Text to voice: a must-have tool for writers

Bullet Summary:

• Advanced Text to Speech technology human-like synthesized speech.
• Text to Speech for the publishing industry
• Overview of ElevenLabs' unique speech synthesis model
• Introduction to Studio, a comprehensive tool for creating long-form audio content.
• Our multilingual model supporting 28 languages for global reach.
• Voice Design and Professional Voice Cloning technologies for creating distinctive and authentic voices.

Introduction to text to speech technology

Text to Speech (TTS) technology, at its core, transforms written content into audible speech. Over recent years, with substantial advancements in machine learning, TTS technology has evolved to a point where synthesized speech is practically indistinguishable from human narration. The realism and expressiveness achieved by modern TTS systems offer unmatched potential, particularly for the publishing industry.

The publishing paradigm: benefits of text to speech

For news publishers, the sonic landscape is not just an emerging field but a requisite to engagement. Growing an audio presence has proven to enhance user retention and satisfaction. While the traditional route would involve hiring voice actors or getting reporters to narrate, these methods are neither time nor cost-efficient. With Text to Speech, stories can be vocalized immediately upon publishing, ensuring that the content remains fresh, relevant, and of high quality.

How’s Eleven different?

How we achieve human delivery even on very long texts is down to the way we’ve built our model. It’s trained to understand what is being said and to adjust delivery accordingly. It does this by taking into account not just the meaning of words but also the context surrounding each utterance.

Traditional speech generation algorithms produce utterances on a sentence-by-sentence basis. This is computationally less demanding but immediately comes across as robotic. Emotions and intonation often need to stretch and resonate across a number of sentences to tie a particular train of thought together. Tone and pacing convey intent which is really what makes speech sound human in the first place. So rather than generate each utterance separately, our model takes the surrounding context into account, maintaining appropriate flow and prosody across the entire generated material. This emotional depth, coupled with prime audio quality, provides users with the most genuine and compelling narrating tool out there.

Generating long-form content with Studio

Studio is our end-to-end workflow for crafting audiobooks in minutes. It offers an unprecedented level of control over your audio creations with the ability to regenerate specific audio chunks, assign different speakers to particular text fragments, directly import multiple format files, and more.

Getting started

Navigating Studio is easy and intuitive.

1. Select Studio from the top bar menu.
2. Click Create New Project.
3. Choose how you’d like to initialize your Project.
4. Start crafting your text.
5. Click Convert to render your entire Project at once, or use Play & Regenerate to test specific fragments.

Feature highlights

Studio provides a straightforward user experience, akin to using Google Docs, with an intuitive, user-centric interface supporting a variety of editing features:

1. Full conversion: Use a single button to render your entire Project at once, or use Play & Regenerate to test specific fragments.
2. Speaker assignment: Assign different text fragments to various speakers; choose default voices for headings and paragraphs.
3. Regenerate audio fragments: Seamlessly regenerate specific segments within larger audio fragments while keeping context intact.
4. Insert pauses (coming later this week): Manually adjust the length of pauses (up to 3s initially) between speech segments to fine-tune pacing.
5. Segment by chapter: Structure your text into sections to focus on a particular fragment one at a time.
6. Save and resume progress: Conveniently pause your work and resume right where you left off.
7. Import files: Studio supports .epub, .pdf and .txt files, as well as URLs for more streamlined workflow
8. Intelligent re-generation: When resuming work on an already generated project, you will only be charged for regenerating altered fragments, not the entire project

Compatibility

Studio stands alongside Speech Synthesis, VoiceLab, and Voice Library, serving as a comprehensive solution for long-form audio synthesis. Additionally, it's seamlessly integrated with Professional Voice Cloning, Voice Library, and our multilingual model.

• Professional voice cloning: generate long-form audio content in your own voice. You can also share your pro voice clone via Voice Library and earn character rewards when others create projects using your voice.
• Voice library: Choose the perfect voice for your narrative from the countless voices created by our community.
• Eleven multilingual: Whether you choose a pre-made voice, a cloned voice or your own voice, you can seamlessly have them speak all the languages supported by our multilingual model.

Broadening horizons: our new multilingual model

At ElevenLabs, our commitment to innovation has led to the launch of a new multilingual model. This allows the same narrative to be translated and vocalized in up to 28 languages. For publishers, this means unprecedented global reach, with stories resonating across different cultures and regions, all in a consistent and unified voice.

Supported languages now include: English, Korean, Dutch, Chinese, Turkish, Swedish, Indonesian, Filipino, Japanese, Ukrainian, Greek, Czech, Finnish, Romanian, Danish, Bulgarian, Malay, Slovak, Croatian, Classic Arabic, Polish, German, Spanish, French, Italian, Hindi, Portuguese, and Tamil.

Voice design: crafting unique narratives

Our proprietary Voice Design tool provides a transformative experience for publishers. It facilitates the creation of completely unique voices based on selected parameters, such as age, gender and accent. Every generated voice is unique, ensuring that publishers can choose a particular voice to become synonymous with their brand or publication.

Efficiency through professional voice cloning

Professional Voice Cloning (PVC) technology at ElevenLabs offers another layer of customization. By cloning the voices of a publication's reporters, we can produce audio stories in their unique tones. This not only provides authenticity but also significantly reduces costs and time spent on traditional recording processes. What's more, our multilingual model is compatible with Professional Voice Cloning, ensuring that a reporter's voice can now speak all the supported languages.

Listen to a podcast episode generated with our Professional Voice Cloning tool:

How publishers can benefit from voice cloning

For publishers, Professional Voice Cloning (PVC) offers numerous advantages:

1. Distinctive brand voice: By cloning a unique voice, publishers can establish a recognizable auditory brand, setting their content apart.
2. Content consistency: Voice cloning ensures a consistent vocal style across multiple articles and publications without needing different voice actors.
3. Efficiency: Need a voice-over revision? Instead of re-recording, just generate the required narration with the cloned voice, saving time and maintaining uniformity.
4. Enhanced engagement: For global readership, a familiar cloned voice enhances connection and trust in the content.

When combined with Text to Voice technology, publishers are equipped with a state-of-the-art toolkit to produce rich, varied, and global auditory content. Adopting the capabilities of Professional Voice cloning Technology is a progressive move for publishers, opening a myriad of opportunities.

Conclusion

The future of publishing is not just in the written word but in how those words are conveyed. With tools like Text to Voice, publishers have the potential to revolutionize their content delivery, ensuring accessibility, uniqueness, and global reach. At ElevenLabs, we're at the forefront of this transformation, offering technology that paves the way for a richer, more diverse auditory experience.

Update: as of January 2025, Projects is now called Studio and is available to all free users.

FAQ