Script box
Add a your script to the script box to transform your text to speech and adjust the pronunciation, pacing, and emphasis of the speech as needed.
Note:
The maximum duration of the script for each scene is 5 minutes.
Adding your script
Create your script by either typing or copying and pasting text in the script box.
Your script can be in any of the languages that Synthesia supports. You can use multiple languages in a single scene and/or video by applying different voices to sections of your script in the script box.
Speaker & voices
Once you've added your script, you can control the speaker and the voice that will be used by clicking on the speaker pill on the left side of the script.
Speaker
If you have more than one speaker or avatar in your scene, click on the left side of the speaker pill to assign the desired speaker to that line:
In this modal:
- Clicking on the eye icon toggles the visibility of the avatar in the scene. Disable it if you just want the voiceover.
- Selecting
+ New speaker
allows you to pick a new avatar to use as a speaker (and adds it to your scene).
Voices
To select a different voice for a section of the script:
- Click on the right side of the speaker pill to select a different voice or language.
By default, the initial voice options displayed will correspond to the language and accent currently being used. - Preview the voices by clicking the play button to the right of each voice.
- Click on a voice to select it.
To select a different language for a section of the script:
- Click
Back to all languages
to select a different language from one of the 140+ Languages available in Synthesia. - Optional: Select
Custom voices
at the bottom of the menu to use one of your own custom voices. Custom voices will only be available if you've created one using our voice cloning feature, or if you've created a personal avatar. - After selecting a language, pick a voice from the options displayed.
Additional script actions
Press right click anywhere in the script box in order to display all Script actions available:
Pauses
Use pauses to pause the script for a defined period of time. Use them to adjust the pacing of your script and the emotional tone of the voice being used.
To add a pause to your script:
-
Position your text cursor where you want to add a pause, and either:
-
Right-click and select the
Pause
option from the context menu. -
Click the
Pause
button at the top-left of the script box.
-
-
Adjust the pause duration to a value between 0.1s and 300s (the default is 1 second).
Pauses can be dragged and dropped to change their position within the script. You can also highlight a pause to copy and paste elsewhere in your script.
Pronunciation
Use the pronunciation feature to adjust the pronunciation of words and phrases in the script.
To modify the pronunciation of a word or phrase:
- Highlight the text you'd like to adjust the pronunciation for, and either:
- Select
Pronunciation
in the modal that appears above the highlighted text. - Right-click and select the
Pronunciation
option from the context menu. - Click the
Pronunciation
at the top-left of the script box.
- Select
- Type your pronunciation preference.
- Press enter.
- Optional: Apply the pronunciation to all instances of that word or phrase throughout your video by clicking
Apply to all
in the toast notification that pops up at the bottom of the editor after confirming your pronunciation preference. Note that this will not automatically apply the pronunciation to additional instances of that word or phrase that you add to your script after clickingApply to all
.
The pronunciation feature can also be used to adjust the emotional tone, emphasis, and intonation of words and phrases.
For example, specifying the pronunciation of the word "absolutely" in the following ways will yield different results:
absoLUTEly ABsolutely ABSOLUTELY absolootlee abSoLuteLee aaabsolutely
Learn more about pronunciation, phonetic spelling, and specifying the pronunciation of abbreviations in the Synthesia Pronunciation Guide.
Gestures
With non-expressive avatars you must manually set gestures in your script for the avatar to express emotions:
Available gestures are:
- Nod: The avatar nods down once.
- Head Yes: The avatar moves its head twice up and down.
- Head No: The avatar moves its head twice left and right.
- Eyebrows Up: The avatar raises its eyebrows.
AI video assistant
The AI video assistant is available on Starter Plans and up.
Select any text from your script then click on Edit with AI to activate the AI video assistant.
This uses the Synthesia AI to edit and transform your script text, empowering you to tailor the script of each scene precisely, ensuring your message is delivered in the tone, style, and length that best suits your audience and objectives. It enables you to:
- Rewrite: Rewrite the selected script in the scene following a given prompt.
- Make it longer/shorter: Make the selected script shorter or longer.
- Change tone to: Change tone to Informative, Professional, Casual, Engaging, Entertaining.. or any given tone.
- Summarize: Summarize the selected text
In addition to the Edit with AI presets, ask the AI to change or tweak your script as you wish by entering your own prompt.
After entering your prompt:
- Click on the left arrow on the right to launch the AI.
- Once done, select
Replace
to replace your selected script with the reworked wording.
Script preview
Click on the play button on the upper left side of the script box to launch a script preview.
Launching a scene preview:
- Launches a voice-over of the script.
- Animates all assets from the scene.
- Doesn't animate avatars on screen.
- Doesn't play the background music you've added to the scene.
If you have a long script, preview only part of your text by:
- Highlight the portion of the script that you want to preview.
- Then, you can either:
- Click on
Preview
in the menu that appears above highlighted text. - Right-click on the highlighted text and select
Play
from the context menu.
- Click on
Script variables
Script variables cannot start with a number; they must begin with an alphabetic character (
A
-Z
,a
-z
).
Script variables allow you to create customizable videos at scale. This can be achieved through the API, but can also be done directly from Synthesia's platform.
To add a variable to your script:
- Place the text cursor where you'd like to insert a variable.
- Right click and select
< > Variable
from the context menu. - Specify a name for the variable.
- Optional: Set a default value for your variable to be used if nothing is specified.
You can place animation triggers on variables in your script.
After adding a variable to your video, you won't be able to generate it; you'll have to turn it into a custom template.
To save your video as a template:
-
Return to the Home page and locate the video in the
My recents
section. -
Open up the
More actions
menu by clicking the three-dot icon in the top right of the video thumbnail. -
Select the
Save as template
option to open the template editor. -
Make edits to your template as needed.
-
Click the
Publish template
button in the top-right to publish it. You'll be redirected to your custom template library.
After you've published your template, you can either use Synthesia's API to create a video with it, or create a video with it directly in Synthesia.
To create a video with variables in Synthesia:
-
Navigate to your custom template library.
-
Open up the
More actions
menu by clicking the three-dot icon in the top right of the template thumbnail. -
Select the
Create video
option. -
Your new video will open up in the editor, and you'll be prompted to input values for the variable(s) you set up:
- Enter your values for the listed variable, and then:
- click
Apply and edit
to continue editing, or - click
Generate video
to generate your video.
- click
Note:
Variables allow you to use Synthesia's API to control the content of your videos. See the Guide: Create a video from template page to discover how to leverage this feature.
You can also use variables to automate video creation by using Synthesia's Zapier integration. See the Guide: Synthesia <> Zapier integration to get started.
Audio file upload
The ability to upload an audio file is an Enterprise Plan feature.
Instead of writing a script, you can upload an audio file with a voiceover to be spoken by the avatar.
You can upload a maximum of 5 minutes of audio per scene. Supported formats: .mp3
, .flac
, .wav.
, .m4a
To upload an audio file:
- Select upload in the script box
- Choose the desired file
- Click
Open
to upload the file. - Specify the language of the audio file.
It is not possible to change the volume or playback speed of the uploaded audio.
Updated 10 days ago