CUL

CUL (カル Karu) was the mascot character for the show VOCALO Revolution. The name has double meanings, short for "culture" and "Culnoza", a collaborative group organized by Hiroto-P.

History
Cul started off as the mascot for VOCALO Revolution. On June 8th 2011, Yamaha announced that CUL would make a real Vocaloid with the voice provider Eri Kitamura. The publisher will be INTERNET Co.,Ltd. On November 4th 2011, her first demo, a cover of V3 Gumi demo "A Flash of Summer", was released on YouTube. Intertnet Co announced on twitter, CUL will be released around December 22nd. A second demo was also uploaded, this time a cover of V3 Gumi demo "Nightmare." Her third and fourth demos have also been uploaded.

Demo Songs
 * A Flash of Summer YouTube Broadcast
 * Nightmare YouTube Broadcast
 * Blue Time YouTube Broadcast
 * ☆Magical☆YouTube Broadcast
 * こんなアタシDOでShow!? Nicovideo Broadcast

Marketing
She was introduced in "CUL makes Revolution!". CUL was featured in the shows introduction, the PV "白の季節" and the closing credits of the show. CUL was also the mascot of "CUL project; offical", a website designed to promote Cul to make her offical. Stickers were also released on sale featuring her. A MMD model used in her PVs, such as "CUL makes Revolution!", was later released. Cul also appeared alongside 秋元結衣 in a music video that later also made it to DVD.

CUL

 * Optimum tempo:40-200
 * Optimum range:F2-E4

Cul is the second Vocaloid released not part of Internet Co., Ltd's "poid" series and like Lily is more of a guest release.

Strengths
Her voicebank is a powerful "young mature" female voicetype and sings in Japanese. She was made to be able to sing all genres of music, being able to climb from low to high notes with ease.

Weaknesses
CUL's voice is nasally and weaker in the higher octaves, leading to unpleasant distortion at time. In addition to this, her vowels get weaker on higher notes.

Examples of Usage
Youtube List/CUL Songs

Popularity
Since CUL's existence as a Vocaloid is owed to her fans, CUL already had an established fandom prior to becoming a Vocaloid. She has had much support and publicity within the Japanese fandom and this has resulted in her overall reception being positive.

After release Cul had suffered a slow popularity raise, having just 550+ hits on Nico Nico Douga, 769 hits on Pixiv and 114 hits on Piapro when researched on 08/04/2012. This made her one of the less popular releases for Vocaloid 3 at this point in time.

Trivia

 * Some Japanese fans have noticed how similar her Vocaloid design is to English Vocaloid 2 Big Al, leading to a few jokes related to this about the pair. Incidently, both were released on Dec 22nd.
 * Like Lily, Cul was not part of Internet's "poid" series.