Recurring problems when creating Zebra 2 patches

[suspectsound]

Hi,

I snagged Zebra shortly before the Legacy release as I was eyeing it for a long time (and Zebra 3) and have been playing around with it a lot since. I really like how powerful it is and I can't stop playing around.

That said I noticed a few recurring issues when I try to make pleasant sounding patches so I thought I'd ask what the general approach to solving them might be or what I am missing:

* I find it difficult to get a thick/lush/wide sound with Zebra. Quite honestly, right after buying and jumping through the included patches I pretty much regretted buying it, all the presets sound so thin and dull. Only exception might be the Crystalline expansion. Anyway, I stuck with it and I created some patches I really like but it is indeed hard to make sounds that are not thin and dull for me so far. I also haven't manged to make them sound as large/wide stereowise as I'm used to with other synths. OSC Eleven + Wide + Detune and SB effects somewhat get me there but it still sounds timid compared to other synths. What gives? For Massive you can just increase global voices and detune or slap the Dimension Expander on it and call it a day for example.

* I just cannot get the filters sounding right. To compare I'm used to the Massive, and lately Massive X, filters that seem to be perfectly capturing what I want. The only filters that somewhat get close for me are the XMF filters and the LP MS2035, for all the others I just can't get them to sound nice. I tried playing with KeyF, Res and Drive but either they open too little, or too much, too resonant or too flat, it is impossible to get that nice, smooth filter sound I want. I must be missing something, are there typical mistakes I might be doing with them?

With the sheer amount of parameters, I don't doubt it's my fault but maybe someone can give me some beginner tips to solve the above problems.

[pierb]

Maybe if you posted examples it would be easier to help you. Although it's perfectly possible Zebra is not for you. Every synth has its character.

[gentleclockdivider]

The ms and tyrell filter in the standard vcf module sound great but are two pole only ( strange because original tyrell filter was 2-4 pole )
Anyway , you can place two vcf’s (set to tyrell filter )in series to get 4 pole.
The xmf filter has all of that covered for you , but yeah compared to the latest offerings it does not compare to the glorious filters in massive x .
Get zebra Hz as I did , which has the amazing diva filters .
Also , for full bandwith osc’s set to crisp .
Zebra hz is amazing and Z3 will add features that are missing in z2 .

[suspectsound]

I feel like Crisp + maxing Resolution made a slight but noticable difference and the sound feels less dull at times, or it's placebo I'm not 100% sure. I actually started with ZebraHZ then read somewhere that if you have Legacy, Zebra 2 is kind of what you should use but if the Diva filters are so good I'll have to try HZ again.

I don't think Zebra is the wrong synth for me, I'm having too much fun experimenting for hours. I also think I need to learn a bit more about the synthesis background to understand how to get the sounds I want out of it. As I said, as happy accidents I get lush/thick/crispy sounds but I typically don't know why, or why most of the time they don't come close.

But I'll stick to what I said, the presets are terrible. Usually I browse until I find an interesting preset then figure out what makes it tick but with the presets included I gave up after browsing a long time. My happy accidents had more character hah.

As for examples, I'm not sure what I would post. Honestly just pick any preset they all sound dull. Reminds me of my first steps into FM8, everything was lacking harmonics and sounded too simple but was user error, we all know the insane sounds you can get out of FM8 if you know what you're doing. I feel like it's the same with Zebra for me.

[trance_lucent]

All your points are right. Zebra sounds thin and probably even lifeless. In the same time, it can synthesize one of the most fattest and biggest sounds. This is sort of its conception. It has a very neutral sound, so if you just take an osc and slap filter after it, you would get a very mediocre sound. Of a very high quality, BTW.

You need to bring all the characteristics that you need manually in the sound, which often isn't easy task: Zebra isn't a sweetspot synthesizer. In the same time, Zebra provides a lot of ways for adding needed character.

Zebra is my favorite synthesizer, implementing the best (in terms of easy of use and possibilities) synthesis conception but, frankly, I almost don't use it currently. This is easier to load Diva (or Hive for some of sounds) and get a good sound immediately. But sometimes I load Zebra, play with it a bit, trying to apply some of tricks I use in Diva like Filter FM, and suddenly I get a great sound, and this always surprises me, how initially lifeless oscs and filters can sound after tweaking and applying some tricks in Zebra.

Still, I'd like to have some ways to get a better sound in Zebra out of pure oscs and filters, so you could indeed take an osc and filter and get a Diva-like sound without various tricks. I think Zebra 3 will be much better in this aspect. And hope it will provide more of audio-rate modulation types, such as Osc-to-Osc FM.

(Of course, you can use Diva filters in ZebraHZ, which help to get a good sound, but, unfortunately, unlike Diva, they don't support FM, and filter FM is one of keys to get a characterful sound).

[gentleclockdivider]

I feel like Crisp + maxing Resolution made a slight but noticable difference and the sound feels less dull at times, or it's placebo I'm not 100% sure.

Soft and crisp mode define bandwith of osc's , so certainly not placebo
Resolution mode affects the speed at which the the osc effects are processed

[suspectsound]

Thanks for confirming!

Increasing resolution definitely made a difference too, it's even in the manual but I must have missed it, that some OSC FX basically require max resolution to work properly. I was wondering why some of them barely did anything before hah so both tips definitely got me in the right direction.

[trance_lucent]

Increasing resolution definitely made a difference too, it's even in the manual but I must have missed it, that some OSC FX basically require max resolution to work properly. I was wondering why some of them barely did anything before hah so both tips definitely got me in the right direction.

Unless you modulate wavetable position and/or oscfx parameters, you won't notice any difference when changing resolution.

Zebra uses so called "graintable" - current waveform is generated on the fly, but only at a certain moments of time, not for every sample - to save CPU. Resolution controls the rate of generation of these waveform grains. Intermediate waveform values are got by blending of two "grains" - current and previous.

So, if wavetable (and oscfx) is unchanged, there is no any affection of resolution on the sound.

[suspectsound]

I see, now that you mention it yeah I was modulating both, especially one of the "Phase xx" OSC FX made some really cool noises with max resolution but otherwise was rather bland. I also felt modulating the wavetable sounded pretty boring before but with max resolution it turned into a nice tool to spice it up as well.

[gentleclockdivider]

I see, now that you mention it yeah I was modulating both, especially one of the "Phase xx" OSC FX made some really cool noises with max resolution but otherwise was rather bland. I also felt modulating the wavetable sounded pretty boring before but with max resolution it turned into a nice tool to spice it up as well.

Yes , the resolution parameter is verry important
Take a simple sine wave , choose dx fx from osc effects and modulate it with an envelope ( the dx effect is a simple 1:1 ratio phase modulation like the yamaha dx series )
Now play with resolution parameter , it makes perfect sense to set it to max