Vox Phonetography (v.01.02)

Description

Vox Phonetography v.01.02

Vox Phonetography is a modern and innovative Praat plug-in for voice and speech range profiling. Vox Phonetography offers complete freedom to the voice clinician, with advanced voice analysis and Phonanium plug-ins integration. With Vox Phonetography, you decide what hardware to use and can calibrate directly within Vox only by using an SPL meter.

Vox …

1. automatically saves all sound files, unfiltered and uncompressed, without the need for a save button;
2. plays all sounds back through your audio system;
3. analyzes Harmonic-to-Noise Ratio (HNR), Cepstral Peak Prominence (smoothed) (CPPs) and Singing Power Ratio (SPR) per coordinate;
4. exports phonetograms as backups, WAV sound files and/or images in PNG;
5. provides additional analysis, like phonetographic surface, slope calculation, f₀/IL interdependency and CPPs voice quality measurement of the speaking voice;
6. uses one second equivalent levels (LEQ1) for accurate determination of vocal limits in unrecognizable voice fields, resulting in higher reliability of vocal limit measurements;
7. compares phonetograms to norms (norm fields) or across time (within subject);

All of Vox’ functionality and functions are described in the manual, which is provided in the download.

In two studies we compared Vox to another automatic phonetograph, as well as determined the accuracy of the Vox system. The abstracts of the two studies can be found HERE.

How does Vox work?

Vox Phonetography is a Praat plug-in built for the Praat demo window. When you start Vox, a new window within Praat will open which displays all menus and buttons. All phonetograms, data, sounds and analysis will be saved to one (or more) particular folder; the source directory. This is set when you configure Vox for the first time. Recordings are made in the familiar way by using the Praat sound recorder. Vox only shows the coordinates after recording, so visual feedback works per recording and not in realtime. All settings and phonetograms are saved in the source directory, so after an update you will keep all your phonetograms, data and settings.

All information needed to work with this plug-in is provided in the manual that will be downloaded with the software.

How do updates work?

We want Vox to keep working on your system, fix bugs that users might experience, and for new Phonanium scripts to be used within Vox all the time. These are all handled in future updates.

You are notified of an update by email. If you follow the link in the mail, you can log into your Phonanium account and the update is listed under ‘Downloads’. The update works through an ‘UPDATE.praat’ script, run it, and click ‘Update’. After Vox restarts, a notification shows you that you are using the new Vox Phonetography version.

Authors of Vox Phonetography

Marthè Nijkamp

(only advisory: Youri Maryn)

Included in this download

• Vox Phonetography plug-in (v.01.02)
• The installer Praat script (INSTALL.praat)
• Documents:
  • User Manual
  • Recording Protocol
  • Terms, Definitions and Help

Plug-in details

Name of plug-in

Vox Phonetography v.01.02

Plug-in size

20 MB

Content of plug-in

All scripts, files, images and data needed for a functional and stable Vox Phonetography plug-in.

How to install this plug-in?

1. Be sure you are running Praat version 6.0.40 or newer.
2. Be sure you downloaded and unzipped the Vox Phonetography plug-in (unzipping can be done by right clicking the zip-file and selection ‘unzip’/’unpack’/’extract’, depending on your system).
3. Open Praat, and click ‘Praat’, ‘Open Praat script…’, then select the script ‘INSTALL.praat’ from the unzipped Vox Phonetography folder.
4. Run the script with ‘Run’ > ‘Run’. The instructions are also shown in the script.
5. Click ‘Install’ in the notification window, after installation you can click ‘Start Vox’ to start immediately.

Important note: after installation, the button ‘Vox Phonetography’ will be shown under the ‘Praat’ button in the Praat objects window. This button is only visible when you quit and restart Praat one time after installation.

How to use Vox Phonetography?

Once the plug-in is installed, within Praat, click ‘Praat’ and ‘Vox Phonetography’ to start the plug-in. You can then navigate through Vox’ menus and buttons. Read the User Manual for further information.

To quit Vox, click ‘Exit Vox’ in the main menu. You can then close the Praat demo window.

Program Praat

Click here to visit the website where the program Praat (Paul Boersma & David Weenink, Institute for Phonetic Sciences, University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands) can be downloaded. This software runs under the GNU General Public License. Click here to download this license.

References

Nijkamp, M., & Maryn, Y. (2018). The modern phonetogram [poster presentation]. Seattle, WA: Fall Voice Conference.

Nijkamp, M., & Maryn, Y. (2018). Comparing the accuracy of two phonetography systems [poster presentation]. Seattle, WA: Fall Voice Conference.