Hey! c: Welcome to the Vocaloid fandom.
Yeah, your friend's right! Vocaloid is not an 日本动漫 in any way, shape 或者 form, but a software used to create songs.
Many people think it is an 日本动漫 because of the 日本动漫 characters on the boxes and in the videos. This is a pretty logical thing to think; I first thought it was some sort of anime, too. In fact, the characters 你 see are all mascots for the voices in the software, so 你 have a representation of the character when 你 listen to the music.
The voices in Vocaloid are not computer generated; they hire people with good 唱歌 abilities to record all of the syllables in the Japanese language to create a voicebank. Once the voicebank is ready, a Vocaloid 阿凡达 is created to represent the voice. In this way, a Vocaloid is a virtual singer! :)
With Vocaloid, 你 can create your own 音乐 and songs with a personal singer in a box. It's a pretty neat concept, right? Some 初音未来 sound almost just like people.
你 can watch Vocaloid PV's (Which are like 音乐 videos) on many video-hosting websites like Youtube. Also, if 你 have a Nico Nico Douga account (A Japanese equivalent to Youtube), 你 can watch many 视频 there as well. c:
It's a bit of a confusing fandom for people just learning about Vocaloid, but it's a super cool one!! Virtual singers with 日本动漫 personas means 你 can connect and meet so many people that like the same songs and singers 你 do.
Here are a few of my 最喜爱的 Vocaloid 音乐 videos- yes, the singers are all from the software! I hope this helps clear things up for you.
link (Sung 由 Hatsune Miku and Kagamine Rin)
link (Sung 由 Hatsune Miku)
link (Sung 由 Megurine Luka)
link (Sung 由 Kagamine Rin)
link (Sung 由 Hatsune Miku)
link (Sung 由 GUMI and Len Kagamine)
There are thousands 更多 songs than these, and many, many 更多 初音未来 to discover! :D
