Miku is a ‘Vocaloid’ – a holographic avatar that represents a digital bank of vocal samples – and performs sellout tours for thousands of very real mega-fans
Get our weekend culture and lifestyle email
Countless flowing green wigs risked spontaneous combustion on a 36-degree Melbourne evening as thousands of J-pop fans queued outside John Cain Arena on Friday night. But the heat was irrelevant to the night’s headline pop attraction, Hatsune Miku. She can’t sweat because she’s a digital animation – a 16-year-old “Vocaloid” virtual pop-star on her first Australian tour.
Miku, as she’s known to fans, is a 157cm-tall avatar of a teenage girl with green pigtails. She represents a digital bank of vocal samples created by the ominous-sounding Crypton Future Media using Yamaha’s Vocaloid voice synthesiser technology. Users input lyrics and melodies which are “sung” by the bank’s sampled voice (Hatsune Miku is voiced by the actor Saki Fujita); some Vocaloid producers “tune” the software to be especially convincing, while others embrace its artificiality.
About Author
More Stories
Esports are booming in Africa – but can its infrastructure keep pace?
AI learns to distinguish between aromas of US and Scottish whiskies
Man who falsely claimed to be bitcoin creator sentenced for continuing to sue developers