Evaluation of Extremely Small Sound Source Signals Used in Speaking-Aid System with Statistical Voice Conversion

• NAKAMURA Keigo

  Graduate School of Information Science, Nara Institute of Science and Technology

• TODA Tomoki

  Graduate School of Information Science, Nara Institute of Science and Technology

• SARUWATARI Hiroshi

  Graduate School of Information Science, Nara Institute of Science and Technology

• SHIKANO Kiyohiro

  Graduate School of Information Science, Nara Institute of Science and Technology

Abstract

We have so far proposed a speaking-aid system for laryngectomees using a statistical voice conversion technique. In the proposed system, artificial speech articulated with extremely small sound source signals is detected with a Non-Audible Murmur (NAM) microphone, and then, the detected artificial speech is converted into more natural voice in a probabilistic manner. Although this system basically allows laryngectomees to speak while keeping the external source signals silent, it is still questionable how much these new sound source signals affect the converted speech quality. In this paper, we investigate the impact of various sound source signals on voice conversion accuracy. Various small sound source signals are designed by changing the spectral envelope and the waveform power independently. We conduct objective and subjective evaluations. The results of these experimental evaluations demonstrate that voice conversion accepts 1) various sound source signals with different spectral envelopes and 2) large degree of power of the sound source signals unless the power of speaking parts is almost equal to that of silence parts. Moreover, we also investigate the effectiveness of enhancing auditory feedback during speaking with the extremely small sound source signals.

Journal

• IEICE Transactions on Information and Systems

  IEICE Transactions on Information and Systems E93-D (7), 1909-1917, 2010

  The Institute of Electronics, Information and Communication Engineers

Keywords

• laryngectomee
• speaking aid
• electrolarynx
• voice conversion
• NAM
• enhancing auditory feedback

Details

• CRID: 1390282679355728512
• NII Article ID: 120005716791
• NII Article ID: 10027364080
• NII Book ID: AA10826272
• DOI: 10.1587/transinf.e93.d.1909
• ISSN: 17451361
• ISSN: 09168532
• HANDLE: 10061/7844
• Web Site: https://naist.repo.nii.ac.jp/records/3852
• Web Site: http://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/transinf/E93.D/7/E93.D_7_1909/_pdf
• Text Lang: en
• Data Source:
  • JaLC
  • IRDB
  • Crossref
  • CiNii Articles
  • KAKEN
• Abstract License Flag: Disallowed