Zebra 3 Public Beta (final beta)

[chagzuki]

As for unison... the detune law is almost exactly like Serum's. Their knob reaches "25" half way, whereas our's is scaled linearly, 25 after a quarter of the knob. But at 25, both sound pretty much identical. We can maybe improve that by scaling 25 towards the middle of the knob movement as well, but we have to check if that breaks any presets (if anyone modulates detune in specific ways).

I just compared it to Serum: I find Serum easy to precisely dial in detune, but Zebra fiddly even using the shift key.
I much prefer the calibration on Dune to both.

[jtsterays]

Hive uses independent LFOs for the osc unison, too...

Idk how Dune really works, but it's not the same as Hive, you should test it. It's really unique, has this noisy quality that makes a basic saw patch really comes alive.

[HcDoom]

Please, add more detune options to this synth in next updates - its pretty relevant. S2 and D3 are good examples. Thank you!

[PieBerger]

Are people making use of Osc FX and Pitches to spice up their supersaws, if not, give them a go

Add 2 Osc in series with 7 voice unison each, detuned to taste and set them to track Pitches 1 and 2 respectively. In the Pitches tab turn up Uncalibrate in Pitch 1 to 50 and enable Calibration in Pitch 2 and turn up its Uncalibrate to a different value, say 45. Go back to each Osc and insert Spectral Noise in OscFX 1 and Dissociate in OscFX 2 and set different amounts for each, 15-20 is a good range for the Noise and 20-30 is good for Dissociate. You should have some nice lush shifting supersaws now.

Every good supersaw patch needs some filtering so add Filter 1 after the two Osc, pick your preferred flavour of lowpass, dial in some tracking with KeyF, 25-50 is good here and set its Pitch Source to 3. Go back in the Pitches tab and enable Calibration for Pitch 3 and crank up its Uncalibration into the 40-50s. The filter now has some drifting applied.

You can push things further by enabling the Tuning sections of each Pitch Source and offseting the Key Follow by 1 or 2 and or have varying speed and depth of vibrato and or glide, per source. You could also use a Mapper in either Increment or Key mode to add per voice modulation/offsets to Osc detune, filter cutoff and more.

It's a lot of work, but this is Zebra not Hive, Dune, Serum et al which are all more simple synths trading convenience/workflow for loss of fine detail/control. If you just want to make bread and butter supersaws the same way you and you already like/prefer the sound of these patches, why do you need/want to make them in Zebra the same old way?

We've been granted access to some novel and interesting ways of doing stuff in Z3, people should use this as an opportunity to think outside the box and try doing things differently, just my 2p

[jtsterays]

It's a lot of work, but this is Zebra not Hive, Dune, Serum et al which are all more simple synths trading convenience/workflow for loss of fine detail/control. If you just want to make bread and butter supersaws the same way you and you already like/prefer the sound of these patches, why do you need/want to make them in Zebra the same old way?

If you can replicate Dune's Swarm mode, I will delete it immediately (not really, projects compatibility). That mode is not bread n butter.

[DCrown]

I spent a while trying to figure out why my CPU melted every time I used the Burn module Then I saw the latest YouTube video... relieved I don't need a new PC

Are there options to reduce cpu usage?
Ok, found the video (a link is always helpful!)
Thanks for the video.
Different quality modes would be great.
I like Zebra 3 really a lot and have to find a way not running into cpu issues.

[Urs]

Most CPU optimisations to come will affect the FX section. Things in the voice section are mostly at the end of options, unless we add quality modes.

[chagzuki]

Are people making use of Osc FX and Pitches to spice up their supersaws, if not, give them a go

Thanks for that, very interesting. I was following your suggestion and confused by what I was or wasn't hearing with the pitch controls, uncalibrate etc. Is there a guide that explains exactly what these settings are doing?

[DCrown]

Most CPU optimisations to come will affect the FX section. Things in the voice section are mostly at the end of options, unless we add quality modes.

Sounds great. Quality modes would be nice,
so you could use lower quality first and render to high quality later
Will there also be updates of beta version or is the next version the official release?

[Urs]

Is there a guide that explains exactly what these settings are doing?

There's a user guide, in the download as well as accessible from the u-he menu.

[Urs]

Most CPU optimisations to come will affect the FX section. Things in the voice section are mostly at the end of options, unless we add quality modes.

Sounds great
Will there also be updates of beta version or is the next version the official release?

Can't say yet, but I do expect another beta before the release.

[chagzuki]

There's a user guide, in the download as well as accessible from the u-he menu.

Oops, don't know how I missed that; brain not working. Thanks.

[PieBerger]

There's a user guide, in the download as well as accessible from the u-he menu.

Oops, don't know how I missed that; brain not working. Thanks.

Check the guide to use the guide!

[Teksonik]

this is Zebra not Dune, Serum et al which are all more simple synths trading convenience/workflow for loss of fine detail/control.

They're trading quality and range of sounds for sub atomic tweaking capabilities.

If you think 16 Oscs with 8 Subs, up to 8 Filters at once, 16 filters in dual mode, up to 16 4 Op FM or Wavetable Oscs and 8 Sample Oscs, is a "simple synth" in comparison to Zebra 3 then I fear you've taken an indefensible and poorly reasoned stance.

I've said it several times before, Zebra 3 is a great synth....in a market full of great synths.

Quality and complexity of sound are what impresses me and so far nothing Zebra 3 has shown me is any different or any better than the other synths in my collection. But it's only in beta so we'll see what the future holds. However I'd hesitate to crown it the god of synths at the point. It's not even in my top 10 at this point, no offensive to the developer or the cult.

In the end "novel and interesting ways of doing stuff" only matters if you end up with novel and interesting sounds hitherto impossible to make.

So instead of writing instructions on how to make a patch why don't you just post the patch?

I'd love to hear waveforms, wavetables, and presets that others have done. I've done a bunch but nothing that's groundbreaking or worthy of sharing but these are early days.

[chagzuki]

There's a user guide, in the download as well as accessible from the u-he menu.

"Uncalibrate: Reduces tuning precision for a more traditional analogue character
Destabilize: Moving instability akin to tape 'wow and flutter'"

So am I right to think that uncalibrate is static, i.e. random tuning applied during note on event, and that destabilize is closer to analog drift?