Your opinion about Zebra 2

[pdxindy]

How about the oscillators and filters in Zebra 3? What can Urs tell us about them?
I believe this is the most interesting information the owners of Zebra 2 want to hear? Isn't it?

I just admitted, I have absolutely no idea what role the oscillators play at all

Ok, so no new oscillators What about the filters? Other enhancements? I'm dying to have some info about Zebra 3

Forget about the SuperSaw! You did the Hive, that's enough!

The Zebra 3 thread in the u-he forum has lots of little tidbits of info on Z3 if you read through it.

[mabian]

Well for me it's easy to say which synth can do sounds that Zebra 2 can't.
Maybe it's unfair, but it's simple: it's Diva... I don't think Zebra filters - well maybe the HZ ones but I'm not sure - cannot reveal some ZDF ones in Diva.

Possibly some other synths with similar ZDF filters would manage to achieve sounds that Zebra cannot... or was the discussion somehow not about this matter?

Just to make some names, what about some Tone2 ones? Don't they have special synthesis techniques (HCM, to say one) that Zebra cannot emulate faithfully?

- Mario

[arkmabat]

Ofc i won't say it's the bestest supersaw (I'm not much into EDM or commercial trance anyway) but the synth is one of those considered "gold standard".

My take on the supersaw using that midi.
https://vocaroo.com/1bGcuLdNW4bZ
Guess the synth (it's not Zebra)

Wouldn’t be usable in EDM as is. Too old fashioned.

EDM is old fashioned by definition...

Could you name a more modern genre of music making heavy usage of synthesizers (yes, that’s why we’re here) please ? Who do you make new synths for ? Hard rockers ?

2010s dubstep was supposed to be the replacement for rock. It sorta worked.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIyE3EDCigE

[DJErmac]

Ofc i won't say it's the bestest supersaw (I'm not much into EDM or commercial trance anyway) but the synth is one of those considered "gold standard".

My take on the supersaw using that midi.
https://vocaroo.com/1bGcuLdNW4bZ
Guess the synth (it's not Zebra)

Wouldn’t be usable in EDM as is. Too old fashioned.

EDM is old fashioned by definition...

Could you name a more modern genre of music making heavy usage of synthesizers (yes, that’s why we’re here) please ? Who do you make new synths for ? Hard rockers ?

2010s dubstep was supposed to be the replacement for rock. It sorta worked.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIyE3EDCigE

You know EDM is the acronym for electronic dance music right ? It includes dubstep, and all the subgenres of every possible newcoming clubbing genre.

[pdxindy]

I genuinely don't remember now, but when I had Zebra, and I was writing Hardcore, the leads (SSaws) just didn't fit right, never had that sheen or fullness compared to Sylenth, which I had at the time or Alchemy which took over , this was some years ago mind, ACE hadn't long arrived.

Back in that time there were two features aka flaws in Zebra which may have been responsible:

1. the oscillators have a high frequency role-off towards 20kHz. This was a choice I made, but it may be responsible for "lack of sheen" for people who have immaculate hearing beyond 17kHz.

This was addressed many years ago by adding the "crisp" render option to the oscillators. It removes the high frequency roll-off, such that the raw sawtooth waveform has an identical spectrum to all physically perfect versions of it that I assume are present in other synthesisers.

2. Zebra's built-in wavetable format has only 128 points. That concerns the "GeoBlend" and "SpectroBlend" waveform drawing tools, it does *not* concern the curve-based "GeoMorph" or "SpectroMorph" ones. Because there is only a limited number of overtones possible, bass frequencies will again have a roll-off if these waveforms are used without other enhancements.

Therefore, to my best knowledge, using the default GeoMorph sawtooth and switching the renderer from "soft" to "crisp" should have addressed the original issue from 10+ years ago.

(another issue is of course that lowpass filters also remove high frequency content even if cutoff is fully open. But as Zebra handles this pretty much the same way as Sylenth did back then, I'd rule this out as the culprit)

The other aspect with Zebra is that it does not offer much unison choice... it is 1, 2, 4 or 11 - and the 11 somehow seems just a touch muddy and I don't think that is just the highend rolloff.

[arkmabat]

Ofc i won't say it's the bestest supersaw (I'm not much into EDM or commercial trance anyway) but the synth is one of those considered "gold standard".

Wouldn’t be usable in EDM as is. Too old fashioned.

EDM is old fashioned by definition...

Could you name a more modern genre of music making heavy usage of synthesizers (yes, that’s why we’re here) please ? Who do you make new synths for ? Hard rockers ?

2010s dubstep was supposed to be the replacement for rock. It sorta worked.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIyE3EDCigE

You know EDM is the acronym for electronic dance music right ? It includes dubstep, and all the subgenres of every possible newcoming clubbing genre.

Yes, 2010s dubstep and trance sort of morphed together into the "EDM" we know today. I suppose my point is that dubstep is the "heaviest modern synth" I'm aware of.

[Tj Shredder]

Could you name a more modern genre of music making heavy usage of synthesizers (yes, that’s why we’re here) please ? Who do you make new synths for ? Hard rockers ?

Any genre you like, there is simply nothing wrong with old fashioned. The term fashion is in old fashioned. I am interested in music not in fashion...
Even thinking in “genre” is kind of strange for me. I make music, others might put it into a genre category. There is so much great music of all times around...
Any genre is already old fashioned, because it belongs to a genre. The really avant-garde stuff didn’t define a genre yet...

[vurt]

Ofc i won't say it's the bestest supersaw (I'm not much into EDM or commercial trance anyway) but the synth is one of those considered "gold standard".

Wouldn’t be usable in EDM as is. Too old fashioned.

EDM is old fashioned by definition...

Could you name a more modern genre of music making heavy usage of synthesizers (yes, that’s why we’re here) please ? Who do you make new synths for ? Hard rockers ?

2010s dubstep was supposed to be the replacement for rock. It sorta worked.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIyE3EDCigE

You know EDM is the acronym for electronic dance music right ? It includes dubstep, and all the subgenres of every possible newcoming clubbing genre.

so, what is the modern edm genre called specifically then??

if edm in your view includes everything right back to disco?

[Tj Shredder]

Any dance music which is not electronic? ADM for Johann Strauss waltzs...

[arkmabat]

EDM includes music which hasn't even been conceived in the mind yet, don't you know?

[Urs]

The other aspect with Zebra is that it does not offer much unison choice... it is 1, 2, 4 or 11 - and the 11 somehow seems just a touch muddy and I don't think that is just the highend rolloff.

True, but as you need two oscillators to do the hard panning, you get anything from 2 to 16 in steps of two...

[Tj Shredder]

To get back on topic, I want Zebra 3 to be perfect for the electronic waltz, a new genre out of EDM which insists on four to the flour. EWM rules... (until we go back to “take five”)

[DJErmac]

Wouldn’t be usable in EDM as is. Too old fashioned.

EDM is old fashioned by definition...

Could you name a more modern genre of music making heavy usage of synthesizers (yes, that’s why we’re here) please ? Who do you make new synths for ? Hard rockers ?

2010s dubstep was supposed to be the replacement for rock. It sorta worked.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIyE3EDCigE

You know EDM is the acronym for electronic dance music right ? It includes dubstep, and all the subgenres of every possible newcoming clubbing genre.

so, what is the modern edm genre called specifically then??

if edm in your view includes everything right back to disco?

I don’t think disco really fits.

Nowadays there is future house, still electro house, still deep house, still tropical house, future bass, future pop, such things... This is what labels expect from producers.

[chk071]

1. the oscillators have a high frequency role-off towards 20kHz. This was a choice I made, but it may be responsible for "lack of sheen" for people who have immaculate hearing beyond 17kHz.

This was addressed many years ago by adding the "crisp" render option to the oscillators. It removes the high frequency roll-off, such that the raw sawtooth waveform has an identical spectrum to all physically perfect versions of it that I assume are present in other synthesisers.

I've noticed that on a synth which gets constantly praised and recommened here (not a u-he synth), it has some top end roll off, like you described, which I noticed in a spectrum analyser some time ago. I always thought there was a lack of brilliance in the synth (and all the other synths from the same developer, which all have that, more or less).

I won't say that I have immaculate hearing, anything but (don't think I can hear much above 12 kHz... if even). But, I definitely always heard the lack of brilliance in those synths. Which was very often subject to discussions, of course, because, the fans, naturally, didn't want to realize it (always difficult to discuss these things, when people try to chase the heretic off the yard...).

I didn't know about the crisp option. Pretty sure that it isn't present in Zebra CM, which is what I used a lot of years ago. I only ever tried the (full) Zebra's demo 1 or 2 times.

[arkmabat]

Is this EDM? It's certainly electronic and you can definitely dance to it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwhBRJStz7w