Review: Dreamtonics Synthesizer V Studio 2 Pro

Understatement of the year: artificial intelligence is a hot topic right now. Searingly hot, even. In the last few years, software developers and engineers like Dreamtonics have achieved massive gains in productivity and capability by utilising A.I. in their workflow. It’s embedded in the software and technology we use every day: banking apps, self-service checkouts at the supermarket, our phones, our computers, even the program I’m using to write this review.

Broadly speaking, there are two schools of thought with regard to the seemingly limitless potential and the blistering speed at which A.I. learns and grows: you are either terrified of the worst-case scenario; or you’re eager to explore the ways in which we can harness the potential to supplement human productivity, and controversially— creativity.

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Love it or hate it, A.I. is here. It’s in our homes, our workplaces, our hobbies, our creative ventures. To put it crudely, any competitive business not investing in A.I. right now is in jeopardy of being left in the dust of their competitors.

In June 2020, Tokyo-based start up Dreamtonics released its flagship product Synthesizer V Studio, a groundbreaking vocal synthesis software which, with the help of A.I. technology, was capable of reproducing the qualities and tonality of realistic human voices. In an exclusive promotional video on the company’s YouTube channel, Software Engineer and Dreamtonics founder Kanru Hua reveals that the “V” in the product name stands not only for Vocals; but also for the roman numeral for 5, as the initial product was in its 5th iteration before it was released to market—a testament to Dreamtonics’ tenacity as developers.

Synthesizer V Studio

At NAMM 2025, almost five years after the release of Synthesizer V Studio, Dreamtonics announced its “bigger, better, faster and stronger” follow-up: Synthesizer V Studio 2 Pro. Combining years of development and the cutting edge of A.I. technology, Synthesizer V Studio 2 Pro has the potential to shake up the entire music industry as we know it by revolutionising the possibilities of vocal synthesis.

Dreamtonics has packed this latest iteration with enhancements that refine vocal realism, streamlined workflow, giving users an unprecedented level of control over synthesized performances. Speaking from the Audio Developer Conference in London in 2023 (ADC23), Hua explains that the “Holy Grail” of vocal synthesis software is to achieve a sound that is as “natural”—as indistinguishable from the human voice—as possible. During testing, a group of listeners with musical backgrounds were shown samples of vocal lines produced by humans alongside vocal lines synthesized by Synthesizer V software in development. The test concluded that the synthesized vocals achieved near-human naturalness. The natural sound is partly in thanks to, along with the incredible design and work from Dreamtonics, the use of recordings license from real singers to build the catalogue of sounds available. A.I. technology is what is used to customise expression from the recorded samples and sounds, Dreamtonics using A.I. technology in an ethical way that still uses real musicians, licensing sounds and recordings from them.

Running the standalone version of Synthesizer V Studio 2 Pro for the first time, I couldn’t help but liken it to learning a new DAW. Thankfully, I very quickly found ways to customise keyboard shortcuts and rearrange my workspace, streamlining my workflow and getting comfortable with navigating a new interface. The options and amount of control available speaks to how deep Synthesizer V Studio 2 Pro goes! Users of the original Synthesizer V Studio will find the new UI comfortably familiar, while the intuitive controls and layout make the program a breeze for new users to learn on the fly.

I decided that my method of stress-testing the program’s ease-of-use would be to program an infamous vocal line by an infamous diva who has infamous control over her voice. I recreated the opening verse to the song “My Heart Will Go On” by Celine Dion. The piano roll functionality could not have been simpler. You double-click, you type a word, you get a note sung by a synth that is almost indistinguishable from a human voice. Do this a few dozen times, and you’ve got an entire song. Even the bare-bones out-of-the-box takes were superb, but when I started delving into the pitch controls, phenome timing and A.I. retakes, things got surreal. I was able to faithfully replicate trills, warbles, vibrato, tonality, breathiness, soulfulness, intensity, tightness, all at the smallest possible scale: per phenome. Phonemes are “perceptually distinct units of sound”, e.g. the sound your mouth makes when you enunciate a consonant, or the various sounds that vowels produce.

Synthesizer V Studio 2 Pro

Synthesizer V Studio 2 Pro is accompanied by nine updated voice models, which deliver richer dynamics and a heightened sense of presence. Thanks to significant algorithmic refinements and enhanced multi-threading, Synthesizer V Studio 2 Pro renders up to three times faster than its predecessor. It achieves this without requiring a dedicated GPU or specialized acceleration hardware, meaning users can take advantage of its efficiency on a wide range of systems, even in offline environments. Human vocalists shape words through precise control of phonemes—the distinct sounds that form speech. With the new ability to adjust phenome timing, users can fine-tune the intensity and duration of phonemes directly within each note. This level of control allows detailed shaping of consonants like plosives for an extra degree of articulation and realism. You can even ask your singer to lay down another take, letting A.I. randomize the nuances of timbre, pitch, and—new to Synthesizer V Studio 2 Pro—phenome timing. You can also combine the results of multiple A.I. takes like you would a vocal comp!

The Smart Pitch Controls make it easier than ever to shape pitch with a surgical level of precision. Instead of painstaking manual adjustments, users can define key points where they want pitch changes, and the system intelligently generates smooth, natural-sounding curves in real time without sacrificing realism. The Mouth Opening Parameter is a game-changer for shaping vowel pronunciation. This control allows users to emphasize certain words or subtly alter the way phrases start and end, adding even more depth and realism to the final vocal output.

Synthesizer V Studio 2 Pro takes a major step toward capturing the subtle nuances and dynamics that define the human voice. With its unparalleled realism, intuitive design, and sheer depth of control, Synthesizer V Studio 2 Pro is the future of vocal synthesis. Dreamtonics has created a tool that blurs the line between human and machine, giving musicians, producers, and sound designers unprecedented control over the human voice, and pushing the frontier of music production further than we ever imagined was possible.

Dreamtonics Synthesizer V Studio 2 Pro is officially available on March 21, 2025. Keep reading or buy the plugin here.