SONiKA

Sonika (ソニカ) is the fifth Vocaloid created by Zero-G. Released on July 14th, 2009, she is the third English speaking Vocaloid to use the updated Vocaloid2 software. She later became the first Vocaloid to be released in Greater China.

History
Zero-G felt that a young, frivolous singer would make for an overall interesting vocaloid, providing the fresh and innocent voice that professional singers do not provide. She is the first English speaking vocaloid to use a character design and profile as part of the product. She was released with profile/biographical information on the back cover of the software package, similar to the other Vocaloid2 products. She had several demo songs released, includeing "Sonika Says", "Sora" and "Ring my bell".

Her software comes with the VSQ file for her song "Sonika says".

Sonika on Twitter
Following her release Zero-G took a unique stance with her post-release development. They have created and maintained a Twitter page for Sonika, something unheard of for any past vocaloid. Tweets have included pictures of herself with a different hair color, announcing her favorite food is sashimi tuna, and announcing upcoming interviews in media articles. She has even made direct reference to fans discussing what her character item should be.

She also reports things like Tonio's late arrival and may even make a reaction to the release of other vocaloids like Big Al. In Jan 2011, her Twitter account reached 1,000 followers.

Sonika boxart 2009
From Nov. 2, 2009 to Nov. 30, 2009. Zero-G announced a competition to give Sonika a new look. The winner would receive a copy of the "Sonika Vocaloid2 Software".

Nearing the end of November an image was uploaded on Crypton Catalog that represented Sonika's new appearance. It was drawn by artist Mario Wibisono (aka raynkazuya) at the request of Zero-G. And with the image being found during the New Look Competition and uploaded to Zero-G's site a few days later, this greatly confused fans and submitters who thought that it was the winning image.

This was quickly corrected by Zero-G stating that the competition rules never included the winning image being used for boxart.

Global Exploit
Sonika was also produced as a Chinese version and Ecapsule Co., Ltd (飛天膠囊數位科技有限公司) is a distributor in Taiwan. The Chinese edition came with a new boxart. Users can choose to use the original English or Traditional Chinese interface, however it does not have Chinese language input method. Because of this, it has an instructional DVD and a comparative table of English and Chinese phonemes in an explanatory leaflet which show her accessibility to about 90% of the Chinese pronunciations and were produced by Ecapsule for users in Taiwan, not to take considerable time for making it sounds closer to nature Chinese. This version when displayed at its announced convention on 24th and 25th July, 2010 came with limited stickers and posters. On August 1, 2010, Sonika was released in Taiwan and became the first Vocaloid released in Greater China.

Usage for Music
Sonika is a Vocaloid designed for Pop Music. She has a strong British accent and is better suited for late 20th century pop and sings with a soft and innocent sounding voice. However she has a limited vocal range and heavy editing may be needed and is capable of singing in the Mezzo-soprano scale. She also shares a similar trait with Miriam, having a voice that is so soft that she sometimes loses clarity in her results, although the impact of the softness varies per user.

Though marketed to an English speaking audience, Sonika can potentially sing in other languages and her vocal bank is not limited to fixed syllables and phonetics so she is able to produce any consonant and vowel combination imaginable. Unlike Luka she does not have a separate voicebank for each language she is able to access all of her language capabilities from just a handful of voice samples. She has an expansive voicebank list with many things that do not exist in other voicebanks giving her an almost unlimited potential amongst the Vocaloids. Despite the capabilities, users reported that they had to use letters of other langauges instead of the one intended for that langauge to get a closer or stronger pronunciation. This meant out of all the Vocaloids Sonika is the one who needs the most attention when made to sing in other languages.

While she may have many things within her voicebanks that were not included in other Vocaloids, she lacks the breathing phonemes ([br1]-[br5]) that is commonly included in the Japanese voicebanks, even though her predecessor Prima had all of them. However, her voicebank is set up in such a way that, theoretically, it does not need them, although a user who is used to having the missing phonemes may need some time to adjust to using alternative means to get a similar effect. However, lacking these breathing effects has been claimed to test her ability to speak any language as some languages that would otherwise be able to make use of these effects for pronunciation purposes are beyond her reach.

She also has a high level of oddities within her samples, and can produce "plucking" sounds within her bank. While Prima also had these sounds, it is almost impossible to produce a lengthy song without Sonika producing a high number of these sounds; they appear more often than any other Vocaloid known using the Vocaloid 2 engine. When these sounds appear, the only way to remove them is to soften the end of the note within the software using the parameters.

Though her voicebanks gives her a large advantage over many other vocaloids, she is said to be difficult to work with and produces flat notes, however a tutorial to give tips and suggestions. Overall this makes her unsuitable for amateur users, but she is highly recommended for advance users who know how to get the most potential out of Vocaloid 2 voicebanks. Sonika provides an excellent opportunity for high levels of experimentation with the Vocaloid 2 program editing options, and a user who is confident in their skills will find Sonika a good learning tool to improve their voice editing skills. However, very few Producers know how to fully take advantage of what she offers.

She has the same engine version as Big Al, installing her after him will not cause problems. However, installing older Vocaloids after her may cause a problem.


 * ''comparison between all English capable Vocaloid2

Reception
The following is based on fan forum, Nico Nico Douga and Youtube reactions and may not nessecary be a universal reflection on the Vocaloid for the entire fandom.

She was initially poked fun at by both English and Japanese fans for resembling Gumi/Megpoid. Her look was said to resemble a simplified version of Gumi's outfit and the colors were similar to each other. On top of this, they were released within a month of each other.

She was also the first Vocaloid to be given a personnelity via her Twitter account, although some fans noted how proud she often sounded. Sonika herself also tweeted on Twittered about the comparison and called herself "most beautiful", although later admited "Gumi was cool". She also noted that she was friends with Megurine Luka and all Japanese Vocaloids ("Well most of them anyway"). Other "traits" were showing jealously towards "chibi Miku" and how cute it looked, and odd use of British slang talk ("I'm on holiday at the moment, swimming with me ducks").

While a noticeable voice amongst the Vocaloid fandom has expressed a desire to see an improved version of Sonika it has been confirmed by Zero-G that they have no intentions to improve her voicebanks.

The reaction to Sonika's new look has been mixed, with positive comments stating that the look is an improvement over the original CG and stylish, and negative comments stating that the look appears too sexual and nothing like the original Sonika. Others have pointed out that the new look does not fit Sonika's soft voice. Sonika herself reacted on Twitter to the negative feed back. Within the Japanese community, a joke often notes the sudden change of boxart and is a source of many remarks regarding make overs and plastic surgrey.

Trivia

 * The winner of Sonika's New Look Competition was Kjbionicle, her entry was number 30.
 * The English community debated over which item would be Sonika's character item. The most popular choices were a golden ring, based off her name's similarity to "Sonic the Hedgehog", and a bell, based off her demo song "Ring my Bell". The Japanese community has focused on a pineapple due to her appearance's similarity to a pineapple (patterned gold shirt and spiky, green hair).
 * Although she was not the first English vocaloid to use an avatar on her boxart, she was the first to mimic the Japanese style of avatars.
 * According to her twitter messages, Sonika's hair color is able to change color (e.g. from green to red), she also has freckles that show in the summer heat.
 * The artist of Sonika's 2nd boxart design has a Devianart account.
 * Sonika regards Leon, Lola and Miriam as her older siblings and Prima as her "auntie".