Character Vocal Series

The Character Vocal series (commonly shortened to CV) consists of Crypton Future Media, Inc.'s most famous set of vocals.

About
The Character Vocals were the successor to the initial unnamed VOCALOID "series" which consisted of Meiko and Kaito. It was the predecessor series to the later Project if…, the popularity of the Character Vocals has lead to the latter being repeatedly put on hiatus.

The concept of Character Vocals was to produce a specific vocal quality, rather than to be professional vocalists like all past Vocaloids. Their vocal goals were based on how sound travels, hence the use of "音" meaning "sound" in the names of the packages. The change of approach was due to the fact it was difficult to find professional vocalists who would lend their vocals to the VOCALOID™ software. Still, despite this, the initial target audience were professional musicians.

However, the overall success of the series has lead to a lost direction for the VOCALOID™ software with much of the cause resting on the Hatsune Miku vocal in particular. In fact, many of VOCALOID™ issues and concerns are a direct result of the series success. However, culturally the series has had great impact on the VOCALOID™ software and in turn other Vocaloids have been stated to have been influenced by the series.

Initially, only 3 products were designed for the series "CV01" (Hatsune Miku; based on sound when it first begins travelling), "CV02" (Kagamine Rin \ Len, based on mirrored or reflected sound), "CV03" (Megurine Luka, based on sound after it has travelled), all of which were voiced by female vocalists. A fourth masculine vocal was later made, commonly referred to as "CV04", but has yet to be released. Due to the series success, additional vocals called "Appends" were added for each character starting with Hatsune Miku Append. The idea of the Appends were to give the CV vocaloids a "rainbow of colours" and were designed to be expressive vocals that expanded the overall usefulness of each individual Vocaloid. Once again, this lead to other studios also producing their own style of expressive vocals, such as "Megpoid Extend". It also lead to the update of the original VOCALOID series vocals Meiko and Kaito to receive "Appends" when they were updated to VOCALOID3, though it was noted the direction of their Appends was different to the CV series appends.

Due to the interest in selling their Vocloids to a broader audience and giving their producers a powerful language tool, all Vocaloids made by Crypton Future Media were being assigned English vocals during the VOCALOID3 updating process. This included the Character Vocal series, which already had one member (Megurine Luka) with English capabilities. Hatsune Miku being once again the first to have her English vocal worked upon.

2007
The series was first noted on the 06/25/2007 when it was announced that Crypton Future Media were working on "a cute female vocal that professionals can create with", part of the "CV" or "Character Vocal" series who were designed to combine recognizable characteristics in their voices and clear colour schemes. The first vocal was released on August 31, 2007 using the voice of Hatsune Miku and was made for the VOCALOID2 engine.

The next product was introduced on November 8, 2007 as "Kagamine Rin". Her partner vocal Kagamine Len was introduced on December 3, 2007. This product was released on December 27, 2007 also for the VOCALOID2 engine.

2008
The original packages for the CV series were mostly rushed to met deadlines, as a consequences the Kagamine product in particular had a number of quality related issues. On June 12, 2008, a updated version of the Kagamine package was announced called "Kagamine Rin \ Len Act2". During production of the product, Crypton also took time to update their End User Agreement to make its details more clearer to understand.

On July 18, the act2 was released. Users who had bought the old version of the Kagamine Rin \ Len product got an expansion disc free of charge, an offer which continued until 20 September 2008, after which users could no longer register.

In late 2008, the next Japanese vocal was announced. again soon after the initial vocal was introduced, a second vocal was announced, this time a English vocal was introduced. This was revealed on the 14th of November 2008.

2009
On the 6th of January, Megurine Luka was revealed as the next vocal for the CV series. She was later released on January 30, 2009.

On Valentine's day 2009, work also begun on Hatsune Miku Append, a updated vocal package with several vocals in various tones.

Throughout 2009, Wat continued to work on Hatsune Miku Append, as well as other projects.

2010
Developments on the Hatsune Miku Append continued into 2010.

In early Feb, work began on the Kagamine Rin \ Len Append update.

Hatsune Miku Append was released on April 30, 2010

On October 8, 2010, at the New York Comic-Con, Ito Hiroyuki (Crypton's CEO) announced that if Miku's Facebook page hit 39,390 "likes", an English voicebank would be developed. The Kagamine Append was released on December 27, 2010.

In December 2010, all updates on old software and new vocaloids fell into uncertainty, as the VOCALOID2 engine was then known to be in the process of retirement and VOCALOID3 was now on the way. Megurine Luka had a Append vocal being worked on for the VOCALOID2 engine. As a consequence, Megurine Luka, along with the Meiko and Kaito updates and Hatsune Miku English, were never released for the VOCALOID2 engine despite being usage of these versions being witnessed in various media forms.

2011
Wat tweeted on the December 1, things were being redone for the VOCALOID3 engine.

2012
The Kagamines were noted to be considered for a English update.

2013
On July 24, 2013, it was confirmed VOCALOID2 Hatsune Miku and Append vocals would be included in a new update Hatsune Miku V3 version.

The next vocal to be released for the CV was on August 31st, 2013 when the Hatsune Miku V3 English.