u-he

Kebmaster · Post by **Kebmaster** » Mon Jan 15, 2007 11:45 pm

Beardedone wrote:Oh yeah! More presest for the best sounding synth (virtual or hardware) I have ever heard. I have freaked of several keyboard players I know so bad with Zebra2 - they felt like idiots for not knowing about Zebra before I did.

URS for President!

Dont you mean U-he?? URS make expensive eq plug ins..!!!

raikard233 · Post by **raikard233** » Tue Jan 16, 2007 6:30 pm

Kebmaster wrote:
Beardedone wrote:Oh yeah! More presest for the best sounding synth (virtual or hardware) I have ever heard. I have freaked of several keyboard players I know so bad with Zebra2 - they felt like idiots for not knowing about Zebra before I did.

URS for President!

Dont you mean U-he?? URS make expensive eq plug ins..!!!

zircon · Post by **zircon** » Thu Jan 18, 2007 1:26 am

Hey guys! Here's the latest update. It looks like the patches will be ready to go by the weekend, according to tas. No promises, of course, since I don't want to pressure the guy (he's got other work on his plate too). Additionally, I'm also at work on a volume 2 which will cover some new ground, but is generally being designed with the same approach of usability and playability.

ps. Since I've gotten this request already, I figure I'll open it up to other people. If you can't wait and would like the *un* optimized patches now (for $15) PM me and I'll hook you up. Then, when tas finishes with the optimized version, I'll send you that immediately (for free, of course).

twolegstoneworks · Post by **twolegstoneworks** » Thu Jan 18, 2007 8:39 pm

Played my way through the presets and I have some first impressions. Firstly, yes, these presets are indeed geared towards dance music, preferably in the trance genre is my guess. There's some acid-bass, the always sought after Benassi sound, and the ever-so-famous trance-supersaw, but there's also some nice analog leadsounds, esp. the Oscar-preset bears a nice resemblance to what I'm accustomed to with the ImpOSCar synth. The pads are also really useful for a number of purposes.

What left me a bit dissappointed is the amount of really simple presets - practically 1 osc sounds and nothing more to it. I know that's probably because some of the popular sounds in todays dance music is pretty simple straightforward stuff, but it left me a tad dissappointed. Given the fact that we've got plenty of 1 osc sounds to go around with the Zebralette factory set, I felt it would've been better to focus a bit more on using Zebra 2 for something beyond the 1 osc sine/square sounds. Maybe if the set was 128 presets instead of 64 it wouldn't be so "visible", if you know what I mean.

Anyway, I dont regret having spend the money on this set. There's plenty of great sounds, and I've already modified 3 presets to make them match "my taste", and I'll definately be using some of those in a future track.

I recommend this set if you want to get some ready-to-use dance sounds.

Cheers.

zircon · Post by **zircon** » Thu Jan 18, 2007 9:55 pm

Thanks for the comments metal. I agree that some of the patches are on the simple side - though (imo) they still sound great, thanks to Z2's wonderful base sound. However, rest assured, the follow up I am working on for this is decidedly more complex on the whole. I guess you could say the part 1 is bread and butter, and part 2 is the dessert? I'm not sure. I'm hungry now, though.

Hunter · Post by **Hunter** » Thu Jan 18, 2007 10:40 pm

Sounds really nice! Good to hear a different side to Zebra2. Now if I only had the time...

zircon · Post by **zircon** » Sat Jan 20, 2007 12:10 am

BUMP - tas is done optimizing and you can purchase the bank now! See first post for details.

audio/fault · Post by **audio/fault** » Sat Jan 20, 2007 1:18 am

the second last( don't know if it is the right english word - i mean the sound before the last

) melody reminds me of hans zimmer(gladiator or something like that). am i right? i have this melody now in mind and try to recall the origin.
nice sounds btw.

luCiPHer · Post by **luCiPHer** » Sat Jan 20, 2007 1:22 pm

you mean that pirates of the carribean theme?

Timfonie · Post by **Timfonie** » Sat Jan 20, 2007 1:45 pm

Haha, yes that Pirates of the Carribean theme struck my attention as well. It is a very catchy tune and I asked Zircon if he made he himself.

Jeremy_NSL · Post by **Jeremy_NSL** » Sat Jan 20, 2007 7:46 pm

I noticed a few others in there too.. Final Fantasy, and Rocky I think.

Anyway, sounds great Zircon! Good luck

zerotonine · Post by **zerotonine** » Sat Jan 20, 2007 7:55 pm

Kebmaster wrote:Dont you mean U-he?? URS make expensive eq plug ins..!!!

zircon · Post by **zircon** » Mon Jan 22, 2007 11:01 pm

Haha, good ear Jeremy... I have about 6 references in there

By the way, this is a question for anyone whether you've purchased the bank or not, any requests for styles/genres for part 2? So far I've gone a little more to the extremes with harder stabs/basses and on the other end, new age-style pads. But any input would be appreciated.

beej · Post by **beej** » Tue Jan 23, 2007 12:00 am

For me, I find dance presets highly ignorable in the main. My personal taste is playable sounds, ie sounds which aren't overly complex, but have unique and interesting timbres, respond well to playing styles (velocity, aftertouch, modwheels etc) and offer me a nice amount of control while playing/automating.

I'm also into organic sounds, sounds which are less synthetic in nature and can work well in more natural music without shouting "HERE'S THE SYNTH PATCH!". The comb filters are very good for this type of stuff.

I hate FX patches and wibbly warbley stuff - the programmer might be using some interesting aspect of the synth to get that tone, but I find those sounds next to useless (at least for my music)

Arpeggios and sequences can be cool but again, I'm less interested in supersaws and overtly synthy stuff - keep it organic, natural - I'm thinking mallets, percussivey stuff, marimbas - not necessarily totally acoustic (we got samplers for that) but synthetic timbres which tend more towards natural than synthetic, if you know what I mean.

A good variety of basses, leads, poly patches, pads (generally simple, although subtle motion is good. To much and it's over the top and again draws to much attention to itself).

Actually, I'm prolly not explaining myself well. Ultimately, I guess I like elements which are more colourful and textural for the mix, which blend well with acoustic and electric guitars.

But hey, like everyone else, it's nice to be inspired, and we all flip through presets and some sounds just make you go "ooh!" and want to play - so lots of those, please!

(But they are hard to do)

It's been good to see Howard's banks go down well with everybody, because many of the patches aren't overdone, they are often tonally simple, but have really been optimised to respond naturally to playing, and as a result, even if you're not keen on the raw tone, when you play it still "feels" nice - and what you play kinda transcends that simple sound. I want the sounds to feel like I'm playing an instrument, rather than just playing notes, so it's mostly tone, movement and expression that I'm into.

I dunno - some ramblings which may or may not be helpful...

zircon · Post by **zircon** » Tue Jan 23, 2007 12:13 am

I agree with you on many of your points - definitely helpful. Of course, being a dance music producer (some of the time), I don't ignore that kind of sound

u-he

KVR Audio

Dance/Electronic Zebra 2 Preset Bank - available NOW!