Zebra 3 Beta Bug Reports

[Urs]

It's probably been reported before, but in Bitwig Studio some Zebra 3 controls aren't being exposed to the DAW for automation, in particular the Mod Wheel "MW" and Pitch Bend "PB" controls (Ctrl A-D too, possibly others). CLAP / VST3 makes no difference. Goal was to automate the MW but it doesn't appear to be possible at this time. Presumably it's a bug or just not yet implemented as I can't imagine that these controls would be omitted from being able to be externally automated.

Rev 20552, Win x64

So, these are UI controls that are meant to try out things when your on a laptop in a coffee shop or something and you don't have a MIDI keyboard around.

PB, MW, Ctrl A..D represent MIDI messages just like notes, velocity and pressure. You'd normally automate them by recording or editing the corresponding MIDI messages in your DAW.

However, we're aware that some people just never use MIDI and some DAWs are simply not well equipped with MIDI editing. So we have a project going, to try and figure out if we can automate these parameters. But we have to make sure that it doesn't break the MIDI workflow, and maybe we have to add preferences for this or something.

[Urs]

Before it gets lost in the other thread, I am posting this here again:

I think something is wrong with the mixer module, input 2 is much softer (like -10 dB) compared to the original volume in the lane itself, input 1 is fine.

I can't reproduce this directly, but I can confirm that "Pan" + "R-L" is about 3dB softer than any of the other combinations of Pan/Bal, L-R/R-L, so this is a bug we'll fix asap.

[PieBerger]

It's probably been reported before, but in Bitwig Studio some Zebra 3 controls aren't being exposed to the DAW for automation, in particular the Mod Wheel "MW" and Pitch Bend "PB" controls (Ctrl A-D too, possibly others). CLAP / VST3 makes no difference. Goal was to automate the MW but it doesn't appear to be possible at this time. Presumably it's a bug or just not yet implemented as I can't imagine that these controls would be omitted from being able to be externally automated.

Rev 20552, Win x64

You can read Urs' reply for the why, but in the meantime you can insert a MIDI CC device before Zebra3 (or any other synth as needed) and set the appropriate CC# for MW and Ctrl A-D (go to the Zebra3 settings to see which # are set by default [it's 2 and 11 for A & B]).

[magickalmutagen]

...

However, we're aware that some people just never use MIDI and some DAWs are simply not well equipped with MIDI editing. So we have a project going, to try and figure out if we can automate these parameters. But we have to make sure that it doesn't break the MIDI workflow, and maybe we have to add preferences for this or something.

As an end result, I'd expect being able to move the MW and for Bitwig Studio to see the last touched parameter so I can easily automate it (in my experience, pretty standard for MWs and macros on softsynths). If it's not a Bitwig Studio shortcoming (also tried Studio One 7), it seems unfortunate that these main controls that typically have the most influence over a preset's sound would need some special MIDI handling compared to all of the others which just work with ease. Hope you find a good solution to this.

And as a side note, dragging the MW slider up and down with the cursor in S1 looks like it's happening at a choppy frame-rate (unlike in BWS where it's smooth). Interestingly, the knobs and graph nodes appear to animate smoothly without issue. Could be the CLAP version S1 is using, which may have been updated in Fender Studio 8 (S1's rebranding).

[aMUSEd]

I wouldn't use CLAP in S1 - it's not well implemented

[Urs]

it seems unfortunate that these main controls that typically have the most influence over a preset's sound would need some special MIDI handling

This is a bit upside down. ModWheel, PitchBend, Control Changes *ARE* inherently MIDI controllers that require no "special" MIDI handling. It *is* MIDI, it is the standard way of doing things since 40+ years.

It is only due to some DAWs and cheap/lacking/closed control surfaces that users do not have access to the full set of standard MIDI controllers. This made it desirable to have those MIDI controllers in the UI, and also mappable from macro parameters.

As I said, we're working on this, and all of these things will very likely become automatable - unless of course any of this interferes with the standard way of doing things. It seems to work well in Hive, I'm confident it'll also work well in Z3.

But let's not forget that it's the DAWs and plug-in formats that were designed 20 years ago on the (false) premise that MIDI was "dead" which led to this mess we have today, where everything needs to be done in redundant and concurrent ways, with an increased risk of conflicts, bugs and glitches. Don't blame us...

[Urs]

(and let's not forget that we now also have Note Expressions as a third way to just do the same thing, and that some DAWs nonsensically interpret MPE - a MIDI standard - into Note Expressions instead of just letting MPE be what MPE is: MIDI)

[magickalmutagen]

I don't doubt you're correct. I meant special in comparison to the ease at which I can automate any other controls on the synth, without needing to look up MIDI CCs and manually assign those. Probably still misunderstanding something. Either way, I'm glad you're looking into it, and it sounds like it'll get resolved, which I'm pleased to hear.

[NAD]

Using the noise model set to Pink and Single Hit with Duration=0, I occasionally get these loud DC spikes that can peak at over +3 dBFS (with all levels at default). At longer Duration settings it never gets that loud, nor with Multi Hit. Is this a bug?

[Urs]

Using the noise model set to Pink and Single Hit with Duration=0, I occasionally get these loud DC spikes that can peak at over +3 dBFS (with all levels at default). At longer Duration settings it never gets that loud, nor with Multi Hit. Is this a bug?

I suppose that's because Pink Noise has a lot of low frequency content. The shorter the envelope the more likely that all of it is on a positive or negative bump. The longer the envelope the less weight of such bumps in the overall response.

[NAD]

Using the noise model set to Pink and Single Hit with Duration=0, I occasionally get these loud DC spikes that can peak at over +3 dBFS (with all levels at default). At longer Duration settings it never gets that loud, nor with Multi Hit. Is this a bug?

I suppose that's because Pink Noise has a lot of low frequency content. The shorter the envelope the more likely that all of it is on a positive or negative bump. The longer the envelope the less weight of such bumps in the overall response.

But then why wouldn't Multi Hit be doing the same thing? Even with the rate all the way down I'm not getting anywhere near those spikes.

[Urs]

I'll have that checked...

[NAD]

Standard disclaimer:

1. Don't know if this is a bug or not
2. Sorry if it's been mentioned before

When using an MSEG with a long decay as the amp source for a grid lane, if I play some notes with the DAW transport stopped, then start playback before the notes fully decay, the MSEG restarts and the notes all play together from the very start of their envelope. Is this intentional and if so how can I avoid it?

[Urs]

Try setting "Automatic Reset on Playback" to "Off" in the audio preferences.

Depends on DAW though, some DAWs always reset on playback start to avoid reverb tails and stuff. The setting mimics those DAWs internally in Zebra 3.

[NAD]

Didn't work... Tried with VST3 and CLAP, no dice. Searched every setting in the Reaper preferences with "reset" or "flush", none of 'em helped. Oh well, I can live with it I guess...