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From: elec10@york.ac.uk (D Rossiter)
Subject: Info release - visual displays for the voice
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Information release - Real-time visual displays for the voice
-------------------------------------------------------------

One DPhil thesis, nine papers and three miscellaneous other reports 
have now been released on the world wide web (www) concerning a three 
year project entitled `Real-time visual displays for professional 
voice development'. These are available at the following address:

 http://www.york.ac.uk/~elec10/ 

[Ftp access is also available at ftp.york.ac.uk  \pub\users\elec10\voice]

At the site each item is listed with the complete reference, abstract and
a link to a postscipt version of the item. The size of the files are also 
quoted. There are hypertext html versions of the DPhil thesis and some 
reports/papers. The items presented on the site are listed below. 
The DPhil thesis abstract is listed here to provide an indication
of the type of information presented in the thesis and at the site in general.


-------- The DPhil thesis --------

D ROSSITER, 'Real-time visual displays for voice tuition', DPhil thesis,
January 1995 

ABSTRACT 

The human voice is used regularly in day-to-day activity, particularly by
teachers, politicians and singers. This can place a level of strain on their
vocal mechanism. To counter this, professional voice users may undergo
some form of vocal tuition. However, there is a prevalence of subjective,
sometimes ambiguous tuition techniques. Vocal damage can therefore
occur in spite of, or partially because of, the tuition techniques that are
supposed to help the subject. 

It is hypothesised that a computer system which can a) objectively measure
a large set of parameters relating to vocal performance, b) appropriately
translate these parameters to a smaller set of easily interpreted measures,
and c) dynamically display this information in an appropriate graphical
form may be able to provide a measure of progress to complement
instructive techniques during vocal tuition. 

A highly flexible, easy-to-use tool for the analysis and visualization of
voice source and acoustic signals has been developed called ALBERT
(Acoustic and Laryngeal Biofeedback Enhancement in Real-Time). The
system can be used to provide real-time feedback on the state of a number
of voice parameters. The visualization of these parameters is highly
configurable, and includes 1D, 2D and 3D arrangements with optional
colour mapping. ALBERT is novel in its ability to display many popular
laryngeal and acoustic parameters in many informative graphical
configurations. The system can be used in real-time to function as a tool
for use by a voice tutor. 

To test the hypothesis, three studies are presented of vocally developing
male and female subjects as follows: i) a six week course of vocal
expression, ii) a group of actors over an eight month period, and iii) a
group of singers over a time span of 2.7 years. Two voice parameters in
particular have been identified as indicative of vocal performance: the
closed quotient of the vocal folds (CQ) and the spectral amplitude in the
frequency band within which the phenomenon of the `singer's formant' is
known to occur relative to the spectral amplitude of the complete acoustic
output (Ratio). ALBERT has been used as a tool to provide real-time
visual feedback of these parameters in the context of singing tuition.
Results suggest that ALBERT is a tool with considerable potential for use
in a voice tuition process. 

[Postscript version and hypertext html version available]


-------- A list of the published papers held at the site --------

D ROSSITER & D M HOWARD, 'Animation of larynx movement
derived from an electrolaryngograph signal', Voice (journal of the British
Voice Association), vol. 3, pp. 86-91, 1994 

D ROSSITER & D M HOWARD, 'ALBERT : a system for interactive
analysis and display of voice source and acoustic parameters', Proceedings
of the Institute of Acoustics: Speech and Hearing Conference, vol. 16, no.
5, pp. 301-308, 1994 
[Postscript version and hypertext html version available]

D M HOWARD & D ROSSITER, 'Real-time visual displays for use in
singing training: An overview', Proceedings of the Stockholm Music
Acoustics Conference, July 28-August 1, pp. 191-196, 1993 

D ROSSITER, D M HOWARD & M DOWNES, 'A real-time LPC based
vocal tract area display for voice development', Journal of Voice, vol. 8,
no. 4, pp. 314-319, 1994 

D ROSSITER & D M HOWARD, 'Voice source and acoustic output
qualities for singing synthesis'. Proceedings of the International Computer
Music Conference, pp. 483-484, 1994 

D ROSSITER & D M HOWARD, 'The application of multimedia and
visualization techniques to the enhancement of voice analysis and
development', Proceedings of the 12th Eurographics UK conference, pp.
5-17, 1994 

D ROSSITER, D M HOWARD, M DOWNES & P GARNER, 'Real-time
visual displays for singing development', Proceedings of the 11th
Eurographics UK conference, pp. 63-72, 1993 

D ROSSITER & D M HOWARD, 'Cyberspace visualization of vocal
development data', Proceedings of the Institute of Acoustics, vol. 14, Part
6, pp. 241-248, 1992 

D M HOWARD & D ROSSITER, 'Results from a pilot longitudinal study
of electrolaryngographically derived closed quotient for adult male singers
in training', Proceedings of the Institute of Acoustics, vol. 14, Part 6, pp.
529-536, 1992 


---------- Other reports available  ----------

M DOWNES, Real-time determination of vocal tract articulation for vocal 
training using linear predictive coding. Unpublished MSc report, Music 
Technology Masters degree, York University, Sept 1992 

ALBERT (Acoustic and Laryngeal Biofeedback Enhancement in
Real-Time) software manual 
[Postscript and hypertext html versions available]

CLARK, M.J.O. (1992) Acoustics of the singing voice. Unpublished final
year project submitted as partial requirement for the degree of Physics,
University of Edinburgh. 


----- Other information available ----------

- A list of audio related software available for Silicon Graphics machines

- Source code and a binary executable for a real time wide band spectrogram
  for Silicon Graphics machines

- a list of links to various other music/singing/audio-related sites on the www


--------------------------------------------

The research associate for this project was Dr David Rossiter 
(elec10@tower.york.ac.uk). The principal investigator for the project was 
Dr David Howard (dh@ohm.york.ac.uk). The work was conducted at the 
Department of Electronics, University of York, England.

Please foward this email to anyone you feel may be interested.

Dave 




