ZEBRALETTE 3 is a messy plugin

[Boudin]

Is ther any tutorial on how to use this plugin.
This plugin is confusing.
For example, what is the purpose of the 3 blue, green, braun curves ?
Not an obvious synth !!!

[jooster]

Literally first link in google: https://uhe-dl.b-cdn.net/betas/public/z ... 240216.pdf

You can also click the uhe logo

[Boudin]

Literally first link in google: https://uhe-dl.b-cdn.net/betas/public/z ... 240216.pdf

You can also click the uhe logo

i red the manual several times but I don't undestand, it's like a chinese book to me. the wrote it can save CPU, ok but how do you use them ???
What is the difference between the main mseg and the 3 colors curves ? where do you select one or the other ? source guides, curve ???, headhache...

[pdxindy]

Is ther any tutorial on how to use this plugin.
This plugin is confusing.
For example, what is the purpose of the 3 blue, green, braun curves ?
Not an obvious synth !!!

In this explanation video, starting at 27:20 or so will be a demonstration of the guide curves.

[Boudin]

thanks but...he says the sound goes trought the 3 curves, what ! one after the other, partially ? this plug in make me feel i'm a retarded, time consuming and frustrating. in french we say : why make it simple when you can make it difficult.
The Curve Set option lets you use the morphable curves. You can dedicate parts of the Curve
Set to different tasks, for example 0-50 for the audio and 60-100 for the effects. Such parts can
overlap, and you can even use the same Curve for the audio and the oscillator effects : my god how to do that ?
another one : A set of 3 'helper' curves which can be used either to manipulate the currently selected Curve or
as a CPU-friendly source for certain oscillator effects. Note that the MSEG has its own set of
Guides, which are NOT available for the oscillator effect???

[Fannon]

This plugin would definately benefit from a good tutorial video, maybe by people like Dan Worall, Jon Audio, XNB, and the like. Maybe it's too early, because with a beta things may change and the video will not age well.

I had actually thought about making a short video, but I'm not really good at that. I think Zebralette 3 can be overwhelming first, but you can also do a lot of nice things by just sticking to the basics.

How you could get into the basics:
- If you want to make something from scratch, have a look at the /templates folder, pick "Analog Waves" or "Basic Shapes". Use "Curve Morph" to switch between the different waveforms. With this you get a typical synth OSC unit.
- Now set OSC FX2 to "Filter" and adjust frequency. You could assign the mod slot below to mod-wheel, MSEG and now you got the basics of subtractive synthesis.
- With OSC FX1 you can now play around and see how each affects the original OSC curve in interesting ways.
- If you want to understand the other curve sets, you could start with the Curve Filter in OSC FX2. Now go to the first (blue) guide curve, with the Curve Filter you can basically draw in the filter response curve. You can draw in a lowpass, bandpass, high-pass or anything crazy. See screenshot, how the curve results in the filtered signal in the spectrum result.
- Some more OSC FX rely on the guide curves as parameters. I think they all start with using the first guide curve, but you can also "morph" through the guide curves if you feel really fancy.

Overall I wouldn't worry too much about complexity you don't need. If you're looking for a simple synth, maybe use something simpler or just use the simple features of Zebralette and just ignore guide curves, start with presets and templates and adjust from there. And yes, Zebralette 3 is for sure not a "simple" / conventional synth to get into.

[pdxindy]

thanks but...he says the sound goes trought the 3 curves, what ! one after the other, partially ? this plug in make me feel i'm a retarded, time consuming and frustrating. in french we say : why make it simple when you can make it difficult.

It's not difficult for the sake of being difficult, it's difficult because it's providing functionality that no simple osc can. If that is not for you, no problem. There are plenty of simpler synths out there.

This new Z3 oscillator is the single most capable and lovely sounding oscillator (hardware or software) that I have used. That doesn't mean it's for everyone though.

[seafire]

Is ther any tutorial on how to use this plugin.
This plugin is confusing.
For example, what is the purpose of the 3 blue, green, braun curves ?
Not an obvious synth !!!

42

[Boudin]

This plugin would definately benefit from a good tutorial video, maybe by people like Dan Worall, Jon Audio, XNB, and the like. Maybe it's too early, because with a beta things may change and the video will not age well.

I had actually thought about making a short video, but I'm not really good at that. I think Zebralette 3 can be overwhelming first, but you can also do a lot of nice things by just sticking to the basics.

How you could get into the basics:
- If you want to make something from scratch, have a look at the /templates folder, pick "Analog Waves" or "Basic Shapes". Use "Curve Morph" to switch between the different waveforms. With this you get a typical synth OSC unit.
- Now set OSC FX2 to "Filter" and adjust frequency. You could assign the mod slot below to mod-wheel, MSEG and now you got the basics of subtractive synthesis.
- With OSC FX1 you can now play around and see how each affects the original OSC curve in interesting ways.
- If you want to understand the other curve sets, you could start with the Curve Filter in OSC FX2. Now go to the first (blue) guide curve, with the Curve Filter you can basically draw in the filter response curve. You can draw in a lowpass, bandpass, high-pass or anything crazy. See screenshot, how the curve results in the filtered signal in the spectrum result.
- Some more OSC FX rely on the guide curves as parameters. I think they all start with using the first guide curve, but you can also "morph" through the guide curves if you feel really fancy.

Overall I wouldn't worry too much about complexity you don't need. If you're looking for a simple synth, maybe use something simpler or just use the simple features of Zebralette and just ignore guide curves, start with presets and templates and adjust from there. And yes, Zebralette 3 is for sure not a "simple" / conventional synth to get into.

Thanks for the advices, i'll try to go step by step but as you said someone at UHE must make a detailled tutorial.

[eclipse_soundlab]

this plug in make me feel i'm a retarded

I dont think you're a retard, you just not done any ground work to achieve context for understanding. Crawl before you walk.

[rafa1981]

One thing Korg's arp2600 does that is very nice is to show some text and hint with each parameter. Not sure how applicable to zebra. The screen-real estate used isn't much.

[Funkybot's Evil Twin]

That's not a bad thing in general. I really like plugins with optional tool tips. It can save a trip to the manual/user guide when the plugin just tells you what the parameter does in a meaningful way.

[coroknight]

I definitely think the plugin can be confusing. Guide curves are not a complicated concept but working with them in the UI is not intuitive.

[videoeyes]

I've never been a big fan of the U-HE sound. I've played with all of their synths, used to own Zebra 2 - just felt a bit lifeless to me even though they're very powerful.

But this is the first synth of theirs that I really like the sound of. It has a lack of aliasing in the high frequencies that sounds analogue, in the best way. It might be the best sounding soft synth I've ever heard. What a free gem.

[p5c]

It's not messy; it's just complex. There really isn't anything like it wrt those vector-based oscillators and their super-clean morphing & sound (except the Zebra 3 beta, now that it's public). The waveform editor's UI takes some getting used to, though. As for tutorials, here are some links copied over from the 'Great reference: "Enchanting Instruments" article series on u-he plugins' thread:

Zebralette3 (written during Beta 2):

• Beta2 - 1 - Overview & Structure
• Beta2 - 2 - Vector-Based Synthesis, Waveforms (Editor, UHM, SVG)
• Beta2 - 3 - Additive Synthesis
• Beta2 - 4 - OSC FX
• Beta2 - 5 - MESG, Morphing