U-HE Zebra 3 Alpha Prototype Developments

[Funkybot's Evil Twin]

How long has this thing been promised for now? I am not kidding seems like it really might be like 10 years.

That's no secret.

[martinjuenke]

How long has this thing been promised for now? I am not kidding seems like it really might be like 10 years.

And it may take another 10 years.
Who cares?
We all love Urs.

[Ou_Tis]

How long has this thing been promised for now? I am not kidding seems like it really might be like 10 years.

And it may take another 10 years.
Who cares?
We all love Urs.

Commercially viable fusion, quantum computing, asteroid mining, harnessing the energy from black holes... hopefully we'll get Zebra 3 before at least one of those (or the extinction of humanity... but perhaps AI would carry on with the plugin's development?...).

[M1st]

I still think we'll get Zebra 3 before GTA VI

[martinjuenke]

This is the latest prototype:

IMG_8854.jpeg

Still a lot to code...

[Urs]

Well, code is shaping up nicely though.

[mi-os]

This is the latest prototype:

IMG_8854.jpeg

Still a lot to code...

Looks like Zebra 1, kinda.

[e-theory]

One thing I've always wanted is a wavetable synth that can properly allow the MKS-50/Alpha Juno pwm saw wave. The issue with vital, zebra and dune, is that they all basically just cross-fade the pre-generated wavetables to implement the morphing. And this does not correctly capture the intermediate transitions of just interpolating the control points directly. Will this be something that can be done in zebra 3 @Urs? The issue is that no matter how fine the wavetable, the intermediate shapes include artifacts that don't sound very good.

[jupiter8]

Will this be something that can be done in zebra 3

Pretty sure that can be done already with Zebralette 3 so i don't see why not. You can do things to waveforms i've never seen elsewhere.

[gentleclockdivider]

One thing I've always wanted is a wavetable synth that can properly allow the MKS-50/Alpha Juno pwm saw wave. The issue with vital, zebra and dune, is that they all basically just cross-fade the pre-generated wavetables to implement the morphing. And this does not correctly capture the intermediate transitions of just interpolating the control points directly. Will this be something that can be done in zebra 3 @Urs? The issue is that no matter how fine the wavetable, the intermediate shapes include artifacts that don't sound very good.

Lol, you can do this in zebra 2 since forever
There is NO pregenerated wavetable , just learn the geomorph and make sure that the points closest to each other join together on the x-axis when morphing .
Example , perfectly morphing a square into a triangle .
Make square wave in your first slot , make a square wave in your last slot .
Interpolate between the two , now all slots are filled with square waves .
Go to your last slot and join the 2points together of the + cycle( so they overlap each other ) , do the same for the - cycle .( decide where to put the joined points for either a triangle or saw wave )
Now interpolate again between first and last slot : result is a perfect transition ‘
Only possible with geomorph ( set resolution to max for smooth and fast automating )

[e-theory]

Lol, you can do this in zebra 2 since forever
There is NO pregenerated wavetable , just learn the geomorph and make sure that the points closest to each other join together on the x-axis when morphing .
Example , perfectly morphing a square into a triangle .
Make square wave in your first slot , make a square wave in your last slot .
Interpolate between the two , now all slots are filled with square waves .
Go to your last slot and join the 2points together of the + cycle( so they overlap each other ) , do the same for the - cycle .( decide where to put the joined points for either a triangle or saw wave )
Now interpolate again between first and last slot : result is a perfect transition ‘
Only possible with geomorph ( set resolution to max for smooth and fast automating )

Thanks heaps. I swear I've tried this but I'll try again. No matter the mode I always got artifacts in the modulation that couldn't be easily explained. I'll try again with your suggestion.

[e-theory]

I just tried it, and no, this does not work. Look at this waveform:


This is using geomorph with all the maximum settings. It's not morphing as you'd expect.
Here is more detail:


It definitely doesn't do what I'd expect, and doesn't sound right as a result.

All the control points are correctly morphing when I drag the waveform position manually.

I recall reading an article a while back where Urs said it's implemented using periodically updated FFT blocks. If that's the case, the geomorph is a process applied as a technique to get the FFT waveform block, and not ACTUALLY the process that is used at runtime. I hope he can clarify for me if this will work differently in Zebra 3 or if this limitation will still exist. Thanks.

[Urs]

It's funny how people still obsess over Saw-PWM.

The (visible) artifacts are only audible on very fast modulation - where some perceptional artifacts ("scratchiness" for lack of a better word) come in that are also present in the original hardware anyway.

(for the fun of it, I tired it in Z3, same as Zebralette 3. At normal PWM-style LFO modulation, the difference between a resolution of 800Hz vs 2kHz is inaudible, hence the visual artifacts are inaudible. At very fast modulation there's a slight difference and thus artifacts become audible.)

[gentleclockdivider]

I just tried it, and no, this does not work. Look at this waveform:


This is using geomorph with all the maximum settings. It's not morphing as you'd expect.
Here is more detail:


It definitely doesn't do what I'd expect, and doesn't sound right as a result.

All the control points are correctly morphing when I drag the waveform position manually.

I recall reading an article a while back where Urs said it's implemented using periodically updated FFT blocks. If that's the case, the geomorph is a process applied as a technique to get the FFT waveform block, and not ACTUALLY the process that is used at runtime. I hope he can clarify for me if this will work differently in Zebra 3 or if this limitation will still exist. Thanks.

You're doing it wrong , I can see from the screenshot that you're animating the points across the Y-axis , noticeable inthe first slots
I specifically wrote the X-axis , it's fundamental to get smooth transitions

[Tj Shredder]

Wouldn’t you just need to multiply the saw with the pwm to get that result?