KVR Audio

mmdejonge · Post by **mmdejonge** » Mon Dec 19, 2005 9:43 pm

Wopelka wrote:sorry for the OT, but i must ask: some of you have mentioned Zebra2... is it out for PC?????

YES!
http://www.u-he.com/Zebra2/Overview.html

M'Snah · Post by **M'Snah** » Mon Dec 19, 2005 9:43 pm

yes. the Zebra public beta is available for pc / Win.

... and you won't be able to resist it... it's gorgeous... I think Zebra and Spectra are must-haves for 2006.

Sascha Franck · Post by **Sascha Franck** » Mon Dec 19, 2005 9:55 pm

M'Snah wrote: I think Zebra and Spectra are must-haves for 2006.

Zebra = in any case, yes!
Spectra = looking really great, would love to listen to some sounds.

Wopelka · Post by **Wopelka** » Mon Dec 19, 2005 9:58 pm

mmdejonge wrote:
Wopelka wrote:sorry for the OT, but i must ask: some of you have mentioned Zebra2... is it out for PC?????

YES!
http://www.u-he.com/Zebra2/Overview.html

WOW! great news! thanks

M'Snah · Post by **M'Snah** » Mon Dec 19, 2005 10:00 pm

Yes I agree... but reading some of the posts in this thread, I think we will be pleasantly surprised with Spectra.

I almost bought Zebra a month ago, after enjoying Filterscape, but just in time I realized that it was only available for Mac

... I really like it's GUI... and it sounds nice too...

But let's get back to Spectra:). Where's the pre-order button? and the beta download?

emdot_ambient · Post by **emdot_ambient** » Mon Dec 19, 2005 10:29 pm

I'm another of those who pitched in on the sound design for Spectra. I had never worked with additive synthesis before other than giving Cube and Cameleon brief demos, so this was a great experience for me. Others have touched on a lot of the main points, but let me chime in and say at least that I admire the clarity of design and implementation on this synth. I found it a lot easier to get my head around how this synth is supposed to work than I did with either Cube or Cameleon. However, it is really a very different synth than either of these others. Kudos to Torben for what he's done here, because this is not a synth trying to emulate or springboard off other people's designs; it is very much its own unique design. I think Spectra at first seems to be a bit light in features--and I'm with Sascha, I'd still like more LFOs--but once you sink into this synth and start exploring what it's good at, it holds up very well.

The sounds I found most interesting in it--at least those I programmed, and I can't wait to hear what others did with it (I'll probably be ashamed of my own work after that)--were very Enoesque. I could very easily do several CDs of nothing but Eno-style ambient works using only Spectra. This synth's hands-on nature, combined with its ease of use add up to a very satisfying experience and open some very complex sound possibilities. I've barely scratched the surface on this synth and look forward to a lot more exploration into its possibilities.

Oh, and I love the Stretch feature on the envelopes and harmony timeline. Being able to control how fast envelopes play based on key and velocity are great features and make for much more instrumental sounds, even if the sounds are very electronic.

Congratulations, Torben, and best of luck to you on this wonderful new synth!

emdot_ambient · Post by **emdot_ambient** » Mon Dec 19, 2005 10:35 pm

Oh, and two other trivia tidbits . . . I started out programming sounds using the wav file analyzer function just to make it easier to get some harmonies built and ready to work with. But after a while, I found it a lot more enjoyable to make my own from scratch. The control that gives you (and it really is very easy to do in this synth) is very instructive and liberating.

And secondly, Spectra has made me a big fan of Tremelo. I never used it much before this. Funny how something so simple can illude one for so long!

oxbee · Post by **oxbee** » Mon Dec 19, 2005 10:41 pm

too bad it's a bit expensive compared to the plugins. It goes over my budget limit for audio softwares of any kind (150€) !

Derek up North · Post by **Derek up North** » Mon Dec 19, 2005 10:48 pm

M'Snah wrote: I almost bought Zebra a month ago, after enjoying Filterscape, but just in time I realized that it was only available for Mac ... I really like it's GUI... and it sounds nice too...

You do know that Zebra2 is for PC as well don't you??

Regards,

Derek.

M'Snah · Post by **M'Snah** » Mon Dec 19, 2005 10:51 pm

just think of Spectra as two synths of both 100€

M'Snah · Post by **M'Snah** » Mon Dec 19, 2005 10:52 pm

Derek up North wrote:
M'Snah wrote: I almost bought Zebra a month ago, after enjoying Filterscape, but just in time I realized that it was only available for Mac ... I really like it's GUI... and it sounds nice too...
You do know that Zebra2 is for PC as well don't you??

Regards,

Derek.

Yes. but it wasn't available then. I already pre-ordered

Torben · Post by **Torben** » Wed Dec 21, 2005 11:11 am

Thanks for the comments to you all!

Spectra will first be available for PC but Mac version will be available as soon as possible.

To those complaining about price vs. feature-count I will say I perfectly understand if a product is over ones budget, but I wonder how anyone can call a product they never heard or tried overpriced (unless quantity is the only thing that matters to them). Also there seems to be some confusion about the price. It is only $158.00 or about €132.00 the first month.

Kjaerhus Audio has always had a bang for the buck price policy and we will continue with that. What you pay for is the development time and developer competence and not the number of times we reused a component; having double as many LFOs or envelopes does not add any significant to the development time. Instead of just throwing 1001 LFOs, envelopes and mod-matrixes in the face of the user in a product that would be impossible for most people to use we have used most of the development time to figure out how to make a powerful product that is easy and intuitive to use.

Here is a couple of non quantity based qualities to consider:

1. Dead easy operation; as some of the sound designers already said, as soon as you understand the concept it is easy to work with (the structure is based on classic subtractive synths).

2. Low CPU usage compared the complexity of the sound (who does not want that?)

3. For those who think this is one of the "dark" sounding synths mainly meant for evolving pads etc. you will be surprised; the 250 partial oscillator makes this a bright and full sounding synth good for any kind of sounds and a combination of IFFT and efficient interpolated look-up wave-tables ensures that there is no hear able spurious / alias.

4. We also used substantial time on our moog filter model. And this is not the one that can be found on the web, commonly used by vendors, that suffers from a one sample delay in the feedback patch. Our filter does not have that delay which gives our filter a response much closer to the analog model and makes it possible to control the feedback tight enough to make self-oscillation in the whole frequency range.

5. And we are quite happy with our two bank system that makes it possible to sort your presets and easily make a new bank of your favourites. This is not easy in any other product I know off.

I hope this answers a few questions about what you get for your money; remember that a heavy car that uses a lot of gas is not better than the one bringing you fast, easy and comfortable to your destination.

Happy Christmas

Torben

M'Snah · Post by **M'Snah** » Wed Dec 21, 2005 11:45 am

I still cannot find the pre-order button on your site

Kraku · Post by **Kraku** » Wed Dec 21, 2005 2:47 pm

Will the demo be available before or at the same time as the synth is released?

The concept and the feature list of the synth look very promising

Now all is needed is a couple of ads in Future Music and Sound On Sound and you'll sell TONS of synths

I'm quite sure I'll buy one once I've demoed it

emdot_ambient · Post by **emdot_ambient** » Wed Dec 21, 2005 4:04 pm

Torben wrote:3. For those who think this is one of the "dark" sounding synths mainly meant for evolving pads etc. you will be surprised; the 250 partial oscillator makes this a bright and full sounding synth good for any kind of sounds...

As one of the lucky ones who programmed presets for Spectra, I agree. I certainly did not find this a dark sounding synth at all. And, yes, it's easily adaptable to many different types of sounds: deep basses to very analog sounding leads, wierd FX, incredibly nice FM sounding bell tones, organ sounds that are anything from soft and mellow to cutting and in-your-face. I found it really well suited for doing synth string ensemble emulations as well as spacy and evolving sounds. It truly is incredibly versatile.

Torben wrote:5. And we are quite happy with our two bank system that makes it possible to sort your presets and easily make a new bank of your favourites. This is not easy in any other product I know off.

Again, I agree totally. I was incredibly happy with the twin-bank scheme. It's probably--no, definitely--the easiest and most sensible bank/patch system I've seen. And to make it even nicer, you can actually copy a harmony (one set of up to 250 harmonics) from one instrument to another, even if the other instrument is in a different bank. That makes the need to go through the load instrument, save harmony, load new instrument, import harmony routine completely disappear. Now you just have the old sound loaded in one of the two banks, toggle to that instrument, copy the harmony, toggle back to the new sound and paste. Very intuitive and very easy.

Slick stuff!

Kjaerhus Synth coming up