Zebralette Patch Contest



So the theme for this contest is pretty simple - just design one or two patches for Zebralette. There's no restrictions on category, this is pretty much a freestyle competition.

The prize for this contest is pretty damn good - a free choice of U-He software!

NB: Those with the latest Zebra(lette) beta -

Please don't use the Osc FX named "PhaseDist" or "Wrap"

(Patches employing them will not work for the many people who aren't using the beta.)

Rulez and other important stuff:

Deadline for Submissions - 10 am (UTC-6) Monday January 24th

Send a link to your patch/es (.h2p format) to bmrzycki, either by PM through this forum, or by email to: brzycki [at] gmail [dot] com

To anonymize your patch please put a question mark "?" in the patch author field (which you'll see when you save the patch in Zebralette).

The winning patch will decided by a vote (and everyone who submits a patch is expected to vote!).

Using wavesets from the factory OSC's or from other users is admissable, but wholesale use of full factory or user OSC presets isn't. In other words, a patch should be significantly the work of the author submitting it, where the precise meaning of 'significantly' is left to individual authors' discretion and sense of fair play.

Please try to ensure that your patch does not exhibit significant - ideally no - audio clipping. (I'm going to suggest that Brian puts a note in the voting thread to the effect that clipping should be taken into account when voting.)

Please don't use Osc FX "PhaseDist" or "Wrap"!
Last edited by hakey on Wed Jan 12, 2011 3:37 am; edited 11 times in total

Competition hints/tips: (just my own observations here, so take with a large pinch of salt)

Looking back through past patch contest winners gives an indication of the kind of patches that do well - chances are that the aggregated taste expressed by the voters won't necessarily agree with your own (in the last two contests, of the two patches I submitted, the ones that I preferred got much fewer votes).

Patches that respond to velocity/modwheel/aftertouch tend to do better than those that don't. Similarly, dynamic or evolving patches are preferred over static ones. Smooth pads, soundscapes, spacey or unusual sound effects seem to be popular, and percussion, real instrument emus, and keys not so.

If submitting two patches, in order to maximize your chances, make them completely different. There's really not much point, competitively speaking, in submitting two very similar patches - they may even steal votes from one another.

Where a patch responds to some kind of player input (AT,MW) explain this in the patch description (the box you see when you save a patch).

Patches that achieve higher perceived volume - without pushing the meter into the red! - will stand out and sound 'better' than quieter ones.
Last edited by hakey on Sat Jan 01, 2011 10:01 am; edited 2 times in total

Patch Design Tips:

(Again - take all this with a pinch of salt)

1. Tweak, tweak, tweak! A finished patch is an accretion of very many small changes.

2. In combination with the above - save patches as you're tweaking, then go back and A/B (/C/D/...) against them, you should be able hear whether the tweaks are going in the right direction. It's also interesting to see the progression and how different a finished patch is from the starting point.

3. From time to time try playing the patch over the top of some appropriate music - a good trick that can quickly reveal problems with a patch.

4. Do most of your edits at a relatively low listening volume - if a patch sounds good when it's quiet, it should sound even better loud (in contrast, loud volume can make an average patch sound more impressive then it really is).

5. Take breaks, don't work on one patch for too long. Have several patches on the go and switch between them. A patch that sounded great last night will often sound quite different the next day.

6. If a patch doesn't sound loud enough without pushing it into audio clipping, then there is a problem with the patch - most likely there's too much energy in one part of the audio spectrum.

7. A patch is never finished - there's always something that can be done to make it better, the hard bit is working out what that is.

8. "The trick is to think of tricks that you wouldn't think of." - Howard


If you really don't know where to start Sound On Sound's "Synth Secrets" is a useful resource.

Also worth a look are the Zebra Sound Design Tips thread, the MSEG's thread and Urs' Zebralette vid.
Last edited by hakey on Sun Jan 02, 2011 2:19 am; edited 4 times in total

nice, thanks for the tips hakey.

i don't use zebralette since I always fire up zebra without even thinking. this contest will make me actually use zebralette, which is quite nice.

good luck to everyone.

Anyone with suggestions for the next contest please write them up in this thread.

What I propose is that if we can get together a few ideas we can vote for them in the patch vote thread - so you'd vote for your 3 patches and the next contest theme:

1. Patch X
2. Patch Y
3. Patch Z

Theme: "Monkey Tennis"

Great tips, hakey

BTW: I'm particularly looking forward to the entries for this one - we might even see some "revolutionary" spectral FX combinations!
Last edited by Howard on Sat Jan 01, 2011 8:58 am; edited 1 time in total

while I am not participating (preset-user...) I am thankful you guys do patches for this fine little synth.

Hakey top bloke!

I'm gonna have a go @ this... I've mainly been a preset tweaker but I love creating sounds from scratch also...

so here's to it!!



Hd

Ay - this is a single oscillator task in disguise so clever use of osc fx might be the key.

Tip: There's a few of Howard's Zebra factory patches that use nothing more than a single oscillator - HS Unprepared Piano, HS My Bubble to name two - worth a look/listen.

@heavansdaw - great to have you on board. Look forward to hearing what you come up with.

@planet ugh - why not have a go? I wouldn't worry about being new to it all - I have a feeling that the first place for this particular contest could be anybody's (and the prize isn't too shabby either).

There's one small problem, the latest Zebra2 betas added two new OSC FX options, PhaseDist and Wrap. So it seems we have to make a decision to only use the older Zebra2 2.5 without those new FX or require all patch voters to use the latest beta.

Ideas? Comments?

By the way, to those of you that want to make a preset inspired by a piece of art you are still more than welcome to do so. Just link a URL in the information section of the preset and people can look at it. I recommend using a URL shortener like http://goo.gl or http://bit.ly to save space in the info section.

Yeah... no PhaseDist/Wrap in this one IMHO

Okay, I'll put a note in the rules.

I've got nothing against the idea, but wouldn't this be better saved for another (perhaps the next) contest, and make it the contest theme, rather than an adjunct to this one?

I just think that adding extra, optional suggestions - 'you can if you like do this' - runs the risk of confusing things (and confusion has caused the odd hiccup with these contests in the past).

Alright, I didn't mean to confuse things. I just offered it up in case anyone wanted to show their source of inspiration.

Woot, GO TIME!