u-he

musicall · Post by **musicall** » Tue Jul 03, 2007 5:45 am

with zebra.ive been using it on every track recently...i wish i was better at it...any tips for a beginner?

Urs · Post by **Urs** » Tue Jul 03, 2007 9:20 am

The general tip as always is... check out Zebralette... it's the gateway drug...

tboulette · Post by **tboulette** » Tue Jul 03, 2007 12:17 pm

... and, be patient with yourself -- this is pretty deep ...

musicall · Post by **musicall** » Tue Jul 03, 2007 10:04 pm

its kinda interesting...cuz i feel like im not a complete beginner...but when i read posts like "how to get a square wave" and i find out there's 4 or 5 different ways that i had no idea about it makes me think that im missing out on a lotta info that could be valuable and aid me in my quest to continue to make cool sounds for zebra...so i guess the real question is how ...do i gauge where im at with zebra? im obviously no expert but..ive made some cool sounds so mayve im not a total beginner...i have a decent understand of subtractive synthesis....lets discuss!

rsmus7 · Post by **rsmus7** » Tue Jul 03, 2007 10:17 pm

well maybe we should build a kind of WIKI for Zebra users,
were we can collect all the tips and tricks and howto's
that would be helpfull imho.

so musicall what do you want to discuss or what kind of tips do you want?

musicall · Post by **musicall** » Tue Jul 03, 2007 10:26 pm

i guess i just want to have a better understanding of zebra cuz i feel like with a better understanding i can make cooler sounds. like for instance i'd like to make a theremin type of sound on zebra but i have no idea how to...does anyone know how to do that?

botkiller · Post by **botkiller** » Tue Jul 03, 2007 10:49 pm

Sorry guys, I didn't realize which forum I was posting in, didn't mean to sound like a sales pitch here. Urs, no disrespect, I assure you - I didn't realize I was posting in the Zebra forum. A long day of posts got me posting silly things in the wrong places.

Apologies again.

musicall · Post by **musicall** » Tue Jul 03, 2007 11:04 pm

yeah a wiki would be great....

mkastrup · Post by **mkastrup** » Tue Jul 03, 2007 11:53 pm

Perhaps a bank of 1 OSC patches only would give a beginner a better start into the world of Zebra. I bet if you took all the presets made available and did some sorting you would end up with lots of very different sounding 1 OSC patches.

/Michael

musicall · Post by **musicall** » Wed Jul 04, 2007 12:41 am

yeah ive downloaded all the zebra presets more or less and have messed around with a bunch of them. a lot of good stuff in there....

bmrzycki · Post by **bmrzycki** » Wed Jul 04, 2007 12:43 am

mkastrup wrote:Perhaps a bank of 1 OSC patches only would give a beginner a better start into the world of Zebra. I bet if you took all the presets made available and did some sorting you would end up with lots of very different sounding 1 OSC patches.

I've learned a lot by loading the Zebralette factory presets in Zebra2. And they'are all 1 OSC and very different

.

In order to load them you have to copy them into the Zebra2 directory to view them in the preset browser. Well worth it though.

tboulette · Post by **tboulette** » Wed Jul 04, 2007 1:08 am

rsmus7 wrote:well maybe we should build a kind of WIKI for Zebra users,
were we can collect all the tips and tricks and howto's
that would be helpfull imho.

so musicall what do you want to discuss or what kind of tips do you want?

I believe Urs has plans for a wiki -- I think we just need to be patient.

musikmachine · Post by **musikmachine** » Wed Jul 04, 2007 1:53 am

...with a zebra?

musicall · Post by **musicall** » Wed Jul 04, 2007 4:38 am

haahah yeah pretty much...like i said before i'd be interested to know from a vet what people consider a beginner zebra user, a mid level zebra user, and an advanced zebra user..?

codef0x · Post by **codef0x** » Wed Jul 04, 2007 11:09 am

Zebra is so 'wide open' that I don't know there is such a thing...

I mean, Beej and Wonshu tend to make really far-out complex patches (lots of modules). Zircon tends to use less. And then we've got mkastrup with his Oldskool stuff that uses less than 5 usually (average of like... 2).

Every single sound out of all those guys sounds awesome (generally speaking!)

I mean, there isn't really such a thing as 'advanced' or not. It's whether or not you're able to come up with the sounds you want.

You don't have to use Zebra-unique or "advanced" or complex modulations in order to get a really complex, awesome sound.

What you might ask yourself is 'do you understand all the terminology used in each control'. When you add a Chorus module, do you know visually and aurally what's going to happen to your sound?

Do you know what FM is? Why does it sound "smooth"? What is self(+) mode?

Do you know what Brilliance FX is, where to find it, and what it does to your sound, even if you don't know precisely what it does or how it does it?

Do you know how to use the ModMatrix?

I mean... RTFM and then you'll be an expert.
But being an expert in Z2 doesn't mean you'll create good sounds.

Knowing how to name a spanner (wrench) or hammer or that a hammer is used to club nails into position like all the hypothetical questions I asked above doesn't make you an excellent craftsman just because you know what the tool is called and what it's generally used for.

There are endless books on synth programming that you can buy, any of which will cover a decent portion of Z2 or any other synth, or just forego that knowledge and just tweak and tweak and tweak until you 'get it'.

Personally, I don't know everything and doubt anyone can (even Urs?!). When you want a sound it helps to know the different controls and watch the oscilloscope and listen carefully and just sort of 'program intuitively' -- tweak and experiment, tweak and experiment. Feeling 100% comfortable just 'diving in' might or might not happen suddenly, even if you know or don't know every last little facet of the synth.

From time to time it may be acceptable that, if you've tried EVERYTHING you can POSSIBLY imagine to get a sound type you want but you're really, really stuck, ask here in the forum. Someone might suggest a technique that will get you what you want... but usually anybody, no matter what "experience level" they are, can intuitively program Z2 into coughing up things that 'sound right'.

At the end of the day there is no Z2 test or certification... not exactly something most people would try to put on their resume!

u-he

KVR Audio

i'm in love....