Kagamine Rin & Len

Kagamine Rin & Len (鏡音リン・レン), codenamed CV02, were originally Japanese VOCALOIDs developed and distributed by Crypton Future Media, Inc., and were initially released in December 2007 for the VOCALOID2 engine. They are the second set of vocals for Crypton's Character Vocal Series and were both Character Voice VOCALOIDs. There has since been numerous instalments for VOCALOID.

Their voices are provided by the Japanese voice actress, stage actress, and singer Asami Shimoda (下田麻美 Shimoda Asami).

As of August 31st, 2019 they will be moving over to Piapro Studio.

Concept

The development of the Kagamines began when Crypton formulated the concept of making a pair of female and male voicebanks. The first idea was for two voices of a girl and an identical male of the opposite gender, just like twins.

Crypton originally had the intention of distributing them as twins, but this was not adopted. Crypton stated that they approved of the many different interpretations of Rin and Len's relationship that they saw in different works. Crypton's final announcement was that the Kagamines were neither siblings nor lovers. During their Append's production, Wataru Sasaki (aka. Wat) described them as two bodies with one soul. Wat also said that the Append boxart makes the pair seem like twins, due to the foetal position they were in.

Etymology

When the Kagamines were being recorded in 2007, their names were not yet decided. Their given names of Rin and Len were said to be based on "right" and "left" according to Asami Shimoda. She later confirmed in an interview after the Append release that the names were based on Ken and Rin from Hokuto no Ken, derived from a discussion about names that were familiar from her childhood.

Their surname was derived from the developing code combining Kagami (鏡, mirror) and Ne (音, sound). This refers to an "echo", which is a sound being bounced back to the user from a different direction caused by soundwaves hitting a surface at a direction that reflects it back the way it came.

Their codename of "CV02" means "Character Voice 02".

Appearance

KEI was given a concept by Crypton that included Rin and Len's approximate ages as well as the idea of them being 'mirror images' and, like Hatsune Miku, androids. KEI was not given any further direction as he had already drawn the art for Miku, the first release in the Character Vocal Series.

Rin was the first of the Kagamines to be illustrated and, following Crypton's concept, Len was made to match her. Their leg features were designed to mimic speakers. The keytar Len is often featured holding in merchandise is a YAMAHA KX5. Their main design, of which is most noticeable on their boots, uses the YAMAHA EOS as a design base.

Also, each Kagamine has a particular musical clef symbol associated to their design. Rin has a G-clef (Treble-clef) on her shirt and Len has a F-clef (Bass-clef) on his. In their Append redesigns, they are found on chokers rather than their shirts.

History

Marketing

The Kagamines were marketed as "2 vocals for the price of 1" and were aimed to catch the interest of the growing VOCALOID fandom. Unlike Hatsune Miku, they were not an immediate hit, failing to meet marketing expectations despite receiving the same level of promotion Miku received at the time of their release. After the release of their "Act2" voicebanks, sales picked up steadily and the Kagamines eventually became one of the more heavily marketed VOCALOIDs though have never met the marketing strength Miku gained before them.

Crypton Future Media registered both "Kagamine Rin" and "Kagamine Len" as a trademark on January 29, 2015.

Voicebanks

Kagamine Rin & Len had a number of VOCALOID releases, some of which were released also for Piapro Studio versions that used the VOCALOID API.