Docs

Voices

You have three choices: ElevenLabs, your own recordings, or no voices at all. Only ElevenLabs needs an account of its own.

Your ElevenLabs key

Your key lives in one file on your computer, ~/DrawnFilms/.env. Never paste it into a chat.

  1. Sign up at elevenlabs.io on Starter or higher. The free plan can't use library voices through a key, and it isn't for commercial use.
  2. Click Developers, open API Keys, and click Create Key.
  3. Leave Restrict Key on. Under Endpoints, set Text to Speech to Access and Voices to Read. Leave the rest on No Access.
  4. Click Create Key and copy it now. ElevenLabs shows it in full only once.
  5. Send this to your AI, from any folder: 
    Create the file ~/DrawnFilms/.env with one line, ELEVENLABS_API_KEY=, then open it in a text editor for me. Don't read it after that.
  6. In the file that opens, paste your key straight after the =, with no spaces. Save it and close it.

It should look like this, with your own key:

ELEVENLABS_API_KEY=sk_your_key_here

In Codex: making that file and making voices both reach outside its sandbox, so it asks to run those steps outside it. Approve them.

The ElevenLabs links on this page are affiliate links. If you sign up through one, we get a small fee, and it costs you nothing extra.

Find a voice ID

  1. On elevenlabs.io, open My Voices. A voice from the Voice Library goes into My Voices first.
  2. Click the three dots beside the voice (More actions), then Copy voice ID.

A voice ID isn't secret, so it's fine to paste it in the chat.

A voice for each person

Drawn Films has default voices you can use by name, on your own ElevenLabs key. They're heard across many channels, so a film in them sounds like everyone else's. Give your narrator and each main person a voice of their own. Your AI offers this at stop 4.

Nora's voice is PASTE_VOICE_ID. The narrator's voice is PASTE_VOICE_ID.

To see the default voices, ask:

List the Drawn Films voices.

A voice can also play through a radio or a phone:

Put Dad's lines through a radio.

How lines are made

  • Each line is made once, on Eleven v4 Turbo. There are never two versions to compare.
  • Stop 4 tells you how many lines and characters it will use, before anything is spent.
  • A line already made is never made again. A changed line is a new take on your credits, so settle the words first.
  • Direction goes in the words and a mood tag, like [nervous]. Whisper, soft and slow tags make a voice sound like a different person, so they're left out unless you ask.

Your own recordings

Any recording works for any line: your own voice, or one from another service. It spends nothing, and if every line has a recording you don't need an ElevenLabs key.

Put the file in your film's folder and say which line it's for:

Use nora-1.m4a for Nora's line "Still warm."

The mouth still moves on the line. A recording has no word timings, so the words are spread across the speech.

No voice at all

A film doesn't need voices. It still draws and renders, silent or with text on screen. Pictures, words, sound and music carry it.

Make this film with no voices, only pictures and words on screen.