Zebra 3 - final beta Rev 21625 April 8th

[Lbdunequest]

I have to admit, Zebra 3 is really unstable in FL Studio when selecting patches, it really crashes often

[cvale]

In terms of core functionality, I feel somewhat strongly that the current way that Guide morphing works is underwhelming because it's a crossfade and not point-for-point interpolated like the curves.

The point here is indeed that by just crossfading we can pre-calculate their values and do this at almost no CPU cost. It also saves us from adding a morph editor for guide curves, which would be a hard sell.

If you need morphing, you can already have it: You can always select the curve itself and dedicate a slice of the "timeline" for whatever duties you'd normally give the guides. Put curves from frames 0-70 for your waveform, and use 80-100 or so for your format filter.

That's really awful from a workflow standpoint though. It means shifting everything in your current curve timeline over, re-adjusting all other modulation ranges on that target, etc. It also greatly minimizes the range of modulation in each of those areas, making dialing things in rather more fidgety than it should reasonably be.

Is there a compelling reason why either of my two proposed solutions couldn't be implemented?

[UmFuFu]

The new UI looks great. Big upgrade imo.
On another note, any chance for MTS OddSound micro tuning support?

[pdxindy]

Here is my edit of the new GUI.

I removed the gradients behind the menus.
I made all the menus a color so they stand out from all the label text.
I'm still playing with the colors of modules and modulators.
I also moved the DC Offset button. Somehow it bothered me being right below the volume knob.

Z3 GUI Edit 1.jpg

[Alchemedia]

The new GUI is terrific!

[jrgillam]

The new theme is too dark for my taste, I think some targets have been abbreviated too much. Looking forward to some lighter variants. The UX improvements are very welcome though, good work everyone. One lingering UX thing from previous versions — is there a better way to choose filter type when the filter is loaded in the FX rack? The only way I can figure out to change it is by clicking the arrows, which is less than ideal.

[Eluwei]

...

[johnnyberrygoode]

While there is time to fix something before the release, I'm trying to look for minor flaws in the visual interface. In the fmo module, the lines are slightly shifted to the right. Displayed on the picture.

Some knobs on other modules have the same flaw. Otherwise, I really like the UI.

[Urs]

Is there a compelling reason why either of my two proposed solutions couldn't be implemented?

First of all, it was never requested or questioned before.

I think there is a shift in perception. That's not a bad thing. What I mean is, the use of curves and guides in the FX was "tucked on". It was "well, if someone wants to, they can use it here", but now it becomes a more integral feature. That's fine, it may inform future decisions.

When we initially put it out, nobody could fathom what it means. Now that they do, they want more and better workflows. I get it.

Restricting Guides to same number of points is not an option for me. The whole point of Z3's morphing system is because it was tedious and unintuitive in Zebra 2 that all curves had to have the same number of points.

Reusing the curve of a different oscillator is also not really very straight forward. I think that would be awkward and counter intuitive.

I have no fast answer or quick solution. It's nice to know that people actually want to use this stuff. We'll see where this goes and what we come up with.

[Urs]

While there is time to fix something before the release, I'm trying to look for minor flaws in the visual interface. In the fmo module, the lines are slightly shifted to the right. Displayed on the picture.

Some knobs on other modules have the same flaw. Otherwise, I really like the UI.

I guess we missed that during night shifts... should be an easy fix!

[johnnyberrygoode]

Here is my edit of the new GUI.

I removed the gradients behind the menus.
I made all the menus a color so they stand out from all the label text.
I'm still playing with the colors of modules and modulators.
I also moved the DC Offset button. Somehow it bothered me being right below the volume knob.


Z3 GUI Edit 1.jpg

How to remove the gradients? It looks better without it!

[Milkman]

This was a great update!! I appreciate the visual refinements and have just begun to try to customize.

My complaint from the last beta was that I was seeing very high ASIO loads and overloads primarily in cubase 15, but not in Bitwig. Ive spent 2 hours checking out everything in this new beta and I havent hit "the red" in the ASIO system the whole time! This is fabulous and gives me back my flexibility to use whichever DAW I want. Thank you for this improvement!

[stippenstoh]

+1 on the "grey on grey" criticism.
A little more 'form follows function' wouldn't hurt here.

[Eluwei]

...

[cvale]

Is there a compelling reason why either of my two proposed solutions couldn't be implemented?

First of all, it was never requested or questioned before.

I think there is a shift in perception. That's not a bad thing. What I mean is, the use of curves and guides in the FX was "tucked on". It was "well, if someone wants to, they can use it here", but now it becomes a more integral feature. That's fine, it may inform future decisions.

When we initially put it out, nobody could fathom what it means. Now that they do, they want more and better workflows. I get it.

Restricting Guides to same number of points is not an option for me. The whole point of Z3's morphing system is because it was tedious and unintuitive in Zebra 2 that all curves had to have the same number of points.

Reusing the curve of a different oscillator is also not really very straight forward. I think that would be awkward and counter intuitive.

I have no fast answer or quick solution. It's nice to know that people actually want to use this stuff. We'll see where this goes and what we come up with.

Thanks for the explanation. I personally don't see why selecting a different curve set would be confusing. The current Guide system is far less straight-forward. To my mind this is the most elegant solution and it seems like it should be "simple" (yes, I know things that seem simple often aren't). You would just have a single dropdown or some such thing next to the "Curve/Guides" selector in the FX that let you select 1-4.

I get that you probably have a huge list of fixes and features that are more commonly requested than this. I am honestly baffled that I would be the first to mention this though. I can only assume that people just haven't properly started digging into all the oscillator effects yet, and that once they do this would be something people would want. Currently, for instance, the fact that there is no "proper" formant filter is actually a downgrade from Zebra 2. I get that the current filter module is meant to be one-size-fits-all and that a formant variety would require a different control scheme. The current Formant oscillator effect is absolutely not a substitute for this though, for precisely the reasons I describe. As I see it, "simply" allowing for freer selection of oscillator curves would eliminate the need to revamp the filter module to deliver something like that, so even though it feels like more work it may actually be less work, if people cared about a proper morphable formant filter (which I'd be surprised if they ultimately won't - it's a pretty common thing in most competing plug-ins like Serum).

The two current workarounds for formant-like behavior are currently: 1. using Curve Filter, which at least lets you cleanly modulate frequency for a given Guide (or Curve) but obviously this isn't that dynamic in the sense that you aren't modulating the contour, just the position of the Guide. 2. Modulating EQ node positions, as described in my other point. The main drawbacks of this one are precision and number of nodes (limited to 6 of course).

Hopefully this is all taken constructively. It's "little things" like this that keep Zebra 3 from feeling (for me) like an unequivocal step forward from Zebra 2. It would be nice to say there isn't anything in Zebra 2 that you can't do in Zebra 3, at least.