press release
Here's Samantha. Her voice is mellow, pleasant and nicely modulated. She seems calm and quite knowledgeable.
Samantha is actually the name of the voice heard by Ford owners who use its latest infotainment technologies.
Customers will hear Samantha's voice -- as well as French-speaking Julie's and Spanish-speaking Paulina's -- give life to the company's advanced communication and entertainment system called SYNC. A new, updated version of this award-winning technology, featuring 911 assist, is now available in Canada.
These female voices are the product of intelligent recording processes combined with highly-specialized text-to-speech (TTS) technology. The digital codes are transformed into human voices to allow customers to interact naturally and easily with their car.
Together with Nuance Communications, Ford developed a comprehensive voice-command system. According to Brigitte Richardson, Product Development Engineer, Voice Command Technology at Ford, "the next-generation navigation system from Ford features a powerful TTS engine along with a massive word database. The quality of TTS voices in Ford's navigation system is simply amazing."
Nuance's scalable TTS software is optimized to deliver voice output solutions of the highest quality by matching memory-print requirements across all the various automotive platforms. In the case of SYNC, vocal artists recorded several hours of sentences that had been carefully selected by linguists in order to create the basis for the reconstructed speech.
Montreal's Roxanne Jean is the actress who provided the French-speaking voice of Julie. "I often rehearsed certain sentences in three different ways as if I was starting from the beginning, the middle or the end," she explains. "I think they picked me because my voice quality is high with a steady tone."
Roxanne says that during the recording, she tried to imagine the type of voice that would appeal to drivers and passengers throughout their daily commute. "A lot of folks want to drive to work in a relaxed atmosphere," she adds. "They want to hear a deep yet mellow voice that's pleasant to listen to."
Roxanne is fully aware that her voice will be heard by thousands of people (maybe even herself) for long periods of time. "It's so exciting to think that, one day, I could take place in a Ford vehicle and, out of nowhere, without warning, I would hear my own voice through the navigation system!"
photo:Ford
Here's Samantha. Her voice is mellow, pleasant and nicely modulated. She seems calm and quite knowledgeable.
Samantha is actually the name of the voice heard by Ford owners who use its latest infotainment technologies.
Customers will hear Samantha's voice -- as well as French-speaking Julie's and Spanish-speaking Paulina's -- give life to the company's advanced communication and entertainment system called SYNC. A new, updated version of this award-winning technology, featuring 911 assist, is now available in Canada.
These female voices are the product of intelligent recording processes combined with highly-specialized text-to-speech (TTS) technology. The digital codes are transformed into human voices to allow customers to interact naturally and easily with their car.
Together with Nuance Communications, Ford developed a comprehensive voice-command system. According to Brigitte Richardson, Product Development Engineer, Voice Command Technology at Ford, "the next-generation navigation system from Ford features a powerful TTS engine along with a massive word database. The quality of TTS voices in Ford's navigation system is simply amazing."
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Nuance's scalable TTS software is optimized to deliver voice output solutions of the highest quality by matching memory-print requirements across all the various automotive platforms. In the case of SYNC, vocal artists recorded several hours of sentences that had been carefully selected by linguists in order to create the basis for the reconstructed speech.
Montreal's Roxanne Jean is the actress who provided the French-speaking voice of Julie. "I often rehearsed certain sentences in three different ways as if I was starting from the beginning, the middle or the end," she explains. "I think they picked me because my voice quality is high with a steady tone."
Roxanne says that during the recording, she tried to imagine the type of voice that would appeal to drivers and passengers throughout their daily commute. "A lot of folks want to drive to work in a relaxed atmosphere," she adds. "They want to hear a deep yet mellow voice that's pleasant to listen to."
Roxanne is fully aware that her voice will be heard by thousands of people (maybe even herself) for long periods of time. "It's so exciting to think that, one day, I could take place in a Ford vehicle and, out of nowhere, without warning, I would hear my own voice through the navigation system!"
photo:Ford