YouTube has launched a new tool called Aloud that allows creators to automatically dub their videos into different languages using synthetic voices. The tool is still in beta, but it is already being used by some of YouTube’s most popular creators, including MrBeast and PewDiePie.
Aloud works by first generating a transcription of a video’s audio. Creators can then edit the transcription before selecting their preferred language and style of synthetic voice. The dub can take just minutes to generate.
The tool currently supports English, Spanish, and Portuguese, but YouTube says that more languages will be added soon. The company is also working on improving the quality of the synthetic voices.
Aloud is a free tool, which means that it is accessible to all creators, regardless of their size or budget. This could help smaller creators reach a wider audience by making their content available in more languages.
“Dubbing used to take weeks worth of effort and a large budget. But with Aloud, you only need a few minutes. We use advances in audio separation, machine translation, and speech synthesis to reduce time-consuming and costly steps like translation, video editing, and audio production. You do not even need to know any language other than the ones you already speak, and all of this is available at no cost to the creator.” Google states.
To dub with Aloud, all you need to do is provide the video and subtitles in the original language. If subtitles are not available, you can also quickly review the text transcript that we generate. With those inputs, Aloud can produce informative dubs like the one below:
However, the launch of Aloud has also raised concerns among some dubbing firms, who fear that the tool could put them out of business. These firms argue that human-dubbed videos are of higher quality than synthetic-dubbed videos and that they are better able to capture the nuances of different languages.
Only time will tell whether Aloud will be able to compete with human-dubbed videos. However, the tool’s launch is a significant development in the field of video translation, and it could have a major impact on the way that creators reach global audiences.
