Roger Ebert dramatically regains his voice with help from CereProc (video)

Roger Ebert, perhaps best known as the Hardy to Siskel's Laurel during his days spent thumbing up and down criticisms at films, has achieved a technological miracle of sorts. After a series of cancer treatments and operations left the man mute and without a lower jaw, Ebert regained his voice in dramatic fashion on Oprah, of all places. A company called CereProc has recreated his voice through its text-to-speech technologies assisted by decades of recordings captured from his television appearances and DVD movie commentary tracks -- not exactly applicable to everyone with speaking disorders. Nevertheless, check the clip after the break to witness the impact his semi-recovered voice has on his wife, Chaz. While it definitely needs tweaking, the results are pretty remarkable.

[EI8HT Posted Mar 3rd 2010 5:58AM]

wow...amazing!

[notbuttershift1 Posted Mar 3rd 2010 7:25AM]

@EI8HT yes, it is really incredible, good for him and a great story for a man is not only unafraid to show his face in public but will also return to a life in the spotlight.

still, i really wish he would consider video games as art. my only gripe.

[doutorpiranha Posted Mar 3rd 2010 10:02AM]

THIS IS AMIGA SPEAKING

[jocantonio Posted Mar 3rd 2010 11:44AM]

@EI8HT: really amazing!

[Veraxus Posted Mar 3rd 2010 12:44PM]

No kidding. That's got to be the best TTS implementation I have ever heard.

[aeth Posted Mar 3rd 2010 5:46PM]

@EI8HT
Two thumbs up

[Blackstar Posted Mar 4th 2010 2:17AM]

@EI8HT

That is awesome! Wow... think of how many bad directors I can tell off while sounding like Roger Ebert. I can download his voice and tell Michael Bay how much he sucks. What a modern world we live in.

[SonicGA Posted Mar 3rd 2010 6:02AM]

Holy shit!!!! It's not 100%, but it's damn close for a text-to-speech program.

[djcarey Posted Mar 3rd 2010 6:06AM]

Wow that is a really nice story. Really tugs on your heart strings.

[killplay Posted Mar 3rd 2010 6:32AM]

Woah. What happened to Roger Ebert? O.o

[admlshake Posted Mar 3rd 2010 6:40AM]

@killplay

The short answer is cancer. He lost his lower jaw and vocal chords to it.

[admlshake Posted Mar 3rd 2010 7:35AM]

@nicholiservia
Yeah, it really is sad. Life has a very cruel sense of humor.

[aubreyq Posted Mar 3rd 2010 7:59AM]

@nicholiservia I used to watch Siskel and Ebert religiously. Too bad we lost Siskel and now Ebert had to go through this. Ebert is a great critic but one has to be careful because he tends to give spoilers when criticizing. Actually, other critics do this, too.

[Ken J Posted Mar 3rd 2010 11:34AM]

@killplay

Couldn't they insert a prosthetic lower jaw? I swear doctors are only slightly better nowadays than in the f'n civil war

[TMoney2007 Posted Mar 3rd 2010 1:20PM]

@Ken J Riiiiight...

[gletob Posted Mar 3rd 2010 3:39PM]

@Ken J

Lost his vocal cords too.

[macmann Posted Mar 3rd 2010 6:41AM]

Only on a mac. ;-)

[EM1 Posted Mar 3rd 2010 7:38AM]

@Darkroom
OS X has a great text to speech tool built-in. Except the voice, it sounds about the same.
Not here defending Apple, just informing those who have never used OS X for more then 3 minutes.
In any case, he looked truely excited. Great video.

[phearme Posted Mar 3rd 2010 8:39AM]

@macmann or not :-p

[Raio Posted Mar 3rd 2010 7:04AM]

Cancer is dramatic...

[Tristan88888888 Posted Mar 3rd 2010 7:14AM]

i dont think ive ever seen someone without a lower jaw. anyways, that was pretty good text to speech, it didnt even sound that robotic.

[Bobot Posted Mar 3rd 2010 7:27AM]

@Tristan88888888

Its there for more than 15 years...one of the first companies who made a program with that quality is AT&T...

[Bobot Posted Mar 3rd 2010 7:31AM]

Very nice story about what a really strong man can do.

[Joshua Floposky Posted Mar 3rd 2010 7:40AM]

Stephen Hawking sounds worse than that? One of the more brilliant men in history and sounds like he is talking through a fisher price toy..

But seriously, it does sound alot better than Mr Hawking voice..

[Pookiewood Posted Mar 3rd 2010 7:59AM]

@joshua flopolsky That's that Intel inside! Just kidding something me and a buddy say around AMD when there is a messed up PC.

[vanmankline Posted Mar 3rd 2010 8:30AM]

@Pookiewood
Dr. Hawking actually has chosen to stay with the voice he has rather than upgrading. Its associated with him.

[orangespoon Posted Mar 3rd 2010 8:30AM]

@joshua flopolsky

the company behind his new voice had access to a massive archive of his TV footage and interviews etc to sample his old voice, unfortunately Hawking probably doesnt have such a useful resource

[PlatinumSkeet Posted Mar 3rd 2010 12:24PM]

@(Unverified)

I don't' think I'd like to hear Hawking with another voice. It's hard to disassociate a voice like that from him...

[Ronster Posted Mar 3rd 2010 7:51AM]

I think he sounds awesome! He seems happy, and thats all that really matters...

[p0p0 Posted Mar 3rd 2010 8:12AM]

Nostalgia Critic is gonna cream himself.
This is pretty crazy.

[cjwild Posted Mar 3rd 2010 8:20AM]

Thanks for watching another episode of ..."Rich People Get More than You!!!"

[Joshua Floposky Posted Mar 3rd 2010 8:32AM]

@cjwild
Yeah not too many people can afford those MBP!

[formetopoopon Posted Mar 3rd 2010 10:14AM]

@cjwild
So what? He earned all the money he made. What do you want to do about it, workers of the world unite and steal his wealth?

Rich people like him pay through the nose for this cutting edge tech and because of that it will be affordable for everyone in 5 years or less you ungrateful child.

[IcedOmega13 Posted Mar 3rd 2010 8:33AM]

I guess the Steven Hawking's model just wasn't cutting it.

[phearme Posted Mar 3rd 2010 8:37AM]

huh... hate to spoil this but text to speach hac been around since win xp, and lots of cvompanies are already selling voices for different languages since 10 years. this is not new.

[aubreyq Posted Mar 3rd 2010 8:42AM]

@phearme Yeah, but this is your own specific voice, dude.

[bsparks Posted Mar 3rd 2010 9:41AM]

@phearme Hate to spoil it, but text to speach has been around since the mid 70's in rarer forms, and every mac with a real speaker has had text to speach software. Hell, I'm pretty sure my Win95 install had Microsoft Sam

[victorstuber Posted Mar 3rd 2010 8:43AM]

This is awesome! I guess the next step is to hook it up to his brain signals so that he can ditch the computer.

[Eugene Action Posted Mar 3rd 2010 12:55PM]

@victorstuber then we could know what he REALLY thinks of Avatar! :p

[TMoney2007 Posted Mar 3rd 2010 1:23PM]

@Eugene Action Hahahaha! I'm just imagining him sitting there calmly while his computer yells "AAAAHHHHHHHH Its terrible! I didn't sign up to see Space Dances With Wolves!!!!"

[Heliosphan Posted Mar 3rd 2010 8:47AM]

This reminds me of that British Telecom employed system which could pretty accurately get the wonderful Tom Baker saying absolutely anything!

It lives on - tombakersays.com

Funny as f00k.

[krosref Posted Mar 3rd 2010 9:08AM]

that is powerful stuff. i am so happy for them.

[naterecording Posted Mar 3rd 2010 9:09AM]

It has been sad to see what Roger has been through, but I find him so inspiring because of his positive attitude about the whole thing. I get annoyed at the smallest things, and he loses his JAW and is like, 'well, that's life, might as well make the best of it'.

[crunc Posted Mar 3rd 2010 9:20AM]

Now, honestly, who doesn't want to get hold of this text-to-roger-ebert's-voice translator and start playing with it?

[Plazmic Flame Posted Mar 3rd 2010 9:37AM]

Wow, where has the time gone? When was Ebert diagnosed with cancer?? Lower jaw gone too??? Jeez. I swear it was just the other day I saw this guy on tv doing movie reviews with Roper... he's lost weight too, damn.

[Inspector Gadget80 Posted Mar 3rd 2010 9:58AM]

This is actually first time I saw Roger Ebert in a long time when I was a kid I used to watch him and his partner forget his name doing movie critics every time that was during the early 90s but didn't know he have throat cancer but I'm glad he's able to speak just wondering what kind of tech he's using.

[kstagg Posted Mar 3rd 2010 10:05AM]

Heartwarming story and feel great for Roger but damn - Oprah has really gained weight.

Just kidding.

[ploit Posted Mar 3rd 2010 10:06AM]

Esquire is running a GREAT article about Ebert that I think everyone should read:

http://www.esquire.com/features/roger-ebert-0310

His condition is sad, though it's amazing how, with the help of the internet, he's putting out some of the best work of his life right now.

[mbushnell Posted Mar 3rd 2010 10:14AM]

Good for him. As a cancer survivor myself, these types of stories really hit home for me. Technology, when used correctly, can be a tremendous thing.

[McHoffa Posted Mar 3rd 2010 10:57AM]

I have actually not seen him since his siskel and ebert days... I saw this and thought, "That's Roger Ebert? Who am I thinking of?" I had to look up photos to see if I was remembering him correctly...

Anyway, this is awesome...