Aoki Lapis

* VOCALOID
* CoeAvatar

### Type

Project VOCADOL, VOCALOID3, VOCALOID NEO, iVOCALOID, VocaloWitter, Mobile VOCALOID, ToSpeak, CoeAvatar

### Affiliation

* Surfer’s Paradise
* Studio Deen
* Bplats, Inc.
* YAMAHA Corporation
* Niconico

**Aoki Lapis** (蒼(あお)姫(き)ラピス) is a Japanese VOCALOID developed and is distributed by Bplats, Inc., and was created in collaboration with i-style Project. She was released in April 2012 for the *VOCALOID3* engine. Her voice is provided by a contest winner, Japanese female, Eguchi Nako (江(え)口(ぐち)菜(な)子(こ)). She is a "Character Voice" type VOCALOID.

Aoki Lapis was released as a free 90-day trial for *CoeAvatar* on June 6, 2022. The full version was announced to be released on June 21.

## Concept

Aoki Lapis is a fairy who has no memory of who she is. She belongs to a race of fairies capable of transforming music into power and her voice is said to have the power to give life when she sings.

### Etymology

Aoki Lapis is named after the semi-precious gemstone Lapis lazuli because of her color palette. "Aoki" (her surname) means "Blue Princess."

### Appearance

The large gem she has on her head is a Paraíba Tourmaline, an extremely rare and precious gemstone.

Her design is "light" in contrast with her sister, Merli who is darker. Merli and Lapis despite being sisters are also portrayed as rivals, making them the first protagonist and antagonist of Vocaloid.

### Relations

* Merli - Older sister, rival.
* Violet - A virtual Chinese idol who often appeared alongside Aoki Lapis in VR concerts because the companies that owned Lapis and Violet were all related to a company named Ima Group. Previously, it was always suspected that Lapis' image was being used illegally.

## History

### Marketing

Lapis had some fan direct marketing, such as her first CD *Daydream Flight*, which contained her demo, and character apps that later featured Merli.

On April 14, 2013, Toshiba showcased Lapis utilizing their text-to-speech synthesizer ToSpeak at the Aoki Lapis Birthday Celebration & Merli Voice Actor Open Audition (蒼姫ラピス生誕祭＆メルリ中の人オーディション) held at Shibuya O-nest. At the event, using ToSpeak, Lapis made announcements as well as spoke in interactions with guests. From July 5-7, Lapis's voice was shown in a demonstration at the Electronic Publishing EXPO Toshiba booth held at the International E-book EXPO (国際電子書籍EXPO). At the expo, her voice was used to demonstrate the text-to-speech function powered by ToSpeak in the application BookPlace Reader for the Android/iOS and in the e-book device BookPlace MONO. From August 10-12, her voice appeared at Comic Market 84 (also referred to as Comiket 84), an event held at Osaki West Station shopping centre. She narrated a commercial for the event as well as made two different announcements, morning (going to Comiket) and afternoon (returning from Comiket), for the Osaki Station alongside Osaki Ichibantaro, the mascot character of the Osaki Station West Exit Shopping Association.

On April 1, 2014, her voice was used in a commercial where she announced that she was going to appear in the game *Daigasso! Band Brothers P*(大合奏!バンドブラザーズP). The last known appearance of her ToSpeak would be at Studio Deen's booth at NicoNico Chokaigi 3 (ニコニコ超会議３) held from August 26-27. At the booth, she gave announcements and interacted with guests in the form of a hologram powered by SORIS.

On March 27, 2022, Aoki Lapis's silhouette was revealed at the "*Software Talk Video Posting Festival Supporting Festival* (ソフトウェアトーク動画投稿祭応援しまくる祭)" from the VOICECONNECT 2 doujinshi convention with an announcement for the *CoeAvatar* voice synthesizer. A free 90-day trial for Aoki Lapis's *CoeAvatar* speech library was released on June 6 on the official *CoeAvatar* website. The full version was announced to be released on June 21.

## Voicebanks

Aoki Lapis
Aoki Lapis was a light and cheerful vocal that was intended for "lifestyle" genre of music, known for it casual and at times relaxing approach.
* Aoki Lapis (*VOCALOID3*), April 6, 2012
* Aoki Lapis SE (*VOCALOID3*), April 27, 2013
* Aoki Lapis NEO (*VOCALOID NEO*), September 19, 2013
* Aoki Lapis (*Mobile VOCALOID Editor*)

*Other versions*
The Lapis vocal had several alternative versions. For example there was a *iVOCALOID* (iPhone vers.)/*VocaloWitter* "tiny" voicebank.
She also had a "lite" *VOCALOID2* vocal released for *iVOCALOID* (iPad vers.).
ToSpeak
Aoki Lapis
A private Japanese text-to-speech library produced by Toshiba.
* Aoki Lapis (*ToSpeak*), unreleased

CoeAvatar
Aoki Lapis
A Japanese text-to-speech library released for Aoki Lapis.
* Aoki Lapis (*CoeAvatar*), June 21, 2022

## Reputation

### Sales

Her version of the VocaloWitter app managed to earn 1st place out of all paid apps on the iTunes store on September 11th, 2013.

### Reaction

Aoki Lapis had a number of songs in the niconico weekly ranking after release.

According to Google trends, Lapis' popularity peeked in the month of release (April 2012). Her popularity remained fairly stable until June 2014, when it suddenly fell. She was overall less popular at the end of the *VOCALOID3* era than before she was released.

### Achievements

* First i-style Project VOCALOID released
* First female VOCALOID by i-style Project
* First VOCALOID to have a confirmed sibling
* First *VOCALOID3* vocal to later be released on a version of the *VOCALOID2* engine

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 https://coeavatar.com/update/detail.php?id=1100021
2. ↑ http://i-style.surpara.com/character
3. ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20130227104035/http://blog2.surpara.com:80/i\_style\_vc/archive/2012/04/90293.html
4. ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20120614014542/http://i-style.surpara.com:80/2nd\_project/ - note that there are issues loading this page
5. ↑ http://www.vocaloidism.com/2012/04/08/aoki-lapiss-sister-needs-a-name/
6. ↑ http://chinanime.blog.fc2.com/blog-entry-857.html
7. ↑ http://i-style.surpara.com/blog/archives/310
8. ↑ http://vocaloid.blog120.fc2.com/blog-entry-15140.html
9. ↑ https://internet.watch.impress.co.jp/docs/event/606411.html
10. ↑ https://twitter.com/ryou\_takano/status/352365531849969665
11. ↑ http://vocaloid.blog120.fc2.com/blog-entry-16032.html
12. ↑ http://i-style.surpara.com/blog/archives/787
13. ↑ https://www.deen.co.jp/webarchives/05204224.html
14. ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7f6myzZeE1M
15. ↑ https://www.deen.co.jp/webarchives/default\_010.html
16. ↑ https://twitter.com/nat0468/status/1508037023671603204
17. ↑ http://vocaloid.blog120.fc2.com/blog-entry-16881.html
18. ↑ http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm17503303