the hope that our Ancient Greek translations can be verified by the online community. Have a think about those for now (and if required look into Ancient Greek pronunciation)

[Sweyn78]

We'll probably ask you to start work on the Greek voice list as that's already partly implemented into the game. I've posted the list here in the hope that our Ancient Greek translations can be varied by the online community. Have a think about those for now (and if required look into Ancient Greek pronounciation)

I do not speak Greek, but I can pronounce all of those words -- but for maximum accuracy, I require the quotes in their original Greek (like, in the Greek alphabet); I know for sure that I'm pronouncing it correctly when I read it with that rather than with the Latin alphabet.

Did you just use Google translate for those? If you did (I hope you didn't, as Google Translate uses MODERN Greek), I can find the Modern Greek versions, learn how the Greek language's pronunciation has changed from 0AD until now, and change the Modern Greek versions into more or less their historical ones. The downside of this method (as opposed to having a scholar of ANCIENT Greek) is that I don't speak Greek any better than I do Ancient Greek (I don't speak either), so the grammar wouldn't likely be perfect (the pronunciation and spelling, however, would be).

I mean, I could spend a week or two familiarizing myself with the grammar, but, well, I have neither the time nor the intention to do that.

A bit irrelevant, but Ancient Greek has a really cool /r/.

Edited December 10, 2011 by Sweyn78

[Erutuon]

Hey, Miles, I'm familiar with Ancient Greek and Latin and their pronunciation — I took them for four years each in high school (I'm now a sophomore in college). I practiced the historical-linguistically-reconstructed pronunciation on the side, paying attention to the phonological features that are difficult because they aren't present in English (such as long and short vowels, single and double consonants, unaspirated and aspirated stops, and the four types of pitch accent). So I have practice with pronouncing the languages.

I would do sound files myself, but I don't have that great enunciation — I tend to mumble. But I wondered if I could help by making suggestions for improvements. I noticed a few things that could be improved in your sound files.

For example, the e, the next-to-last a and the o in dēlendus Carthāgō are long, not short: [deː'lendus kar'tʰaːgoː]. But I s'pose this is because the words were given to you without macrons. (The grammar doesn't make any sense, though; delendus is a adjective with a masculine ending, but Carthago is a feminine noun that should have a adjective with a feminine ending. Or maybe I mis-heard and it was delenda? And the phrase is usually given as Carthago delenda est anyway.)

Anyway, I need to go do something else. But would such corrections be helpful? And would it also help if I made you IPA transcriptions of the phrases before you recorded them?

Edited December 12, 2011 by Erutuon

[Sweyn78]

Hey, Miles, I'm familiar with Ancient Greek and Latin and their pronunciation — I took them for four years each in high school (I'm now a sophomore in college). I practiced the historical-linguistically-reconstructed pronunciation on the side, paying attention to the phonological features that are difficult because they aren't present in English (such as long and short vowels, single and double consonants, unaspirated and aspirated stops, and the four types of pitch accent). So I have practice with pronouncing the languages.

I would do sound files myself, but I don't have that great enunciation — I tend to mumble. But I wondered if I could help by making suggestions for improvements. I noticed a few things that could be improved in your sound files.

For example, the e, the next-to-last a and the o in dēlendus Carthāgō are long, not short: [deː'lendus kar'tʰaːgoː]. But I s'pose this is because the words were given to you without macrons. (The grammar doesn't make any sense, though; delendus is a adjective with a masculine ending, but Carthago is a feminine noun that should have a adjective with a feminine ending. Or maybe I mis-heard and it was delenda? And the phrase is usually given as Carthago delenda est anyway.)

Anyway, I need to go do something else. But would such corrections be helpful? And would it also help if I made you IPA transcriptions of the phrases before you recorded them?

Thanks! I was worried about the macrons.

The IPA would be the biggest help -- especially with the Greek; its tones are something I can never remember (though I should be able to do everything else for Greek from the orthography itself, so long as that orthography is that of Ancient Greek avec accents). The Latin I won't really need IPA for; I can do it so long as I have the macrons (which the WORDS dictionary unfortunately does not include).

Oh, I didn't say "Delendus", but "Delenda est". In classical Latin (according to Wikipedia), when there is a vowel at the end of a word and the next word has a vowel at its beginning, they sort of slur together. So, what I said was "Delendaest", but the /t/ at the end of "est" is difficult to pick-out when spoken quickly and immediately next to another plosive, /k/, which would have made it sound more like, "Delendaes", which is somewhat allophonic to "Delendus". Oh, and about the word-order, I was quoting Cato (if I remember correctly), so the sentence wasn't SOV like usual and as you suggested. But, you're right: for the commoner, "Carthago delenda est" or "Carthago est delenda" is more appropriate (from what I saw in Latin class (maybe it was purely for instructional purposes and not historically accurate ones), SVO was more common than SOV for linking-verb statements. Not sure why, but I remember Old English doing something like that too).

Thanks again! This will be fun.

I won't be able to work full-time on this until Winter-break (exactly one week from Wednesday this week), but I'll bet we could knock-out all the Greek and Latin Wildfire needs before school resumes.

Postscript: I wish I'd been given a chance to take Latin and Ancient Greek like that, but my school only offers English (obviously), Spanish, French, and Italian. I took a year of Latin online and started a second year this year, but I had to drop my second year of Latin due to lack of time (AP Lit. and Laureates are often very time-consuming -- too time-consuming).

Edited December 13, 2011 by Sweyn78

[Erutuon]

Thanks! I was worried about the macrons.

The IPA would be the biggest help -- especially with the Greek; its tones are something I can never remember (though I should be able to do everything else for Greek from the orthography itself, so long as that orthography is that of Ancient Greek avec accents). The Latin I won't really need IPA for; I can do it so long as I have the macrons (which the WORDS dictionary unfortunately does not include).

Oh, I didn't say "Delendus", but "Delenda est". In classical Latin (according to Wikipedia), when there is a vowel at the end of a word and the next word has a vowel at its beginning, they sort of slur together. So, what I said was "Delendaest", but the /t/ at the end of "est" is difficult to pick-out when spoken quickly and immediately next to another plosive, /k/, which would have made it sound more like, "Delendaes", which is somewhat allophonic to "Delendus". Oh, and about the word-order, I was quoting Cato (if I remember correctly), so the sentence wasn't SOV like usual and as you suggested. But, you're right: for the commoner, "Carthago delenda est" or "Carthago est delenda" is more appropriate (from what I saw in Latin class (maybe it was purely for instructional purposes and not historically accurate ones), SVO was more common than SOV for linking-verb statements. Not sure why, but I remember Old English doing something like that too).

Thanks again! This will be fun.

I won't be able to work full-time on this until Winter-break (exactly one week from Wednesday this week), but I'll bet we could knock-out all the Greek and Latin Wildfire needs before school resumes.

Postscript: I wish I'd been given a chance to take Latin and Ancient Greek like that, but my school only offers English (obviously), Spanish, French, and Italian. I took a year of Latin online and started a second year this year, but I had to drop my second year of Latin due to lack of time (AP Lit. and Laureates are often very time-consuming -- too time-consuming).

Aha, you were doing synaloepha or whatever the proper term is. Contraction. That's one part of Latin pronunciation that I haven't properly attempted to get right. That makes much more sense then. No criticism on that then, since I'm not sure exactly how it's done (a and e changed into a diphthong, or one of the two vowels elided). Although I think the e is elided, from examples I vaguely remember seeing of phrases in colloquial pronunciation in early Latin plays (Plautus, I guess). And in Vergil, elision rather than formation of a diphthong is assumed, since vowels between words coming together are not counted as a long vowel in the dactylic hexameter, as they would if they formed a diphthong.

From reading this article on JSTOR (http://www.jstor.org.../stable/3289867; you can maybe get access through a local library), the exact phrasing of Cato's mantra isn't known from any works of his own, even which verb he used, and the delenda form was given by writers long after his time. So I'm not sure which word order should be chosen.

[Sweyn78]

Ah, okay. Cool.

Well, it's finally Winter-Break here, so I am all ready to get to work on these recordings.

Eruton, would you be willing to start posting at your own leisure some IPA transliterations of the Ancient Greek? You could make a post with only one IPA and then edit that post over time, adding more and more. That way, I can work on a recording while you work on putting the next word(s) into IPA.

[Erutuon]

I'm a little unsure about the pronunciation, since it's supposed to be Koine Greek but I'm more familiar with Classical pronunciation. But I guess I'll try out a learned early Koine Greek pronunciation given on Wikipedia. Below is English, Greek, transliteration, and IPA transcription.

This pronunciation differs from Classical in a few ways: ει and ου represent [iː] and [uː] rather than [eː] and [oː]; η and ω represent [eː] and [oː] rather than [ɛː] and [ɔː]. It, however, still has aspirated consonants, voiced stops, long vowels, and pitch accent.

On accent: one mora (one short vowel or one half of a long vowel) is given the highest pitch in a word. Pitch rises gradually before this pitch and falls gradually after it. Logically, then, there are four pitch patterns possible in a given syllable. The first two are represented by the acute, the third by the circumflex, and the fourth by no accent mark. The grave is the odd one out, a variation on a final-syllable acute accent. It may have represented normal pitch or a fifth type of pitch, low pitch.

1. high pitch — á — [á]
2. rising to high — aá (written ā́) — [ǎː]
3. falling from high — áa (written â) — [âː]
4. normal pitch — a — [a]
5. low pitch — à — [à] ?

Phrases:

What is it? — τί εστι; — tí esti? — [tí esti]

My lord? — δέσποτά μου — déspotá mou — [déspotá muː]

I will walk — βήσομαι — bḗsomai — [běːsomai̯]

I will go out against — ἀντέξειμι — antékseimi — [antéksiːmi]

I will build — τεύξω — teúksō — [teǔ̯ksoː]

I will work land — γεωργήσω — geōrgḗsō — [geoːrgěːsoː]

I will gather together — συλλέξομαι — sylléksomai — [sylːéksomai̯]

I will herd — νέμω — némō — [némoː]

I will fish — ἁλιεύσω — halieúsō — [halieǔ̯soː]

Edited December 27, 2011 by Erutuon

[Cool_amigaN]

I'm a little unsure about the pronunciation, since it's supposed to be Koine Greek but I'm more familiar with Classical pronunciation. But I guess I'll try out a learned early Koine Greek pronunciation given on Wikipedia. Below is English, Greek, transliteration, and IPA transcription.

This pronunciation differs from Classical in a few ways: ει and ου represent [iː] and [uː] rather than [eː] and [oː]; η and ω represent [eː] and [oː] rather than [ɛː] and [ɔː]. It, however, still has aspirated consonants, voiced stops, long vowels, and pitch accent.

On accent: one mora (one short vowel or one half of a long vowel) is given the highest pitch in a word. Pitch rises gradually before this pitch and falls gradually after it. Logically, then, there are four pitch patterns possible in a given syllable. The first two are represented by the acute, the third by the circumflex, and the fourth by no accent mark. The grave is the odd one out, a variation on a final-syllable acute accent. It may have represented normal pitch or a fifth type of pitch, low pitch.

1. high pitch — á — [á]
2. rising to high — aá (written ā́) — [ǎː]
3. falling from high — áa (written â) — [âː]
4. normal pitch — a — [a]
5. low pitch — à — [à] ?

Phrases:

What is it? — τί εστι; — tí esti? — [tí esti]

My lord? — δέσποτά μου — déspotá mou — [déspotá muː]

I will walk — βήσομαι — bḗsomai — [běːsomai̯]

I will go out against — ἀντέξειμι — antékseimi — [antéksiːmi]

I will build — τεύξω — teúksō — [teǔ̯ksoː]

I will work land — γεωργήσω — geōrgḗsō — [geoːrgěːsoː]

I will gather together — συλλέξομαι — sylléksomai — [sylːéksomai̯]

I will herd — νέμω — némō — [némoː]

I will fish — ἁλιεύσω — halieúsō — [halieǔ̯soː]

Hello! I am Greek, I can help you with the above, speaking ancient Greek as well, but my English suck, so bare with me, I will try to explain the wrong and correct as much as I can...

There are some mistakes on the above. First of all, for many you are using the wrong voice (you don't need Passive voice). For example:

I will gather together — συλλέξομαι — sylléksomai — [sylːéksomai̯] is worng, whereas the correct is: I will gather together — συλλέξω (from the abnormal verb λέγω, Future tense I, Energetic voice).

The phrase I will build — τεύξω — teúksō — [teǔ̯ksoː] is correct, though you could add the word "τι", making it "Τεύξω τι" that will translate "I will build something" and makes more sense in (ancient) Greek.

The phrase I will fish — ἁλιεύσω — halieúsō — [halieǔ̯soː] is correct.

Got to go now, but I will come back asap and finish the rest of the list.

[Erutuon]

I will gather together — συλλέξομαι — sylléksomai — [sylːéksomai̯] is worng, whereas the correct is: I will gather together — συλλέξω (from the abnormal verb λέγω, Future tense I, Energetic voice).

I assumed λέγω was a verb with a future tense that is only found in a middle voice, thus λέξομαι rather than λέξω. But perhaps I'm wrong on this particular verb. I looked at my dictionary and it's not clear.

There are several verbs whose future tenses have middle-voice form but active-voice meaning. Same with βήσομαι, rather than βήσω, from the verb βαίνω. Usually changing from active to middle voice changes the meaning of the verb, but with some future-tense, middle-voice forms, the meaning of the middle-voice form is no different from the active voice, and the active voice is not used.

Edited January 9, 2012 by Erutuon

[Pureon]

Miles and Erutuon are you guys still around?

We're really relying on the online community to help us with the voice acting and phrases. If you need something from the 0 A.D. team to help you guys move forward please let us know.