Price: $0.99
Download for iPhone/iTouch/iPad!
Hi there, my name is Baldi. Welcome to the iBaldi application.
Baldi is an animated character who can read you any text with extraordinarily accurate mouth and face movements and convincing emotions.
Here are a few tips to get you started.
-You can import any text to have Baldi read it to you.
-You Press Play to have Baldi’s face and voice communicate the message.
-To rotate Baldi, drag your finger around when Baldi is on the screen.
-To change Baldi’s size, pinch in or out with two fingers.
-To change Baldi and his speech, touch the Settings button.
-In the Settings view, you can change the audio volume and the speaking rate.
-You can show Baldi in a standard Outside View or an Inside View that shows the tongue and inside the mouth (this view is valuable for language learning).
-You can change Baldi’s emotions by varying the sliders for six basic emotions.
-You can change several emotions at the same time to give an emotion mixture.
-The text you import can come from Notes, Web pages, RSS feeds, and so on. In all cases, simply select and copy the text from the application, and start Baldi. When Baldi opens, you can see the text that he will currently speak by touching ‘Show Text’. Touch the text to begin editing. You can then paste the text (Select All and then Paste). You can also edit it. When you are done editing, hit the Done button. Your text will automatically be saved (If you leave the app, this text will show the next time the iBaldi app is entered.) To return to the Baldi view, touch “Hide Text’).
-You can also permanently save your favorite texts in your Notes app, and then copy and paste one into the iBaldi app.
-It is possible to show visual cues to help people who are deaf or hard of hearing. There are two sets of cues:
*Facial cues on Baldi’s face: red nostrils indicate Nasal sounds like m or n; clouds of dots coming out of the mouth indicate Frication sounds like s and sh; and circles indicate Voicing sounds like the sounds of d and v.
*Disk cues on the side of Baldi’s head signal the same Nasal, Frication and Voicing information by lighting up red, white, and blue, respectively.
You can return to the original view of Baldi by touching the Settings button in the bottom right corner and touching the Reset button on the Settings screen.
Baldi is happy to make this new presence, and eager to see how he might help bring spoken language into more prominence.
Yes, Baldi knows that he could sound better and has even been accused of imitating the voice of California’s governor, the terminator. He plans on having a more pleasant voice in the very near future.
Have fun telling Baldi what to say and watching him say it. Design how Baldi looks and what he says, and celebrate spoken language rather than just text.