Forgotten Friday #45 - Kiwi Fukane / 不可音キウイ

So, I'm not going to Internet Archive the voice provider, credited mononymously as Katie. Most of her stuff has been taken down, and I won't go search for it. The only thing that matters is that we have Kiwi!

Forgotten Friday #45 - Kiwi Fukane / 不可音キウイ

I clicked on one of this UTAU's samples because it was named oddly. I heard the sample and smiled. This bank was recorded on a very bad microphone and that's why I love it. I don't feel bad pointing it out, because her name literally means "bad sound".

Anyway, let's not mince words!

Who is Fukane Kiwi?

Icons from UTAU Wikia and Bank

Let's start off with what comes packaged with her bank. She has a txt file named "IMPORTANT" and another named "readme". The Readme states that she has problems and implores us to fix them. However, the readme also shows us gratitude by thanking us eternally. 

In her Important txt file, we are informed that Kiwi has issues and that we will be loved in perpetuity if we can fix her. This is a 2010 bank! How did I not know about this?!

I actually did. I even got the love I was promised!

It's so crazy how I thought I knew nothing of this UTAU, but then it turns out that I OTO'd her and had a few exchanges with her voice provider. 

ANYWAY! 

Kiwi is fifteen years old and only weighs one hundred pounds. She loves kiwi fruit, kiwi birds, and I assume, New Zealand. She hates pink and she hates VOCALOIDs. (That was kind of a thing back then; rivalries between UTAUs and VOCALOIDs. Does that still happen with younger users? I'd love to hear about that!) Her samples are actually given an in-universe reason for being off. She damaged her vocal chords in an accident! With that out of the way, let's get to the bank.

How is her bank?

Her OTOs are wonky, but I redid them in 2010. I'll warn you, my OTOs in 2010 were great by 2010 standards, but not good by today's standards. However, they're a bit better than what Kiwi has out of the box.

it was 2010, okay

Until I realized that I had OTO'd an entirely different bank.

I said earlier I wouldn't Nancy Drew anything, because I'd respect that everything was taken down. Now, let's just go visit our good ole frenemy, Moresampler. I'd prefer visiting my good friend Setparam, but this is a romaji bank and the sample quality makes SetParam flip out even more than Moresampler. 

The samples are recorded very inconsistently. Some are spoken and some are sung. Some are the right volume, and some are clipped. Maybe if I had access to all of the banks, I could mix and match samples... But I only know of this specific bank since Katie has set all of her UTAU videos to unlisted.

I fixed the Moresampler OTOs to get the best sample possible. It was a bit of a lost cause, sadly. I do love the voice and the samples, and I think this bank is good enough that you could fix it with enough effort. But, like, when I say "enough" I mean "quite a bit".

that wasn't an instant messenger noise, it was her "do" sample

Where can I download Kiwi Fukane?

The only link to the only bank I can find is on her UTAU Wikia page. I do love it. It's not that fun to use because of all of the problems, but I still love it. I know that if Katie came back, she'd never record another bank like this. Even on-board microphones in laptops have gotten to be pretty good quality in the last decade. But still, I love it. I wish there was a more fixed up version, but I still love it.