voice
2 TopicsStoryline 360: Enrich Audio Narrations with Classic or AI-Generated Text-to-Speech
Course authors have long relied on the classic text-to-speech feature in Storyline 360 to create quick audio narration for their e-learning content and speed up course development. However, even with the neural voice options that have been added to the standard ones, the voices in the classic text-to-speech feature can sound robotic, making for a less natural and engaging learner experience. Now, AI-generated text-to-speech is changing the game. The newest addition to your authoring toolkit, AI Assistant’s text-to-speech gives you access to incredibly lifelike, AI-generated voices that are hard to distinguish from a real human voice. So will you keep using the classic version or embrace the brave new world of AI text-to-speech technology? Let’s take a look at the pros and cons of each to help you decide which option to choose for your next project. Classic Text-to-Speech Storyline’s classic text-to-speech has evolved significantly over the years. In particular, the introduction of neural voices empowered authors to create more realistic and natural-sounding narrations. Here’s an overview of when classic text-to-speech may be the best choice to elevate your audio content. You need certain languages. Classic text-to-speech allows you to create narrations for diverse audiences with support for multiple languages in standard and neural voice. In addition, some of these languages—including Icelandic, Welsh, Catalan, and Irish—are only currently available in classic text-to-speech. You need full SSML support. Unlike AI-generated text-to-speech, classic text-to-speech offers full speech synthesis markup language (SSML) support. This allows you to fine-tune narrations by adjusting the speaking rate, modifying pronunciation, adding pauses, and more to boost clarity and interest. You have reservations about using AI. Not everyone is ready to embrace new technologies like generative AI, and even some organizations have restrictions on using AI-powered tools. Outside of these specific circumstances, however, the overall quality of classic text-to-speech voices may not be sufficiently natural, especially for more complex or nuanced content. Want to judge for yourself? You can hear classic text-to-speech in action by playing the narrations below. Standard Voice Your browser does not support the audio element. Neural Voice Your browser does not support the audio element. AI-Generated Text-to-Speech AI Assistant’s text-to-speech feature takes voice narration to the next level, using generative AI technology to create highly realistic voices. You can customize the voices to fit your content needs, making the experience feel more personal and engaging to your learners. Here’s an overview of when AI text-to-speech may be the best option for bringing your narrations to life. You need certain (other) languages. AI Assistant allows you to broaden your reach with support for up to 32 languages, depending on the model used to generate narration—including some with multiple accents and dialects. The table below lists 11 languages you can only find in AI text-to-speech. Bulgarian Croatian Filipino Greek Hindi Hungarian Indonesian Malay Slovak Ukrainian Vietnamese You want an easier process. AI Assistant’s intuitive interface helps you quickly generate narration in any supported language. Simply select a voice and enter a script—AI Assistant handles the rest. Even though the voice description may note a specific accent or language, AI Assistant still generates narration in the language used in your script. You need highly customizable voices to create a personalized audio experience. AI Assistant lets you control everything, from adjusting the balance between steadiness and randomness to determining how closely the AI should adhere to the original voice when attempting to replicate it. Click here to learn how to customize AI-generated voices. You want to impress your learners with lifelike, context-aware voices. AI Assistant’s text-to-speech adapts to the tone, emotion, and nuances of your content or script. Here’s an example of a text-to-speech narration created using an AI-generated voice. AI-generated Voice Your browser does not support the audio element. You need voices tailored to specific training needs. AI Assistant comes with a voice library that offers thousands of ultrarealistic, AI-generated voices that can be filtered by age, gender, and use case. That said, AI text-to-speech has its own drawbacks. For example, because the underlying models don’t support SSML phoneme tags, AI text-to-speech has limited SSML options, as mentioned above. If you have special terminology or pronunciation, indicating that can be harder without full SSML support. And while AI text-to-speech does support the break tag <break time=“1.5s” /> if you want to manually control pacing, note that an excessive number of break tags can potentially cause instability. In addition, AI text-to-speech offers a huge variety of options but no specific guidance on which voices work best for a given language. Finding just the right voice can require a lot of experimentation—that may be time you don’t have. Pro tip: Keeping a reference list of voices that work for specific languages in your courses can help for your next project. Choose What Works For You AI-generated voices clearly have the edge over classic text-to-speech options on voice quality. However, if you (or your organization) are still on the fence about adopting generative AI in your content creation process or have specialized needs, classic text-to-speech is still there to help you create engaging audio interactions. You get to decide what sounds right for your learners—and for your own content and workflow.1KViews0likes0CommentsAI Assistant in Storyline 360: Voice Library
You already know that AI Assistant makes generating ultra-realistic text-to-speech narrations easy. Now, with the addition of a voice library with thousands of voices and intuitive search and filter options, finding the right voice for your content is even easier. Keep reading to learn how to use the voice library in Storyline 360. Browse Voices Start exploring with either of the following methods: In Slide View, go to the Home or Insert tab on the ribbon. Then, click the Insert Audio drop-down arrow and choose Voices. In Slide View, go to the Insert tab and click the Audio drop-down arrow. Then, hover over AI Audio and choose Voices. When the Generate AI Audio window displays, click the Voice Library button on the right. On the next screen, you’ll see a list of all the available voices in the library. Each row displays the name, description, and other details about the voice. Scroll down the list to load more voices. Some voices have long descriptions, so some of the text may be hidden. Hover over the description to reveal a tooltip with the complete text. Preview Voices To preview a voice, click the play icon—a little circle with a play button—just to the left of each name. You can preview voices one at a time. Use a Voice Once you find the voice you want, click the Use button located on the right. This adds the chosen voice to your library under the My Voices tab. The screen then automatically switches to the Text-to-Speech tab, where you can generate narrations using the selected voice. If you find a voice you’d like to use later, save it to your library by clicking the Add to My Voices pill button located just to the left of the Use button. Once added, the button changes state to display Remove from My Voices. If you want to remove the voice from your library, click the button and it reverts to its initial state. You can add up to 10 voices to your library. The Added Voices counter in the upper right corner displays the remaining number of voices you can add. Once you’ve added 10, the buttons become grayed out. You’ll also find other information about each voice at the top of the buttons, such as the date it was added, the number of times it’s been added to user libraries, and the total number of characters of audio the voice has generated. Search, Sort, and Filter Voices Right above the list of voices are the search, sort, and filter functions. From there, you can do any of the following: Search specific voices by entering text into the search box. You can search voices by name, keyword, or description. Note that voice library uses a fuzzy search technique—finding results that are similar to, but not necessarily an exact match for, the given search term. Reorder the list by Trending, Latest, Most Used, or Most Characters Generated using the Sort dropdown menu. By default, voices are sorted by Most Used. Find voices based on age, gender, and use case with Filters. The table below provides a list of available options for each filter. Age Young, Middle aged, Old Gender Man, Woman, Non-binary Use Case Narrative & Story, Conversational, Characters & Animation, Social Media, Entertainment & TV, Advertisement, Informative & Educational1.3KViews0likes0Comments
