Zebra 3 Public Beta Revision 20399

[DrWashington]

Zebra 3 20399 just crashed Nuendo 14.0.41 again, I think upon changing presets. Any ideas on why this is happening yet, u-he reps? Would be thrilled to get access to a nightly build or something...

[DrWashington]

Also, I just wanna say... I actually really love this new color scheme. I find it very easy on the eyes and great to look at, very easy to find what I need quickly. Nice work.

Edit: ...but I am finding myself missing the X-Y pads somewhat, hoping they'll make a comeback at some point. Just got Pounding Systems' "Gamepad MIDI" and was all excited to control them with my Dual Sense controller's gyroscope and/or physical X-Y pad and/or joysticks. Lots of fun possibilities there.

[The Sound Of Merlin]

https://soundcloud.com/thesoundofmerlin ... ta-patches

The past few weeks I have had lots of fun with Zebra 3. It's a dream come true synthesizer. I love it. This collection are 11 single instance improvisations with my favorite presets I have created so far. Have fun!

[stippenstoh]

Nice, some of those sound like real instruments being performed on stage.

[Sound_Trace]

you can see in screenshot attached that pan is only going 0-50 in this case despite the attenuator for mapper 1 being turned all the way up. Am i making a mistake here?

Loving Zebra 3! Running into an issue however with bipolar modulation- if I want to send a random to pan for example, I only seem to be getting half-wave/rectified values (e.g. 0-50 or 50-100). I've read the manual and it seems to suggest that I would get values from 0-100 by default but this is not the case. What am I doing wrong?

Working fine here (Mac). Can you post a primitive example preset?

[The Sound Of Merlin]

Nice, some of those sound like real instruments being performed on stage.

Thanks! Yeah, well... Zebra's FX section is insanely beautiful.

[reppinghades]

Here's the patch if someone's interested in checking it out:
BlindingLights.h2p.zip



Skjermbilde 2026-01-06 kl. 23.05.30.png

Seriously impressive. Felt like I was listening to the original track.

[AuralBee]

https://soundcloud.com/thesoundofmerlin ... ta-patches

The past few weeks I have had lots of fun with Zebra 3. It's a dream come true synthesizer. I love it. This collection are 11 single instance improvisations with my favorite presets I have created so far. Have fun!

Wow, all of these really sound excellent. Outstanding work!!

[Ghul]

Hello

I’m currently testing the Zebra 3 beta and wanted to share a few quick impressions.

One thing I really enjoy is how flexible the oscillator is. It’s easy to create inharmonic overtone structures in a controlled way, which is especially useful for drum and percussion sound design.

It’s also exciting that the additive oscillator can generate noise-like signals. These don’t sound overly synthetic, and you have a lot of control over their character. This makes it very effective for detailed snare and hi-hat textures.

I’ve also had fun experimenting with the modal resonator. Are there plans to release additional CSV files for more modal structures? That would be exciting to explore.

A few additional ideas and questions:
• Is it possible to use the MSEG in bipolar mode? Building on that, it would be interesting if the LFO could also have a spline editor with morphing, or if the MSEG had an “LFO mode” with tempo-sync and uni/bipolar switching.
• For the distortion module, additional distortion types would be great to experiment with in future updates.

Overall, exploring Zebra 3 has been very inspiring, especially for percussion and experimental sounds. Looking forward to testing more of the beta.

Best regards

[magickalmutagen]

It appears that a lot of effort has been successfully made to enhance Zebra 2 sonically, but that much less attention has been given to its workflow and UX. Sure, it's got a nice coat of new paint and some other improvements, but it seems that its form factor wasn't ever really reconsidered for Zebra 3, when, in my opinion, it really should've been to bring it up-to-date. At this current stage, if Z2 never really clicked for you, neither will Z3 I believe, which is unfortunate.

Both have great capabilities, but for some users like me, its unintuitive workflow still dissuades us from enjoying what it has to offer. I'm not suggesting to dumb it down, but a lot could've been done to make it feel more familiar and approachable simply by the way the synth is presented and laid out. Now that it's in beta, its fundamental layout undoubtedly won't change, but there are still some things that can be done to increase a user's immediate understanding of what's going on (primarily through visually tying the grid and the modules more tightly together, manipulated oscillator modules automatically selecting their osc tabs and grid counterpart, as well as ordering the modules on each side in a more user-friendly manner rather than just based off the left-to-right order of them in the grid).

Although much simpler, Zebralette 3 does a lot right with its design, and I think Z3 should've taken its form factor and iterated upon it rather than remain truthful to its Z2 roots (or struck some reasonable balance). For example, it's much more pleasurable to edit an oscillator (the core of any synth) in Zebralette 3 thanks to its UI elements not feeling so cramped and the grouping of the osc and its "easy editor" (as the manual calls it; its small curve editor) together. It's clear and straightforward to understand.

My final criticisms apply to both: Some of the icons of the main editor could be simplified, re-designed, or both. They need not re-invent the wheel. And the Move XY and Horizontal Select options appear to be more tools than options as they de-select the current tool you're using (i.e. they're in the wrong category).

I continue to look forward to how Zebra 3 evolves as after reading many pages of this topic it's clear that the devs are receptive, love their creation, and will do their best to improve it in the way they see fit. It may just not be in the manner which I believe would be ideal for the purposes of increasing Z3's appeal without sacrificing its functionality. Still love u-he products, especially Bazille, Diva, and Uhbik 2.

[Blowfish Tide]

I’ve also had fun experimenting with the modal resonator. Are there plans to release additional CSV files for more modal structures? That would be exciting to explore.

I've also been interested in those CSV files and generated some experiments to get more boomy, long-decaying sounds. If you want something new to test with your sounds, I posted three examples in another Zebra 3 Beta thread viewtopic.php?p=9178297#p9178297

[Andreya_Autumn]

Ha! That's fun.

[wnick]

There's one one thing that I didn't like in all U-he Plugs: why are you using no real parameter values like Hz, ms etc.
In the new limiter there are real values but not in the (old?) effects.
Sure I adjust the parameters by ear but sometimes I would like to see the real values to fine tune something with other plugs with real values.

Othervise Zebra 3 is really good.

[Blowfish Tide]

It appears that a lot of effort has been successfully made to enhance Zebra 2 sonically, but that much less attention has been given to its workflow and UX. Sure, it's got a nice coat of new paint and some other improvements, but it seems that its form factor wasn't ever really reconsidered for Zebra 3, when, in my opinion, it really should've been to bring it up-to-date. At this current stage, if Z2 never really clicked for you, neither will Z3 I believe, which is unfortunate [...]

Exactly my thoughts. Even behemoths with a vast user base, like Ableton Live, with thousands of hardcore users, could see significant improvements in version 12. A year ago, I read some posts from a fellow UX researcher at Ableton, and I know they helped tame the chaos of new features and significantly improve the workflow. I know it’s impossible to compare budgets and the whole scale of U-he and Ableton. But still, after seeing Zebralette 3 a few months ago, I thought the company was on the right track with redesigning such a complex, nerdy synth.

However, Zebra 3 beta definitely shocked me in this regard. Still the sound quality is superb, and the oscillator, with its editing options and curve morphing, is a hands-down masterpiece. This part is definitely well thought out from the ground up. Additionally, the filters sound so good that it’s hard to believe they’re software.

But for me, the synth doesn’t provide enough affordances and/or signifiers, especially about modulations. I read that moving orbs will not be implemented. Are moving orbs a deal breaker? Probably not. But not seeing clearly enough what’s going on with many modulation sources and targets could be the case in complex patches. I just can’t easily see what the combined modulations (2, 3,...) are doing to a parameter. As an experiment, anybody can add 3 envelopes and LFO to one detune in an already busy preset and try to manipulate the modulations without opening the Matrix. Especially if they’re 18th, 19th, 20th, and 21st in a long lane of other bricks. Everything looks the same: sources, targets, and slots. Pure cognitive overload

Overall, I don’t shy away from complexity or weirdness, but clunkiness bothers me much more. For now, I have a love-hate relationship. I keep my fingers crossed that the next beta will tip the scales more in Zebra's 3 favor and more love.

Cheers

[pdxindy]

It appears that a lot of effort has been successfully made to enhance Zebra 2 sonically, but that much less attention has been given to its workflow and UX. Sure, it's got a nice coat of new paint and some other improvements, but it seems that its form factor wasn't ever really reconsidered for Zebra 3, when, in my opinion, it really should've been to bring it up-to-date.

Different people will have different preferences. That's why it is good that there are plenty of synth designs to satisfy diverse wishes.

The basic design philosophy of Zebra 2 is not out of date. It is a successful and respected synth and it makes sense for Zebra 3 to follow the same basic design structure. It's still Zebra.