Imitation of Target Speakers by Different Types of Impersonators

Abstract

Vowel formant frequencies planes obtained from speech samples of three well-known Polish personalities and their imitations performed by three impersonators of different type (professional, semi-professional and amateur) have been compared. The vowel formant planes for the imitations were generally, but not always, placed between the impersonator’s natural voice and the target. The largest resemblance between the formant planes for the imitation and the target was obtained for the amateur, whose imitations were, however, subjectively evaluated as the worst ones. Thus, except for acoustical parameters, other factors, like qualification and experience of the impersonator, are very important in realization of impersonation tasks.