EVOC 20 PolySynth (U/V) Detection Parameters
Human speech consists of a series of voiced sounds—tonal sounds or formants—and unvoiced sounds. The main distinction between voiced and unvoiced sounds is that voiced sounds are produced by an oscillation of the vocal cords, whereas unvoiced sounds are produced by blocking and restricting the air flow with lips, tongue, palate, throat, and larynx.
If speech containing voiced and unvoiced sounds is used as a vocoder’s analysis signal, but the synthesis engine doesn’t differentiate between voiced and unvoiced sounds, the result will sound rather weak. To avoid this problem, the synthesis section of the vocoder must produce different sounds for the voiced and unvoiced parts of the signal.
The EVOC 20 PolySynth includes an Unvoiced/Voiced detector for this specific purpose. This unit detects the unvoiced portions of the sound in the analysis signal and then substitutes the corresponding portions in the synthesis signal with noise, with a mixture of noise and synthesizer signal, or with the original signal. If the U/V Detector detects voiced parts, it passes this information to the Synthesis section, which uses the normal synthesis signal for these portions.
- Sensitivity knob: Determines how responsive U/V detection is. When this knob is turned to the right, more of the individual unvoiced portions of the input signal are recognized. When high settings are used, the increased sensitivity to unvoiced signals can lead to the U/V sound source—determined by the Mode menu, as described in “Mode Menu” below—being used on the majority of the input signal, including voiced signals. Sonically, this results in a sound that resembles a radio signal that is breaking up and contains a lot of static, or noise.
- Mode menu: Sets the sound sources that can be used to replace the unvoiced content of the input signal. You can choose between the following:
- Noise: Uses noise alone for the unvoiced portions of the sound.
- Noise + Synth: Uses noise and the synthesizer for the unvoiced portions of the sound.
- Blend: Uses the analysis signal after it has passed through a highpass filter for the unvoiced portions of the sound. The Sensitivity parameter has no effect when this setting is used.