The vOICe is a simple Java program to create spectrograms or sonify images from any URL.
The vOICe allows you to save your freshly created visual sound in .wav format via The vOICe pull-down menu options.
With suitable phones, or else through third-party ringtone converter software, this may be used to create your own unique ringtones.
You can now also more easily load .gif or .jpg image files for sonification and .wav or .au files for spectrographic analysis via pop-up file requesters.
Furthermore, you can specify sample rates from 8 kHz up to 96 kHz, while the direct Java audio output is by default 16-bit 22.05 kHz hifi stereo with the latest Java engines. You can choose to save the .wav files as mono or stereo, using either 8-bit or 16-bit sound samples.
With the default start-up parameter settings, files are saved as 32 kHz 16-bit (hifi) stereo.
Note that the stereo in sounds as displayed and saved by The vOICe application is not the stereo as read from a .wav file, since The vOICe uses stereo to support perception of left-to-right column scanning.
In case you love terminology: using headphones, mono sound is equivalent to what is called a diotic situation in the psychophysical literature, meaning that both ears receive the same sound, whereas stereo corresponds to a dichotic situation.
If you listen to the resulting stereo sound files, make sure that any 3D stereo enhancement of the sound card is disabled for best left/right channel separation.
