u-he at NAMM 25

[Fannon]

Very nice to see the first screenshot!

Are you planning to show a live-demo on NAMM then? Wish you a good recovery from jet-lag!

I noticed that the envelop module got much simpler. No v-slope (curve control) or vel/key scale finetuning, though? Is this something that moves to MSEG if you want more complex curves? I'm just not sure how the MSEG could replace the vel/key scale finetuning.

I like the idea of showing the context relevant ModMatrix slots where they apply to! There is obviously not enough space to do that within the modules, too. Idea: If something is modulated there via ModMatrix - would it be an option to somehow visually indicate this? If you click on this indicator, it could take you to the full ModMatrix (now on the right side, if I understood correctly?). Maybe you could even filter there by the current module? This could give a similar experience between bottom-tab and the module rack view.

[Maykie]

We gonna get Zebra 3 befora GTA VI

I hope for beta to play with ASAP

[eclipse_soundlab]

When beta comes out i will take 1 month off work.

[Joe Leidigkeit]

Very curious about the "pitch/glide" page. And in the OSC tabs it says "Pitch1"and "Pitch 2"... Somewhere you mentioned the west coast approach.
Have a good time at NAMM!

[surreal]

This looks good! I am still hoping for Steiner parker filter topogrophy and improved physical modeling like hives extra filters! Anyway Urs, thank you for showing us this prototype Z3. All of the best for Namm 2025!!

[Urs]

I'm glad you changed the env knobs to sliders, knobs were quite awkward for me to use. Curve control for them in the future?

Currently there's a "feedback" modifier which modulates the envelope times by the envelope itself, without need to use up ModMatrix slots. I want to explore how far we get with this.

The topic of Curve/Slope has been discussed within our beta team, let me copy and paste:

"The problem with Slope is that the new envelopes are very dynamic, and you'll see that "reallocate" in the voice section evokes quite the analogue behaviour, as does triggering by LFOs etc. But the envelopes in Zebra2 can't do that (never even could do self-modulation). They are two different paradigms: Z2 has "phase based" stages that are linear internally and then get mapped to some value. Cool, but doesn't play nice in dynamic scenarios, like retriggering and stuff. Z3 envelopes are much like analogue ones. Stages differ in reference values and integration time. Very good for any sort of triggering and modulation-while-it-plays.

I'll think about it, there are probably some ways to simulate slopes. It is relatively easy to fake linear ones."

This is also slightly entangled with the question of whether or not MSEGs can become VCA sources. Currently we could do so, but we give up eternally looping MSEGs. If sound designers are fine with latter, MSEGs will probably become VCA sources and then you can have any Slope/Curve you want, maybe at the expense of comfort, dunno.

In other words, there isn't an equivalent to Z2 Slope Control yet, making the right decision is part of the parameter refinement process.

[Urs]

Very nice to see the first screenshot!

Are you planning to show a live-demo on NAMM then? Wish you a good recovery from jet-lag!

Thank you, yes we'll have a machine with a live running Zebra 3 alpha. We also have an appointment with SonicState, so there should be a vid as well

I noticed that the envelop module got much simpler. No v-slope (curve control) or vel/key scale finetuning, though? Is this something that moves to MSEG if you want more complex curves? I'm just not sure how the MSEG could replace the vel/key scale finetuning.

There is a lot of mileage hidden in the V1/V2 slots that say "none" in the screenshot. This includes feedback modulation, key scaling, delay, hold, init, minimoog-style "stacking" and so on.

Some options from Z2 such as looping are replaced by the greatest feature of all: You can now trigger any envelope by anything meaningful, e.g. Pressure: Yes, of course. Velocity: No, makes no sense.

There is now a Release Gate, so you can trigger an envelope on release, which is infinitely better than the echo-ish options in Z2. Or trigger by ModWheel/Pressure as a means of expression where you fly in an envelope while you play.

You can also of course trigger envelopes by LFOs and MSEGs, and that's your per-voice sequencing envelopes right there.

I like the idea of showing the context relevant ModMatrix slots where they apply to! There is obviously not enough space to do that within the modules, too. Idea: If something is modulated there via ModMatrix - would it be an option to somehow visually indicate this? If you click on this indicator, it could take you to the full ModMatrix (now on the right side, if I understood correctly?). Maybe you could even filter there by the current module? This could give a similar experience between bottom-tab and the module rack view.

Like in Hive, parameters that are modulated by the ModMatrix can be tweaked "on target", so if the Modulator is selected, a dot and a circle piece appear on the parameter's knob for direct access to modulation depth.

If anyone is wondering, my stance however stands that there's no "balls in orbit" which indicate current modulation value, simply because slow modulations probably don't need it and fast modulations drown in a blur of lightning fast motion. We're working on ideas to visualise modulation, but those might not make it into the initial 3.0.

[Urs]

This looks good! I am still hoping for Steiner parker filter topogrophy and improved physical modeling like hives extra filters! Anyway Urs, thank you for showing us this prototype Z3. All of the best for Namm 2025!!

There are new Exciter modules and Modal Resonators offering various Materials and Objects to throw things at.

[surreal]

This looks good! I am still hoping for Steiner parker filter topogrophy and improved physical modeling like hives extra filters! Anyway Urs, thank you for showing us this prototype Z3. All of the best for Namm 2025!!

There are new Exciter modules and Modal Resonators offering various Materials and Objects to throw things at.

Sounds Good Urs! What about FMO? Will they feature as well or is that for a later stage of development Urs, will there also be a seperate fx vers as in Zebra 2.. just curious

[Urs]

Very curious about the "pitch/glide" page. And in the OSC tabs it says "Pitch1"and "Pitch 2"... Somewhere you mentioned the east coast approach.
Have a good time at NAMM!

This is a very powerful new concept in Z3. Think of 4 independent settings for transpose, pitch modulation, glide, quantisation, drift and/or pitch bend. Oscillators, resonators, filters can choose which of these to follow.

Duophonic mode in Z3 is achieved by setting Voicing to legato, and have Pitch 1 track the lowest key for Osc1, while Pitch 2 tracks the highest key for Osc 2. Then, filter key follow can track either lowest or highest key.

Likewise, people often ask to have ACE/Bazille-style tuning in Hertz or Beats, and while this would clutter the oscillators, it's available through Pitch 1/2/3/4.

Another thing this resolves are the various options to apply glide: On legato, always or only on retrigger.

So I decided to give this its own page simply because one will commonly need this laid out in a spreadsheet style overview, and most of the time it's set up once and forget, and if people don't need it, Pitch 1 simply acts as a Global Pitch with all the common controls you'd have in any of our synths, while controls for Pitch 2-4 are greyed out and duplicate Pitch 1.

[Urs]

Sounds Good Urs! What about FMO? Will they feature as well or is that for a later stage of development Urs, will there also be a seperate fx vers as in Zebra 2.. just curious

FMOs are not yet in there - but they'll come! I had worked on new ones about 6 or so years ago maybe, during one of many attempts to push Z3 up the priority ladder. During that time I had the idea to make them dual oscillators (as in Buchla-style complex oscillators). But I wasn't happy with the results and I concluded that it would not fit Zebra's concepts. I'll revisit them some time after NAMM and give them some fresh thoughts.

Also, it's important to finalise a slew of other generators first in order to figure out how they react to that kind of input material.

Re. separate FX: Not at the moment. If Z3 gets audio input, we'll probably stick to just a single plug-in. That's our preferred choice because it keeps things easier to maintain and push ahead in the future. Like in Z2, if we do an extra FX plug-in, it will happen down the road, I think it happened to Zebra at 2.5 or so.

(Zebra 3 will start with fewer modules than Zebra 2.9, partly because some modules and concepts are consolidated, partly because in order to get this done we have to move some concepts into future updates, or else we'll never catch up...)

[jtsterays]

I'm glad you changed the env knobs to sliders, knobs were quite awkward for me to use. Curve control for them in the future?

Currently there's a "feedback" modifier which modulates the envelope times by the envelope itself, without need to use up ModMatrix slots. I want to explore how far we get with this.

The topic of Curve/Slope has been discussed within our beta team, let me copy and paste:

"The problem with Slope is that the new envelopes are very dynamic, and you'll see that "reallocate" in the voice section evokes quite the analogue behaviour, as does triggering by LFOs etc. But the envelopes in Zebra2 can't do that (never even could do self-modulation). They are two different paradigms: Z2 has "phase based" stages that are linear internally and then get mapped to some value. Cool, but doesn't play nice in dynamic scenarios, like retriggering and stuff. Z3 envelopes are much like analogue ones. Stages differ in reference values and integration time. Very good for any sort of triggering and modulation-while-it-plays.

I'll think about it, there are probably some ways to simulate slopes. It is relatively easy to fake linear ones."

This is also slightly entangled with the question of whether or not MSEGs can become VCA sources. Currently we could do so, but we give up eternally looping MSEGs. If sound designers are fine with latter, MSEGs will probably become VCA sources and then you can have any Slope/Curve you want, maybe at the expense of comfort, dunno.

In other words, there isn't an equivalent to Z2 Slope Control yet, making the right decision is part of the parameter refinement process.

Gotcha, personally I wouldn't like to use MSEG just to change the curve. Sometime I just want to make a simple pluck with a snappy decay curve, I'm guessing the feedback modifier will do it but what if I also want the release to be linear instead of snappy (convex? can't remember the word), Is that impossible in Z3 atm?

Also why no waveform visualizer for the OSC tab? You worked hard on the OSC with the morphing and FXs, wouldn't it be cool to have them all visualized and animated? or is that too busy with 4 oscs? And the filter tab too, does it have visualizer?

[Alexander_D]

I am so exciting about Zebra 3! Waiting it so much! It will be free for owners of Zebra2 and Zebra HZ, right?

[Urs]

Gotcha, personally I wouldn't like to use MSEG just to change the curve. Sometime I just want to make a simple pluck with a snappy decay curve, I'm guessing the feedback modifier will do it but what if I also want the release to be linear instead of snappy (convex? can't remember the word), Is that impossible in Z3 atm?

It's entirely possible that we add options to do that. We just don't know yet, as we only start to explore things a bit deeper.

Also why no waveform visualizer for the OSC tab? You worked hard on the OSC with the morphing and FXs, wouldn't it be cool to have them all visualized and animated? or is that too busy with 4 oscs? And the filter tab too, does it have visualizer?

Visualisation costs a lot of CPU in the UI, and we currently have so much going on that we need to first look and see how it goes. In a worst case scenario we have to actually rewrite our UI rendering code on Windows to use Direct X or something.

That said, the filters show a visualisation of its response, but not yet any realtime indication of filter frequency. I suspect it would be possible, but it's not a huge priority for an initial 3.0 release.

The oscillators of course have the same visualisation options as Zebralette 3, but they only appear in the bottom tab or in the inflated full-featured editor.

[Urs]

We gonna get Zebra 3 befora GTA VI

I hope for beta to play with ASAP

We still have a long way to go, but then again, who knows. I'm very, very hopeful for a release this year.