2

User Guide

Version 2.9.3
22. July 2021


U-he • Heckmann Audio GmbH • Berlin

 Table of Contents
Introduction 5
About Zebra2 ........................................................5

Quick and Easy Tutorial ........................................7

User Interface 10
Basic Operation ..................................................10

Upper Bar ............................................................11

Temporary GUI settings ......................................12

Synthesis Window ...............................................12

Main grid .........................................................13

Lane Mixer ......................................................14

Performance Window ..........................................15

Lower Bar and Lower Pane .................................16

Preset Browser 17
Overview .............................................................17

Directory Panel (folders) ..................................18

Presets Panel (files) .........................................20

Preset Info Panel .............................................22

Installing Soundsets ............................................22

Preset Tagging ....................................................23

Search by Tags ....................................................24

Search by Text ....................................................26

Global Settings 28
PITCH .............................................................28

GLIDE ..............................................................28

VOICES ...........................................................29

MODE (voice mode) ........................................29

MICROTUNING ...............................................29

SWING ............................................................29

Generators 30
OSC main panel ..................................................30

PHASE ............................................................31

OSC FX ...........................................................31

List of spectral effects ....................................32

MIXER .............................................................33

OSC Lower Panel ................................................34

2
 OSC Wave Editor ................................................37

GeoMorph & SpectroMorph ...........................37

GeoBlend & SpectroBlend ..............................39

FMO main panel ..................................................41

FMO lower panel .................................................42

Noise ...................................................................43

VCF .....................................................................44

XMF .....................................................................46

Comb ..................................................................48

SB (Sideband) .....................................................51

Shape ..................................................................51

Distortion .............................................................52

Ring .....................................................................54

Mix ......................................................................54

Fold .....................................................................55

Modulators 56
List of Modulation Sources .................................56

Modulation Matrix ...............................................57

ENV .....................................................................58

MSEG ..................................................................61

LFO .....................................................................63

LFOG ...................................................................65

MMap ..................................................................66

MMix ...................................................................68

Outputs and Effects 69

The FX Grid .........................................................69

Modulation FX .....................................................70

Delay ...................................................................71

Reverb .................................................................72

Compressor ........................................................73

EQ .......................................................................74

NuRev .................................................................75

Performance 76
Arpeggiator / Sequencer Programming ..............76

Hands-on tutorial ............................................76

Selectors .........................................................77

Step parameters .............................................78

XY Pad Programming ..........................................79

3
Configuration 81
About MIDI CC ....................................................81

MIDI Learn ...........................................................82

MIDI Table ...........................................................83

Preferences .........................................................84

Tips & Tricks 86

Motion viewer for modulators .........................86

Spectralize ......................................................86

Modulation inverter .........................................87

Absolute value ................................................87

Vibrato under control ......................................87

More MSEG points .........................................87

Zebrify 88
Introduction .........................................................88

MIDI .....................................................................89

Input ....................................................................90

Input Mixer ......................................................90

Envelope Detector ..........................................90

Pitch Detector .................................................92

ZRev 93

Modulation Target Lists 94

Generators ..........................................................94

Modulators ........................................................100

Global ................................................................102

Effects ...............................................................102

Flow Diagrams 108

Delay Modes .................................................108

XMF Modes ...................................................110

FX Grid ..........................................................111

NKS 112

Troubleshooting 113

4
TOC INTRODUCTION

Introduction
About Zebra2

Zebra2 is a wireless modular synthesizer. Designed for flexibility, ergonomy and low CPU
hit, Zebra2 has an excellent reputation for consistently great sound quality. Zebra2 is the
weapon of choice for composers and musicians who need an uncompromising workhorse
synth – practically all parameters are valid modulation targets.
Zebra2 modules only appear while they are in use: Add an oscillator to the patching grid
and it will appear on the left, use an LFO for anything and it will appear on the right. After a
little practice you will find programming Zebra2 very comfortable and lightning fast. Which
in the end translates to... more fun!

Installation and updates

Go to the Zebra2 web page and download the latest installer for your system (macOS or
Windows). Unzip the compressed file, open the Zebra2 folder and start the installer.
Zebra2 works in demo mode for a while before it cycles through a series of 5 notes instead
of the correct ones. Register your copy by clicking on Zebra2’s data display and selecting
the first entry, enter serial number. Then unload and reload Zebra2 to make 100% sure
that the registration process is complete.

During installation, files are written to the following locations by default (Windows users
please note that these have changed since previous Zebra versions):
macOS
Presets (local) MacHD/Library/Audio/Presets/u-he/Zebra2/

Presets (user) *YOU*/Library/Audio/Presets/u-he/Zebra2/

Preferences *YOU*/Library/Application Support/u-he/com.u-he.Zebra2...

Themes MacHD/Library/Application Support/u-he/Themes/ (skin folders)

Module presets MacHD/Library/Application Support/u-he/Zebra2/Modules/

Microtuning MacHD/Library/Application Support/u-he/Tunefiles/

Windows
Presets (local) C:\Users\*YOU*\Documents\u-he\Zebra2.data\Presets\Zebra2\

Presets (user) C:\Users\*YOU*\Documents\u-he\Zebra2.data\UserPresets\Zebra2\

Preferences C:\Users\*YOU*\Documents\u-he\Zebra2.data\Support\ (*.txt files)

Themes C:\Users\*YOU*\Documents\u-he\Zebra2.data\Support\Themes\
Module presets C:\Users\*YOU*\Documents\u-he\Zebra2.data\Modules\

Microtuning C:\Users\*YOU*\Documents\u-he\Zebra2.data\Tunefiles\
To uninstall everything (including Zebralette, Zebrify and Zrev), delete all the above except
the Themes and Microtuning folders, especially if they are used by other u-he plug-ins.


presets global generators modulators outs+fx perform config targets 5

TOC INTRODUCTION

Online resources
For downloads, news and support, go to our website
For heated debates about u-he products, go to our forum
For friendship and informal news updates, go to our facebook page
For u-he presets (paid or free), go to our patch library (PatchLib)
For video tutorials and more, go to our youtube channel
For personal pics and a few videos, go to our instagram page
For audio demos of soundsets, go to our soundcloud

The most frequently asked question by newcomers is:

Q: Why does Zebra go way out of tune after a short while?
A: That’s the demo mode restriction.

Right-click on the data display, enter your serial number and restart Zebra.

Team u-he 2021 (Q3)

• Urs Heckmann (boss, concepts, big code)
• Jayney Klimek (office management)
• Howard Scarr (user guides, presets, grump)
• Rob Clifton-Harvey (IT admin, backend development)
• Sebastian Greger (graphic design)
• Jan Storm (framework, code)
• Alexandre Bique (all things Linux)
• Oddvar Manlig (business development)
• Viktor Weimer (support, presets, the voice)
• Thomas Binek (QA, bug-hunting, presets)
• Henna Gramentz (office supervision, support)
• Frank Hoffmann (framework, browser)
• Alf Klimek (rock-star vocals, studio)
• Sebastian Hübert (media, synthwave)
• David Schornsheim (more code)
• Stephan Eckes (yet more code)
• Luca Christakopoulos (communication design)

Special thanks Brian Rzycki for maintaining the original PatchLib.


presets global generators modulators outs+fx perform config targets 6

TOC INTRODUCTION

Quick and Easy Tutorial

Load Zebra2 into your preferred plugin host / sequencer / DAW. If you’re not sure how to
do this, please refer to the documentation belonging to that application.

Click on the PRESETS button in the upper bar. The browser shows a list of folders on the
left, and all presets contained within the selected folder in the center:

The contents of the Local folder

In the folders pane, click on Local to open it if necessary. You should see category folders
(1 Bassics, 2 Leaders etc) on the left, and several presets in the main area. Click on any
preset and play your keyboard. Use the up/down cursor keys to step through the others.

While auditioning the factory presets you should always try out the standard performance
controls velocity, pitch bend, modulation wheel and pressure. Some presets will also
react to the user-definable MIDI control changes (CC#02 and CC#11 by default).

New in version 2.9

All factory presets now include complete XY pad assignments.
Click on the PERFORM button and try them out!

Now that you know how to audition factory presets, it’s time to familiarize yourself with the
Zebra2 way of creating your own!


presets global generators modulators outs+fx perform config targets 7

TOC INTRODUCTION

Right-click on the data display and select init (initialize), then the click SYNTHESIS button:

SYNTHESIS window of the ‘init’ preset

Only 3 modules are visible in Zebra’s main programming window because init only uses
one oscillator, one envelope and one LFO. Play your keyboard – it sounds even simpler
than it looks, but this simplicity is precisely what makes init a great starting point for creat-
ing your own presets.
Click on the OSC1 button in the lower bar, grab the highlighted rectangle at the bottom
and move it around while playing some notes: All waves are the same (sawtooth). In the
OSC1 WAVE panel to the left, choose the oscillator preset called Tri-Saw-Pulse by click-
ing on the grey bar (which currently reads ‘none’) and selecting Tri-Saw-Pulse from the list.
Close the preset window, test the different waveforms, then set it to Wave 5 (a sawtooth).
Click in the main grid somewhere below OSC1 and select OSC2 from the list. A second
oscillator appears in the lefthand pane. Turn the Detune knob in one of the oscillators up to
15 and play some notes. Take the Vibrato amount in the other oscillator up to about 30 for
some extra movement. In the righthand rack, change the LFO SYNC mode to 0.1s and
move its Rate down to about 60.
Now click below OSC2 and select VCF1 (a multi-mode filter). The default is LP Xcite: Click
there and select LP Allround, a more resonant lowpass. Move the Cutoff knob while play-
ing the keyboard, then leave it at about 75. Click on the unlabeled knob on the far left, se-
lect Env2 from the list and turn that knob up to 70. Play your keyboard. In the righthand
rack, adjust the ENV 2 Attack to 20, Sustain to minimum and Velocity to maximum.

In the upper bar, turn OUTPUT down a little so that you don’t distort, then just play…


presets global generators modulators outs+fx perform config targets 8

TOC INTRODUCTION

Click on the GLOBAL button at the far left of the lower bar. In the middle you will now see
a small effects grid, which is used for selecting and routing effect modules.

Click on the cell below the currently inactive ModFX1 (a chorus) and choose NuRev1 from
the bottom of the menu. Reverb parameters appear in a panel to the right, replacing what-
ever was there before. Adjust reverb parameters Decay, Size, and especially Dry/Wet.

Next, add an EQ module below [NuRev]. An Equalizer panel appears, replacing the reverb
panel. In the effects grid, click on [EQ1] and drag it up one cell: [EQ1] will swap places with
[NuRev] so that the dry signal is equalized before the reverb instead of after it. Experiment
with all effect settings (remember that clicking on a cell will reveal its panel) as well as the
generator and modulator settings.

the SYNTHESIS window after following the above tutorial, with the GLOBAL panel open

Now would be a good time to learn more about Zebra’s GUI – see the next section.

If you’re already feeling confident you could try refining this simple preset while looking up
the appropriate information in the reference chapters.

Tips: For fine control, hold down a SHIFT key on your computer keyboard before adjusting
the knob. Whenever you arrive at an interesting sound, press SAVE in the bar at the top.
By default, saved presets will land in the root of the User folder, but you can change this
behaviour globally (see Preferences).


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TOC GUI

User Interface
Basic Operation
Although basic operation is quite intuitive, there are a few points worth mentioning…

Standard controls
Values are adjusted via click-and-drag, with fine control by holding
down a SHIFT key. All knobs are either unipolar like Release in this
image, or bipolar like Velocity in this image. Bipolar knobs are usu-
ally center-zero, with negative values to the left and positive values
to the right, but there are exceptions e.g. the Delay times.
Double-click resets a knob to its default value. If your mouse has a scroll wheel, hover
over any control and then roll the wheel. For finer control, hold SHIFT.

Assignable controls
Most panels include assignable controls that directly modulate important pa-
rameters. Select a source by clicking the label. The target is the knob above
or to the right, indicated by a small triangle. Note: Both assignable controls
in the VCF module affect Cutoff. Also, what look like assignable controls in
the envelopes are actually pre-attack and post-sustain (see ENV).

Parameter locking
Right-click on a control and select ‘Lock’. The lock only prevents the value
from changing when you switch presets, it does not prevent you from ad-
justing the value directly. To unlock, right-click again and untick ‘Locked’ in
the menu. Example: Lock both Microtuning options to audition various pre-
sets, all with the same non-standard tuning.
Note: Right-clicking a knob also lets you assign XY control, as a quick alternative to the
method described in the section about programming the XY pads.

Switches and the mouse wheel

Most of the rectangular buttons open drop-down menus. Like the knobs, most of them
also react to mouse wheel movement (this is particularly useful in the Arp/Seq panel).
If your mouse wheel is rastered i.e. it has noticeable ‘ticks’, you should check that the
Mouse Wheel Raster preference is switched on (see Preferences). This ensures that
each tick will correspond to a sensible step, usually an integer.


presets global generators modulators outs+fx perform config targets 10

TOC GUI

Upper Bar
At the top of Zebra’s window you will see this bar:

SYNTHESIS, PERFORM, PRESETS: The buttons on the left select the 3 main windows.

DATA DISPLAY: The display has three main jobs: Firstly, it shows the preset name. You
can step through the presets by clicking on the triangles to the left and right. Clicking on
the name opens a list of all presets in the current directory – a convenient way to load a
preset without having to open the PRESETS window. Since version 2.9.1 you can load a
preset by dragging it from your desktop (or any system window) onto the data display.
Secondly, it shows the value of the parameter being edited. Watch the display whenever
you need to set specific values. After about 2 seconds, it reverts to the preset name.
Thirdly, right-clicking on the display toggles between compatibility mode 2.3 (a faint ‘2.3’
appears on the right) and the regular 2.5+. While editing 2.3 presets, remember that this
mode does not support some more recent features and improvements. Also, the sound
can change when you switch from 2.3 to 2.5, mainly due to the improved XMF module.
INITIALIZE: At the top of the same context menu (right-click on the display) is a simple
template called init you can load whenever you want to program from scratch. The main
grid contains an oscillator and the effects grid has an inactive Chorus/Phaser (ModFX1).

UNDO / REDO: The curved arrows to the right of the data display can be used to fix recent
‘mistakes’. Although the number of steps in the undo buffer is limited, you can even undo a
change of preset so that switching presets before saving doesn’t mean losing your work.

MIDI activity: This small indicator lights up whenever MIDI data is being received.

SAVE button: Stores the preset into either the currently selected folder or the ‘User’ folder,
depending on the Save Presets To setting (see Preferences). To select a different folder,
click on PRESETS and navigate in the directory. Then click on [SAVE], give your preset a
suitable name any details you would like to appear in the INFO area of the browser.
Please avoid using the following characters: (\ / ? % * : " > < =).
Right-clicking on [SAVE] opens a menu with a choice of file formats. The recommended
h2p option is our normal cross-platform format (editable text), while h2p extended includes
extra readable information. The native option is the standard format of your system (.fxp
for VST and AAX, .aupreset for Audio Units). If you have loaded Diva as VST2, you will
also see the option nksf: See the NKS chapter towards the end of this document.

OUTPUT knob: The final volume, the sum of MAIN, BUS1 and BUS2. Controls the same
parameter as the OUTPUT knob below the FX Grid. Normally set to 100%, a preset’s vol-
ume can be boosted up to 200% if necessary.

BADGE: Clicking on the u-he badge opens a menu containing links to this
user guide, to the documents folder, to our company homepage, to our
KVR support forum as well as to our presence in various social networks.


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TOC GUI

Temporary GUI settings

Right-clicking anywhere in the background of the control bar or lower pane opens a menu
with options for GUI skins i.e. alternative designs (the current standard is DotEight) as
well as GUI sizes (as percentages and as width x height in pixels).

More permanent settings are available in the Preferences page.

Synthesis Window
Click on the SYNTHESIS button in the upper bar...

UPPER BAR

MAIN GRID

GENERATORS MODULATORS
RACK RACK

LANE MIXER

LOWER BAR

LOWER PANE

areas of the SYNTHESIS window

Generators rack
The area to the left contains control panels for each active module in the main grid (see
the next page). Generator panels can be reordered by clicking on the dividing line be-
tween them.

Modulators rack
The area to the right contains panels for control signals (envelopes, LFOs etc.) currently
in use. Modulators are not defined in the grid, but automatically appear as soon as they
are used as modulation sources. Modulator panels can also be reordered by clicking on
the dividing line between them.
If the rack isn’t tall enough to show all active panels, a scroll bar will appear. Right-click
in an empty area of each rack to choose auto scroll – the rack scrolls (if necessary) to
reveal the panel belonging to the module selected in the grid, or selected on top – the
module selected in the grid moves to the top of the rack.
Note that the order of panels in the generators rack will seldom reflect the patch struc-
ture as it is defined in the grid. However, you can swap the positions of adjacent panels
by clicking in the narrow space between them.


presets global generators modulators outs+fx perform config targets 12

TOC GUI

Main grid
The center of the Synthesis window is a grid consisting of four vertical lanes. This area
is used for connecting generators together, whereby the signal flow is top to bottom.
To add a module, click on an empty cell and select from the list. Drag modules around
the grid, deactivate via double-click (or Mac: cmd+click, Win: alt+click), specify input
routing or remove the module via right-click. Clicking on a module will highlight the cor-
responding control panel in the generators pane.
IMPORTANT: Oscillators and noise generators (as well as FMOs in certain modes) do
not process audio, so when placed on top of one another in the same lane, the signals
are simply mixed together.

OSC1 OSC2 OSC4

XMF1

OSC3

Lane 1 Lane 2

Lane 1 Lane 2

In the above example, both OSC1 and OSC2 flow into XMF1 (a filter). The XMF1 output
is then mixed with (not processed by!) OSC3, and the mixture flows down lane 1. OSC4
flows down lane 2 as well as modulating XMF1 cutoff (the red arrow).

Routing between lanes

Any module can route signals between
lanes. Select the source (‘Input’) lane for
the module by right-clicking on it.
In this example, OSC1 is comb-filtered in
lane 1. Both OSC1 and Noise1 are filtered
by VCF1 in lane 2.
By the way: If Noise1 had been two cells
further down lane 2, the Noise module
would have taken its input from Comb1.

Note: For the sake of simplicity and brevity,

the names of modules as they appear in
the grid (which often differ from the titles of
panels) are used throughout this manual.

presets global generators modulators outs+fx perform config targets 13

TOC GUI

Lane Mixer
Below the main grid is what looks like a 4-channel mixer. Indeed, this is where you adjust
the pans/volumes and select envelopes as well as routing to the FX grid for each lane.

main grid
mute, fx bus select

L/R pan or balance

pan modulation

amp envelope

volume

volume modulation

Mute
A handy mute button for each lane. In the image above, lane 2 is muted.

FX Bus Select
Selects an output for each lane:
main ............route to the lefthand lane of the FX grid (MAIN)
bus1 ............route to the center lane of the FX grid (BUS 1)
bus2 ............route to the righthand lane of the FX grid (BUS 2)

PAN / MOD
Pan position knob plus assignable modulation knob. Right-click on the Pan knob to tog-
gle between pan and bal (balance) modes. Remember that balancing to the left means
fading out the righthand channel of your stereo signal, while panning to the left means
moving it over to the left.

Amp Envelope
Selects an envelope for each lane’s amplifier.
Gate ............a simple on/off envelope, slightly smoothed

Env(n) ........envelopes 1 to 4

VOL / MOD
Lane volume knob and assignable modulation knob. Modulation here scales the volume
from 0% through 100% (center) to 200%. In the example above, the modulation wheel
fades lane 1 down to silence, irrespective of the VOL value (which is about 70 here).
Note: If you want a unipolar modulation source to fade a lane in from zero it’s best to
use the modulation matrix instead.


presets global generators modulators outs+fx perform config targets 14

TOC GUI

Performance Window
Zebra’s performance window is opened by clicking on the PERFORM button in the upper
bar. The four X/Y pads can control up to 16 parameters each, all at the same time.

Performance window, with a different ‘XY’ panel selected below

• Click anywhere to jump to a new position – find different variations of the sound
• Click and drag to move smoothly – for realtime morphing
• Double-click to reset to the center
Next to each pad is a large field where you can add some text e.g. a functional description
(as in the above image). To do that, double-click in the empty area.

Note: NKS hardware owners might generally prefer to use the 8 knobs instead of the pads,
as the X and Y dimensions are independent. Many of the factory presets, however, are
geared towards 2D control.

Clicking on the [≣] icon of each pad replaces the text field with a list of X/Y assignments.
You can also make assignments here without having to open the XY panel in the lower
area. Drag & drop assignment also works (as in the above image), but as the generator
and modulation racks are not currently visible, this is mainly useful for assigning XY to the
lane mixer and effect parameters.

For details see the section about XY Pad programming in the PERFORMANCE chapter.


presets global generators modulators outs+fx perform config targets 15

TOC GUI

Lower Bar and Lower Pane

The lower bar switches the contents of the lower pane:

GLOBAL
Output levels, the FX grid and FX panel, miscellaneous preset settings. Go there

OSC1 to OSC4
Wave Editor, oscillator load/save, miscellaneous oscillator settings. Go there

FMO
Additional settings for all 4 FMOs in a single panel. Go there

MSEG1 to MSEG4
Multi-Stage Envelope Generators. Go there

ARP/SEQ
For programming the arpeggiator / sequencer. Go there

XY1 to XY4
For programming the X/Y pads. Go there

MATRIX
The modulation matrix. Go there

Note: The lower bar and lower pane remain active in all window modes.


presets global generators modulators outs+fx perform config targets 16

TOC PRESETS

Preset Browser
Overview
You can load a preset in the current folder by clicking on the data display, or step through
them by clicking on the arrow symbols either side of the data display…or even drag a pre-
set file from a system window or your desktop and drop it onto the data display. But of
course Zebra2 also has a powerful preset browser – click PRESETS in the upper bar:

Layout
Folders are on the left, presets in the center and information about the currently active
preset on the right. If there is no PRESET INFO panel on the right, click on the [≡] button
in the top righthand corner and tick Show Preset Info. The same menu also offers Show
Tags in Preset Info – untick if you prefer not to see any tags there.

Default, init
When Zebra2 starts it checks whether Local contains a preset called default. If so, this
is loaded instead of the demo sound. If you want a simple template every time you start
a new instance, right-click on the data display and select init. Then select the Local
folder and SAVE under the name default. (which does not appear in the browser). If a
fresh instance doesn’t load your new default, it probably landed in User, in which case
you should change the Save Presets To in the Preferences and repeat the above.

PATCH FORMAT
At the bottom right of the browser you can specify the format in which your patches will
be saved. The default is .h2p (recommended). To save in the plugin version’s own for-
mat, select native. The .h2p extended format can include comments for each line.

SAVE ONLY ACTIVE MODULES

Unused modules will not be saved with the preset. Activating this option causes newly
created modules to adopt settings from previously loaded presets.
presets global generators modulators outs+fx perform config targets 17
TOC PRESETS

BYPASS EFFECTS
Mirrors FX BYPASS in the GLOBAL panel. Click to temporarily deactivate all effects in
the grid. This switch is truly global – you won’t hear any effects until you deactivate it!

Directory Panel (folders)

Local and User Folders
Factory presets are sorted into 9 folders. Untagged copies of several of them are also in
the Local root. After selecting a preset you can step through them using the cursor keys.
‘Local’ is primarily meant for factory content and MIDI Programs. You should save all
your own creations to the ‘User’ folder (see the Save Presets To preference).

MIDI Programs
As well as factory presets, ‘Local’ also contains a special folder called ‘MIDI Programs’.
When the first instance of Zebra2 starts, all presets in that folder (up to 128) are loaded
into memory so they can be selected via MIDI Program Change message. To retain the
order it is important to rename them e.g. ‘000 rest-of-name’ to ‘127 rest-of-name’.
‘MIDI Programs’ can contain up to 127 sub-folders, switchable via MIDI Bank Select
messages (CC#0). Send Bank Select first, then Program Change. ‘MIDI Programs’ itself
is bank 0, while sub-folders are addressed in alphabetical order starting with bank 1.
IMPORTANT: The content of the ’MIDI Programs’ folder cannot be changed on the fly.
Any changes there will only be updated after the host application is restarted.

Smart Folders
These are not regular folders, but the results of querying a database of all presets. The
content is therefore dynamic; it will change whenever the underlying data changes.
Search History
A list of the most recent searches. To make them more permanent, right-click and select
Save Search… To empty the list, right-click on ‘Search History’ and select Clear.
Saved Searches
This folder contains any ‘Search History’ entries that have been saved. To remove en-
tries here, right-click and Delete.
Bank
These folders reference metadata about preset origin – the version of the factory library
or the name of the soundset with which the preset was installed. See Preset Info.
You can even create your own custom banks: Drag & drop one or more presets onto the
‘Bank’ folder then enter a suitable bank name into the dialogue box.
To remove Bank attributes from selected presets, either drag & drop them onto the ‘no
Bank’ folder you will see at the bottom of the Bank list, or right-click on the Bank and se-
lect Remove Presets from Bank. Empty Banks will disappear.
Favourites
8 smart folders, one for each Favourite colour (1-8). See Presets context menu a few
pages down. Only one Favourite colour/number can be set per preset. Presets dropped
onto one of the ‘Favourites’ folders will be marked as such. Favourite status can be re-
moved from all presets of one particular colour / index by right-clicking on the ‘Favourite’
folder and selecting Remove All Favourite (n) Marks.

presets global generators modulators outs+fx perform config targets 18

TOC PRESETS

Junk
A list of all ‘junked’ presets (see Presets context menu below). Presets dropped on this
folder will disappear from the browser unless you make them visible via show Junk. The
context menu also includes a function to remove the Junk status from all presets at
once (Remove Junk from Presets).
Tags
Smart folders for each Categories, Features and Character tag. Presets dropped onto
these folders will adopt the corresponding tag. Presets dropped onto the ‘Untagged’
folder will have all Categories, Features and Character tags removed.
Author
Smart folders for each author name as defined when presets are saved. Presets
dropped onto these folders will adopt the new nameTip: Instead of signing each of your
creations, you could sign just one of them, then select them all and drag onto ‘Author/
(You)/’. As the process cannot be undone, use this feature with caution! See the section
Internal Drag & Drop a few pages down.

Directory context menu

Right-clicking on any folder within Local or User will open this menu:

Refresh
Create New…
Rename…
Open in Finder *

Move to Trash
On Open Expand to
Show Folder Icons

Refresh
Updates the browser. Windows users might need to call this function whenever files
have been moved, added, deleted or renamed in Explorer. Refresh is seldom necessary
on the Mac.
Create New…
Insert a fresh, empty subfolder.
Rename…
Edit the folder name.
Open in Finder / Explorer
Opens a system window for the currently selected folder. If you hold down the option
key (Mac) or ctrl key (Windows), this entry will change to Show in Finder / Explorer and
the folder will be highlighted instead of opened.
On Open Expand to
Determines which nested directories will appear in the directory whenever the GUI is
loaded. The first option (none) collapses all folders, while the final option (all levels) re-
veals all nested folders.
Show Folder Icons
Show or hide all symbols to the left of each folder. Note that the Junk symbol remains
visible at all times.


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TOC PRESETS

Presets Panel (files)

The central area of the browser shows all presets in the current directory. Click to load.

Presets context menu

Right-click in the preset list to open a menu containing the following functions:

Mark as Favourite
Mark as Favourite
Mark as Favourite
Mark as Favourite
Mark as Favourite
Mark as Favourite
Mark as Favourite
Mark as Favourite
Mark as Junk

Show Junk
Select All
Deselect
Rename…
Duplicate
Show in Finder *
Convert to h2p

Move to Trash

Mark as Favourite
Choose one of 8 ‘favourite’ marks. The entry will be replaced with Unmark as Favourite.
Mark as Junk / Show Junk
Instead of deleting presets you can mark them ‘Junk’ so they disappear from the brows-
er. Activate Show Junk to display junked files and mark them with a STOP symbol.
Select All, Deselect
See ‘Multiple Selection’ on the next page.
Rename
Rename the most recently selected preset.
Copy to User Folder / Duplicate
The entry here depends on the status of the Save Presets To preference as well as on
the location of the source preset(s) i.e. whether they are in the Local or the User folder.
Selected presets are copied with a number appended to the name, which increments
(just like the Auto Versioning option) so that no preset can be overwritten by mistake.
Show in Finder / Explorer
Opens a system window for the right-clicked file. In smart folders only, holding down an
option key (Mac) or ctrl key (Windows) replaces this entry with Show in Browser, which
highlights the currently selected file in its original location within Zebra2’s browser.


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TOC PRESETS

Convert to native / h2p / h2p extended / nksf

Selected presets are converted to the format specified in the [SAVE] button context
menu or in the PATCH FORMAT field.
Move to Trash / Recycle Bin
Send selected presets to the system ‘trash’.

RESTORE
At the top left of the Presets panel is a [RESTORE] button which lets you audition pre-
sets to your heart’s content without losing track of the one that was loaded before.

Scan / Ready
Progress indicator for Refresh (see Directory context menu above).

Multiple selection
A block of adjacent presets can be selected via shift+click, and individual presets can be
added to the selection via cmd-click (Mac) / alt+click (Win). Presets can be moved to a
different folder via drag & drop (see the next paragraph). To deselect, either click on an
unselected preset or choose Deselect from the context menu.

Internal Drag & Drop

You can drag and drop single or multiple files from the preset panel onto any folders in
the directory panel. Files dragged onto regular folders will be moved unless you hold
down option (Mac) or ctrl (Windows), in which case they will be copied instead. Files
dropped onto smart folders will adopt the attribute of that folder: For instance, you can
set e.g. the Author or Favourite status of several presets at once.

External Drag & Drop

To manage your preset library more comfortably you can drag presets and folders be-
tween Zebra’s browser and your desktop (or any system window).
On the Mac most Finder operations will automatically update the browser. Updating
might not be immediate when using multiple formats or multiple host applications, but all
it usually takes is a click on the GUI or in the directory tree (which sets the focus to the
clicked instance of Zebra). On Windows systems, a manual Refresh (see Directory
Context Menu) will be required before changes to the contents of the browser appear.
Exporting smart folders
Drag a smart folder onto e.g. your desktop to create a folder containing those presets.
For instance, an entry in the Search History, one of the Favourites, the ‘Drums’ category
(includes sub-folders), all presets with the ‘Duo’ feature, or an Author…
Exporting favourite / Junk status
You can export Favourites, either all at once or individually. Shift+click and drag the
‘Favourites’ folder onto the desktop to create a file called Favourites.uhe-fav. Similar for
sub-folders: If you shift+click and drag e.g. ‘Favourites 5’, this will create a file called
Favourite 5.uhe-fav. Such files can be imported into Zebra's browser on a different
computer (for instance), via drag & drop onto or anywhere within the Favourites folder.
Note: Importing .uhe-fav files from another computer will only work 100% correctly if all
preset names and locations are identical on both computers!


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TOC PRESETS

Preset Info Panel

The panel to the right shows information about the selected preset. If you can’t see this
panel, click on the triple bar [≡] button in the top right corner and tick Show Preset Info:

Show Preset Info

Show Tags in Preset Info

Below the preset name you should see its path (from /Local or /User), the Bank and the
Author. DESCRIPTION and USAGE text is entered immediately before saving a preset.
CATEGORIES, FEATURES and CHARACTER are the tags for the currently selected
preset. You can remove or add tags directly here (see Tagging via Preset Info below)…

Installing Soundsets
All soundsets that we distribute ourselves will have the extension .uhe-soundset, and
third parties are encouraged to use this format for their own commercial soundsets (for
details please contact our support team).

Standard Method
To install, simply drag & drop the .uhe-soundset file into Zebra2 – anywhere will work.
The soundset folder should appear within the ‘User’ folder. If a soundset with the same
name already exists there, any modified files will be backed up and the location of the
backup file will be displayed.

Alternative Method
Soundsets in .uhe-soundset format can also be installed by clicking on the u-he badge,
selecting Install Soundset... and navigating to the desired file.

Regular Folders
Folders containing Zebra2 presets can be manually copied or moved into the ‘User’
folder. You might have to refresh the browser (see Directory context menu) before they
appear there. A refresh is generally necessary in Windows but not in macOS.
Note: As .uhe-soundset files are basically ZIP-compressed folders, you can rename
them i.e. replace the long file extension with ’zip’, then extract the presets and docu-
mentation.


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TOC PRESETS

Preset Tagging
“Tags” are elements of metadata, information that you can add to presets so that they can
be found more easily.

Tags are updated automatically – clicking on the [SAVE] button isn’t required! The
main advantage is that presets don’t have to be saved every time you edit a tag.
The main caveat is that you should only edit tags after saving your preset.
For instance, if you decide to edit tags while creating a 2nd version of an existing
one, please remember that you are actually changing the tags in the original preset!

The Tagging Window

Right-click on the [SAVE] button and select Tag this patch:
Category Features Character

Bass Acoustic Mono Bright Dark

Pads Analogue Poly Constant Moving
Leads Digital Duo Clean Dirty
Keys Dist+LoFi Chord Soft Aggressive
FX E-Bass BPM Phat Thin
Drums FX Bass Comb Natural Synthetic
Seq+Arp Plucks OscSync
Other Rhythmic RingMod
Sub FM
Sync Dry
Synth Modulated
Vocal Percussive
Soft Attack
Slow Release
Glide

Category describes a preset by analogy to instrument types or typical usage, and each
has a more or less appropriate set of subcategories. Features are technical classifications,
and Character tags are pairs of opposites from which you can choose just one. When you
are finished, click on the X at the top right of the window.

Tagging via Preset Info

In the PRESET INFO panel, right-click on the Category, Features or Character and select
or unselect tags in the context menu. If you right-click on an individual tag, the first option
in the menu becomes Remove Tag…
The function Create Search from Tags finds all presets with the exact same set of tags.
Tip: This function can be used to locate differently named duplicates.

Tagging via Smart Folder

You can tag presets by dragging them onto any of the Tags subfolders in the directory. To
remove all tags from presets, drag and drop them onto the [no Tags] subfolder.

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TOC PRESETS

Search by Tags
Click on the TAGS tab to open this view. The buttons here let you set up search criteria
according to existing tags with just a few mouse clicks:

Below the Search field are 4 sets of buttons (CATEGORIES, FEATURES, CHARACTER
and FAVOURITES). The first 3 correspond to the tags in the tagging window (see the pre-
vious page), while the bottom row lets you find presets you have tagged as Favourites.
Clicking on the [^] icon to the right of each heading hides the options for that set of tags.

Categories and Subcategories

Here are a few bullet points to get you started. Especially for Category tags, following a
step-by-step tutorial is much easier than studying a full technical description. Try these:
Each Category has its own set of subcategories. Not selecting a subcategory here means
“show me presets tagged with any subcategory”. Click on [Leads]…
You can select multiple categories without specifying a subcategory if you hold cmd (Mac)
or alt (Windows) while clicking on the category. Try that with the [Keys] button. The num-
ber of hits increases dramatically.
Selecting a subcategory (e.g. [Bass]) with the same name as the main category means
“show me all presets in the Bass category that do not have any subcategories defined”.
Complete category+subcategory tags appear below the subcategories as buttons with ‘off’
switches [X] so that you can add other main categories by simply clicking on them.

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TOC PRESETS

Search by Tags Tutorial

• Click on the DIRECTORY tab, right-click on the Search History smart folder and select
clear. Double-click on Local/3 Fillers to restrict the scope of the search to that folder. In-
stead of preset folders, the selected path appears below the Search field.
• Click on the TAGS tab. In the Categories, select [Leads]. Subcategory buttons appear
and the preset window is updated to list all presets in 3 Fillers that are tagged as
[Leads]. In this case there is only one, namely HS Dom7Plus.
• Now click on [Keys]. The [Leads] category is switched off, and the preset window is up-
dated to list all presets in 3 Fillers that are tagged as [Keys]. There are quite a few of
those! Note that you haven’t specified a subcategory yet.
• Hold down the cmd (Mac) or alt (Win) key and select the [Leads] category again. The
previously selected [Keys] button remains highlighted and the list includes the preset
HS Dom7Plus again – it shows all presets in the 3 Fillers folder that have either [Leads]
or [Keys] category tags, disregarding any subcategories.
• Click on the DIRECTORY tab: The text #Leads:* #Keys:* appears in the editable field,
as well as in the Search History followed by the number of presets that were found. The
colon symbol ‘:’ functions as a separator between Category and Subcategory, while the
star (*) means “any Subcategory, even none”.
• Click on the TAGS tab. Select the [Pads] category without holding cmd/alt: the [Leads]
and [Keys] tags are removed from the search. Now select [Dist+LoFi] as subcategory.
The result is a list of all presets in the 3 Fillers folder that have the #Pads:Dist+LoFi tag.
Immediately below the subcategory options you will see the complete tag in the form
[Category:Subcategory|X]. Clicking on the X here would remove the tag, but don’t do
that right now…
• Instead, let’s widen the scope by including another subcategory: Click on [Vocal]. The
[Dist+LoFi] tag remains selected and the list is updated to presets which have either of
those tags. Click on [Dist+LoFi] again and the tag search will find just one preset – the
only one tagged as [Pads:Vocal] in the 3 Fillers folder.
• Click the [Leads] category. Below the subcategories, the [Pads:Vocal] tag remains in
place because it is complete (Category with Subcategory). Check the tags in PRESET
INFO by clicking on the two presets in the list: they will include a Pads:Vocal tag or a
Leads tag (with any or no subcategory), or both.
• Click on the DIRECTORY tab. The text #Leads:* #Pads:Vocal appears in the Search
field as well as the Search History smart folder. If you are feeling adventurous, you can
try editing the characters in the Search field – after hitting Return, the results will be up-
dated accordingly.
• To the left of the grey search path is an ‘up’ [^] symbol. Click on this to exit the current
folder, which in this case changes the search path from Local/3 Fillers to the Local root.
The list now includes more presets because the range of the search spans all of Local.
• Another click on [^] expands the scope to the entire preset library i.e. /Local and /User.
Note that clicking on the [X] symbol to the right of the search path will exit any subfolder.
• Repeat the above a few times if necessary – you’ll soon get the hang of it!

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TOC PRESETS

Search by Text
The Search field lets you find presets according to a string of characters i.e. text. If you
remember that the preset you’re looking for has the word “clock” in either its name or its
description, simply enter clock into the Search field and hit Return…

Search normally looks into the preset name, author, DESCRIPTION and USAGE (see the
PRESET INFO panel). Searches are not case-sensitive and quotes are not required un-
less you want to include spaces between words.

If you want to restrict the search to a particular path e.g. Local/04 Pianoids, double click on
the 04 Pianoids folder. This path appears below the Search field instead of the preset fold-
ers. You will only see smart folders plus any subfolders within the specified path.

The [^] button to the left moves the search path up one level (in this case to /Local). The
[X] button to the right sets the search path to include all Zebra2 presets (i.e. Local and
User), and the regular preset folders reappear.

Try it: Enter three or four letters then hit Return. For instance, star would find all files con-
taining the text string star (e.g. mustard or starters). Entering "star wars" (with the quotes!)
would find e.g. Battlestar Warsaw if such a preset exited.


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TOC PRESETS

Syntax
Scope
You can limit the search to just the preset name or parts of INFO by using name, author,
desc (description) or use (usage) followed by a colon. For instance, author:the finds all
presets by authors whose names include ‘the’. Similarly, desc:space will find all presets
with the word space in the description.

An alternative syntax lets you use ? (a single letter) and * (any number of letters), but the
scope name, author, desc or use must be specified, followed by ‘=‘, and logical operators
are not allowed.

Logic
The AND operator specifies that presets contain both words surrounding it. AND is implicit,
but can be written explicitly if you prefer: For example, star AND wars (or simply star wars)
will find presets that contain both star and wars.

OR only requires that presets contain one of the words surrounding it. For example, star
OR wars will find presets that contain star as well as presets that contain wars. Or both.

NOT excludes presets containing the following word. To find all presets that contain star
but do not contain wars, enter star NOT wars.

Examples using regular syntax

brass OR string ‘brass’ or ‘string’ appear in the Name, Author, Description or Usage

brass string both ‘brass’ AND ‘string’ appear somewhere in the preset

use:vibrato ‘vibrato’ appears in Usage

"at =" aftertouch usage is mentioned in the Author, Description or Usage field

‘=’ is not a valid character for preset names

“hs s” ctrl #Mono All monophonic factory presets starting with an ’s' that use at least one 

of the A / B performance controls

Examples using alternative syntax

desc=*trin* e.g. ’string’ or ‘Patrington’ appear in the Description
author=*ow?e would find "Howie", "That old Howie", but not "Howie S”


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TOC GLOBAL

Global Settings
To open this panel, click on the GLOBAL tab in the lower bar.

Lower pane, the GLOBAL panel

PITCH
Transpose
Shifts incoming MIDI notes within a range of +/- 24 semitones.

Fine Tune
Shifts all oscillator and filter pitches by +/- 100 cents (relative to 100% keyfollow).

- Bend +
Sets pitch bend ranges independently from 0 to +/- 48 semitones.

GLIDE
Mode
time .......The duration of the glide is constant, irrespective of the note interval.

rate ........ The duration of the glide is proportional to the note interval.

Range
Lower values shift the beginning of the slur closer to the target note.

Glide, Glide2
A smooth pitch transition between consecutive notes. Glide affects the Key Follow mod-
ulator, so it is applied to all modules that include this parameter (OSCs, FMOs, Combs,
VCFs and XMFs). Glide2 is a bipolar offset for the even-numbered modules. The modu-
lation source KeyFol2 is the same as KeyFol, but includes the Glide2 offset.

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TOC GLOBAL

VOICES
To prevent glitches while running CPU-intensive presets, you can reduce the maximum
number of notes that Zebra2 will try to play at once: few = 4 notes, medium = 8 notes,
many = 16 notes. Due to intelligent voice allocation, these are all approximate values.
VOICE DRIFT
If set to On, each new note is slightly detuned, emulating the imprecise pitch of classic
analogue oscillators. Switch this off for “absolute” precision.

MODE (voice mode)

Remember that here is where you activate the arpeggiator!
poly......................... Normal polyphonic.
retrigger................Monophonic – each new note triggers the envelopes.
legato ....................Monophonic – envelopes are retriggered after spaces between notes.
Allows for more interesting musical phrasing.
arpeggiator ......... Polyphonic – triggers, pitches etc. are defined in the ARP/SEQ panel.
duophonic ........... Both low note AND high note priority. Odd-numbered OSC, FMO,
Comb, VCF and XMF pitches and cutoffs follow the lowest note, while
those of even-numbered modules follow the highest note.
SOFT ATTACK
Instantaneous attack times can mean audible clicks at the start of each note. Switching
this on removes all such clicks. Tip: If you do want clicks (consistent ones), leave this
option off, activate RESET in the oscillator panel(s) and adjust PHASE/PW.

MICROTUNING
Zebra2 supports standard .TUN microtuning tables. Literally thousands of these are
available online, and most of them are free. Click the TUNING button, then the selector
(likely to be ‘default scale’) to open a floating directory where you can choose a table.
Note: This window works like the main browser, including the drag & drop functionality.
Alternatively, right-click on the selector and choose a table from the current folder. Near
the top of the same menu is Show in Finder / Explorer, which opens a system window
for the location of microtuning files… you can put more .tun files in there.

MTS-ESP
Zebra2 supports Oddsound MTS-ESP, a system for microtuning multiple plug-ins within
a DAW environment. The freeware ‘Mini’ version is all you need to get started.
Note: MTS-ESP can be overridden by activating Zebra’s own microtuning, for instance
with the .tun file Default Scale.

SWING
In most synthesizers, ‘swing’ is only applied to the timing of an arpeggiator or mini-se-
quencer. In Zebra2, it also affects any/all synchronized LFOs.

Time Base / Percent

Set a rhythmic basis in the popup menu then a swing factor using the knob.


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TOC GENERATORS

Generators
OSC main panel
To state that the Zebra2 oscillators are ‘highly flexible’ would be a huge understatement.
They are so powerful that the Zebra2 package includes an extra instrument called Ze-
bralette – just one oscillator transplanted into a much simpler synth framework.

Oscillator panel with the MIXER sub-panel selected

The button next to the module label is for loading oscillator presets (see Oscillator Preset).

Switches
Stack
Selects single or polywave i.e. 2, 4 or 11 stacked oscillators. The eleven mode is much
more than a “supersaw”, as the polywave effect can be applied to any waveform at all.
PWM
Adds an inverted copy of the waveform. Applied to a sawtooth, phase modulation cre-
ates an effect very similar to classic PWM (only the phase of the original wave is shifted
around, while that of the inverted copy remains fixed). See PHASE below.
Sync
Activates oscillator-internal hard sync. See PHASE below.

Reset
Causes the oscillator to start at the same phase position each time.

Knobs
Wave
The position (index 1–16) within the waveset. Unlike the row of selectors below the
wave editor, this knob lets you set intermediate values.
The knob below Wave is for wave index modulation (+/-16) – click on the label to select
a source. How smoothly and precisely waves are interpolated depends on the oscilla-
tor’s Resolution setting in the lower panel. Note: The center of the waveset is actually
8.5, so a modulation amount of 7.5 from a bipolar source is enough to span the entire
waveset. To reach Wave 16 from Wave 1 using a unipolar source (such as the mod
wheel), set the amount to +15.
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TOC GENERATORS

Tune
Oscillator pitch offset (+/- 48 semitones). You can hold down SHIFT for finer control, but
there is also a Detune knob to the right. The knob below is for Tune modulation (+/- 48
semitones). Right-click to select a source, then turn up the amount

Detune
Detune actually has two slightly different meanings, depending on the polywave setting:
In Single mode it is for fine tuning (+/- 50 cents). In Dual, Quad or Eleven modes it does
not lower or raise the overall pitch of the oscillator, but spreads detuning equally. Of
course you can still fine tune the oscillator via Shift+Tune.

Vibrato
The amount of pitch modulation directly from LFO1 (0 – 100). The maximum depth here
is only +/- 50 cents – for deeper vibrato, click on the assignable ‘…’ control below the
Tune knob and select LFO1 from the list.

The oscillators in Zebra2 may appear quite harmless, but there is a lot more than meets
the eye. Apart from the extra parameters in the lower panel, oscillators have 3 switchable
sub-panels, PHASE, Osc FX and MIXER, selected via the buttons at the top right...

PHASE
Click on the oscillator’s PHASE tab:

Phase/PW
Adjusts the oscillator phase (from 0° to 180°, but you can
modulate it up to 360°). Rapid phase modulation normal-
ly affects pitch, but if the PWM switch (see above) is on,
the effect is similar to pulse width modulation.

Sync
Pitch offset for the oscillator’s integrated hard-sync. This
classic ‘analogue’ sync adds a lot of upper harmonics.

OSC FX
Click on the OSC FX tab:

The oscillator waveform can be processed by a couple of

spectral effects, which are routed in series (left > right).

To select a spectral effect, click on the label of an upper

knob. Adjust the value and/or modulate to taste using the
assignable control. Here, the Scrambler effect is set to
zero, but is modulated by the pitch bender.
Note: When modulated, the speed and smoothness of
most spectral effects DEPEND on the Resolution setting.

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TOC GENERATORS

List of spectral effects

Adjusts the level of the fundamental. Range = -200% (inverted) to +200%.
Fundamental At the central position, the fundamental is inaudible.

Even-numbered harmonics are cross-faded into odd harmonics. This re-

sults in a more ‘squarish’ waveform (square waves contain only odd har-
Odd for Even monics). With negative values, the opposite applies – odd harmonics be-
come even harmonics.
Boosts (positive) or attenuates (negative) higher harmonics, resulting in
Brilliance brighter or darker waveforms.

A combination of lowpass (negative values) and highpass (positive values)

Filter filters. Because in reality the ‘filter’ code only manipulates amplitudes, its
slope is more than 100dB/octave.

Bandworks A combined bandpass (positive) and notch filter (negative).

Boosts any octaves of the fundamental while attenuating all other harmon-
Registerizer
ics, often resulting in an organ-like sound.

Similar to operator feedback in FM synthesizers: the phase of the wave-

Scrambler form is modulated by the wave itself, creating many new overtones. If you
need dirty-sounding digital oscillators, this is the one.
Periodically shuffles the harmonics at random. Even if not modulated, the
Turbulence speed of this effect is dependent on the oscillator Resolution. Turbulence is
useful in SpectroBlend mode with only a few harmonics.

Expands (or contracts when negative) the spectrum. Similar to brilliance if

Expander the harmonics are distributed evenly.
Contracts the waveform towards the beginning or end of its cycle. Often
Symmetry sounds like pulse width modulation – and for a square wave, that’s precise-
ly what it is!

A variant of PD (phase distortion) synthesis. The original waveform is not

Phase Xfer output directly, but is used as the phase response of an extra sine wave –
which you can hear when the value is zero.

Phase Root The original wave multiplies the phase response of the sine wave.

The original wave adds to the phase response of the sine wave. Like
Trajector phase modulation in ‘FM’ synthesizers – try Trajector on a pure sine.

Multiplies the waveform with a variable harmonic, resulting in quasi-reso-

Ripples nant sounds.

Multiplies the spectrum of the waveform with a variable harmonic, resulting

Formanzilla
in formant-like spectra with several strong peaks and troughs.

Simulates hard sync by contracting the time axis then writing the waveform
Sync Mojo
back into wave memory.

Like Sync Mojo, except that the already contracted wave is contracted
Fractalz again etc.. This results in a fractal waveform with even more harmonics
than Sync Mojo. Fractal structures can be found in nature.

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TOC GENERATORS

A classic 7-stage phaser is applied to the original wave. This effect is

Exophase
equally useful for static coloration or resonant sweeps.

The relative amplitudes of harmonics are scaled, either to the power of 2

Scale (negative, softer) or 3 (positive, brighter). Results in finer resolution of quiet
harmonics, so more precise control over the overtone structure.

Similar to Scrambler (see above), but here the phase is modulated by itself
Scatter squared (i.e. to the power of 2). An FM triangle or square from a pure sine,
or absolute chaos from a sawtooth – Scatter is flexible.

Negative values raise an amplitude threshold below which harmonics are

ChopLift
faded out (Chop). Positive values raise levels of fainter harmonics (Lift).

Adds 3 copies of the original wave to the wavetable. For positive values
(only), the phases are randomly shifted, resulting in a subtle to dramatic
HyperComb
effect similar to chorus. Even when not modulated, positive HyperComb is
dependent on the value of oscillator Resolution.

Phase distortion, as in the ‘80s Casio CZ series of synthesizers. The wave

acts as a function for the phase of an inverse cosine. The ‘amount’ knob
PhaseDist
crossfades between no effect and full effect, so the most dramatic uses of
this effect involve modulating Wave index.

Inverts parts of the wave that extend above or below a threshold. The limits
Wrap
for multiple wrapping are greater with negative values.

DX Same as Trajector (see above), but approximately 10 times stronger.

Smear Blurs the spectrum in one direction (negative = down, positive = up).

MIXER
Click on the oscillator’s MIXER tab:

Pan
Panorama shifts the stereo position to the left or right.

Volume
Oscillator output level.

Width
If the oscillator’s STACK setting is dual, quad or eleven, this knob controls the stereo
separation of the polywave. Does nothing if STACK is set to ‘single’.


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TOC GENERATORS

OSC Lower Panel

Center-stage in the oscillator’s lower panel is its Wave Editor. On the far left is a sub-panel
containing the following elements...

Note: The OSC 1 WAVE panel allows wavetable export to Hive – see the next page!

Preset
Use this button to load or save complete oscillator templates. Left-click to select a pre-
set from a floating window or right-click to open a context menu containing the functions
copy, paste, Save Oscillator(n) Settings and Show in Finder (Mac) / Explorer (Win). The
Copy function can be used to transfer all settings to a different oscillator, even one in
another instance of Zebra2. Show in Finder (Mac) / Explorer (Win) opens a system win-
dow and highlights the oscillator preset folder.
Note that all modulation assignments (e.g. Wave modulated by LFO2) ARE oscillator
settings, while the settings in the modulation sources themselves are NOT. This means
that an oscillator preset might not sound the same as when you saved it.

Waveform
This button selects the basic mode for the current oscillator: Geomorph, SpectroMorph,
GeoBlend or SpectroBlend. All will become clear in the next few pages...

Renderer
Oscillator ‘sharpness’, either soft or crisp. We recommend only switching to crisp if you
really need those extra ‘spikes’ and are not too concerned about aliasing.

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Norm (normalization)
The output level of the generated wave is analyzed (RMS), then low-level waves are
boosted so that the final level would be 0dB if Normalize were set to 100%.
High normalization values are OK for boosting most low-level waves, but please keep
them lower on very spiky waves – unless of course you enjoy blasting a lot of high fre-
quencies through your system!

Resolution
Controls the time between successive waveform calculations, ensuring that Zebra2 is still
very CPU-efficient compared with other synthesizers that calculate their waveforms in realtime.
The range is from 4 seconds (at 1.00) to below one millisecond (at 9.00).
High values lead to more precise transitions at the cost of higher CPU load. Low resolu-
tion can actually make transitions smoother, as intermediates are smoothly interpolated,
but can introduce other unwanted effects e.g. during rapid pitch-modulation. For most
purposes, the default value of 5.00 is best.

KeyS (key scale)

MIDI note to oscillator pitch, centred around the note E2. A bipolar ‘KeyFol’ for the oscil-
lators. for perfect semitones, set this to 100.00.

Wavetable Creation and Export (OSC 1 only)

While developing our Hive 2 synthesizer, we soon
realized that Zebra2 would be a great source of
wavetables, so we added the necessary functions
to the lower oscillator 1 panel of the DotEight skin.

Whenever Zebra2 detects a significant change in the waveform, including any caused
by the spectral effects but not by anything else (e.g. Sync, Stack or PWM) the waveform
will be recorded into a ‘frame’, after which the frame index is incremented.
Saving creates a plain mono WAV file with up to 256 frames containing 2048 samples
each, which can be loaded into Hive 2 or wavetable-based synths such as Xfer Serum.

Quick Walkthrough
• Load HS Ice Temple – LFO2 is modulating oscillator 1 Wave
• Click [REC] – the button turns red
• Play any note – the grey bar starts incrementing…
• After a few seconds, click [REC] again – this pauses the recording
• Click [SAVE] – a new wavetable file will appear in the following location:
Mac MacHD/Library/Application Support/u-he/Zebra2/Wavetables/
Win C:\Users\*YOU*\Documents\u-he\Zebra2.data\Support\Wavetables

The default file name is Z2 Wavetable Export -WT2048 x256.wav (or x42 or however
many frames you actually recorded). To avoid overwriting an existing wavetable with the
same number of frames, double-click where it says [Z2 Wavetable Export] and edit the
name before you start recording.

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The Buttons
[265] The maximum number of frames. Click and drsg up / down.
[REC] Start or pause recording
[CLEAR] Clear the buffer – the orange bar disappears
[SAVE] Save the recording as a wavetable
Note: You cannot audition recorded wavetables within Zebra.

Tips and Pitfalls

You can pause, change the OSC1 waveform any way you like, then resume recording:
New frames will be appended to the current wavetable.
The speed of recording often depends on the oscillator’s Resolution parameter. In gen-
eral the higher the resolution, the faster the buffer is filled.
You can record a series of static waveforms without pause (you don’t have to hit REC
again) by changing the waveform and playing a note for each frame.
Tip: pressing multiple keys at once may result in chaotic recordings. To be on the safe
side it is best to use Legato voice mode.

Gain Scaling
To the right is a sub-panel containing graphic controls for scaling the oscillator gain...

KEY SCALE / GAIN

MIDI note to OSC gain scaling. It can be used to balance oscillator volumes across the
keyboard or even create ‘keyboard splits’ between oscillators. The horizontal axis is
MIDI note (8 octaves) and the vertical axis is oscillator gain, independent of Volume.

VELOCITY SCALE
Velocity to OSC gain scaling: The horizontal axis is MIDI velocity and the vertical axis is
oscillator gain. Again, this feature is independent of the oscillator’s Volume control. Can
be used for velocity cross-fades or even ‘velocity switching’ between oscillators.


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OSC Wave Editor

The Wave Editor is where you create your own waveforms. As the editor manages up to
16 different waves per Waveset, it includes a Wave Selector bar below the editing area:

The wave selector has almost the same function as the Wave knob in the oscillator’s main
panel – if you adjust one, the other will move accordingly. Unlike the Wave knob, however,
the selector doesn’t allow intermediate values (e.g. Wave = 1.5).

Mouse operations in the Wave Selector

Some extra features that work with multiple waves…
Rearrange
(Mac) opt + drag

(Win) ctrl + drag
Morph or Blend
(Mac) cmd + click on the desired target wave

(Win) alt + click on the desired target wave
Duplicate
(Mac) opt + cmd + click on the desired target wave

(Win) ctrl + alt + click on the desired target wave
Context menu (right-click)
Morph / Blend, Duplicate or Exchange this wave with the currently highlighted one

GeoMorph & SpectroMorph

Although there are four oscillator modes, only two editing methods are required. This sec-
tion describes the ‘Morph’ waveform modes and how to edit them.

GeoMorph

A typical GeoMorph wave

GeoMorph mode lets you draw waveforms by positioning up to 32 points, and adjusting
the curvature of the lines between them. Note that the first and last points cannot be delet-
ed or moved horizontally – they define the level at 0° phase. The minimum number of
points is 4, and all waves in the waveset adopt the same total number.

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SpectroMorph

A typical SpectroMorph wave

Although it looks and feels like GeoMorph, SpectroMorph is a very different animal! It does
not depict a waveform directly, but rather its spectrum. 1023 harmonics in the horizontal
axis are scaled logarithmically for a total range of about 10 octaves. In this mode, a hori-
zontal line spanning the width of the editor so that all harmonics have equal levels creates
a bright saw wave. By the way, the example above is a bright saw (the upper horizontal
line) with two wide troughs – practically a dual notch-filtered saw.

Mouse operations, GeoMorph and SpectroMorph modes

Create or remove a handle
(Mac) cmd + right-click

(Win) alt + right-click
Multiple selection
Click in the background and drag over one or more handles

Shift + click on a handle to add or remove it from the selection

To move all selected handles, click and drag one of them
Adjust curvature (left, right)
(Mac) opt + drag, cmd + drag

(Win) ctrl + drag, alt + drag
Context menu (right-click in the editor window)
insert point .....................creates a new handle (appears in all waves in the waveset) 

smooth .............................adjusts all curves in the selection for minimum spikes.

linear .................................straightens all curves in the selection

peaks ................................ adjusts all curves in the selection for maximum spikes

distribute all ...................adjusts the horizontal positions of all handles for equal spacing

line up selected............ line up all handles with the leftmost / rightmost in the selection

clear .................................. resets all handles to minimum level

copy / paste. .................. transfers wavesets between oscillators (also between presets)


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GeoBlend & SpectroBlend

This section describes the two ‘Blend’ waveform modes, and how to edit them...

GeoBlend

A typical GeoBlend wave

A single cycle is defined by 128 columns. GeoBlend is similar to GeoMorph in that it re-
flects the actual shape of the wave. However, when the morph function is used or the
wave index is modulated, waveforms are not morphed, they are blended. The main advan-
tage of GeoBlend over GeoMorph is that waveforms can be drawn freehand.

GeoMorph wavesets can be extracted from audio sources. A few third-party utilities are
available for this purpose (try googling ‘Wav2Zebra’ and ‘Blueberry Thing’), but they do re-
quire some dedication.

SpectroBlend

A typical SpectroBlend wave

The spectrum is represented by 128 bipolar columns. Similar to SpectroMorph except that
it has fewer harmonics, and these are scaled linearly for a total range of six octaves.

The lower half is ‘anti-phase’, so the same harmonic in adjacent waves (e.g. 1 and 2), but
with opposite phases, can cancel each other out (at exactly 1.50 in this example). This
cancellation effect can be put to good use – see the oscillator preset ‘Bells Flipper’.
The main advantage of SpectroBlend over SpectroMorph is the total control over individual
harmonics, including polarity. Waves are not morphed in this mode, they are blended.


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Mouse operations in GeoBlend and SpectroBlend modes

draw freehand
click + drag
draw a straight line
(Mac) opt + drag

(Win) ctrl + drag
reset sections to zero
(Mac) cmd + drag

(Win) alt + drag
context menu (right-click)
blur..........................softens transitions between columns

sharpen ................accentuates transitions between columns

maximize ............. sets the highest column to maximum, scales the rest accordingly

copy / paste........ transfers wavesets between oscillators (even between presets)

Expand
A much larger version of the wave editor opens when you click on the vertical [EDITOR]
button to the left of the data area. To exit, click on the same vertical button, which has
been conveniently renamed CLOSE. While the wave editor is expanded, the lower pane
contains a copy of the oscillator panel.

Zebralette
Making your own sounds in Zebralette (freeware, bundled with Zebra2) is the best way to
become a true Zebra2 oscillator expert, as there is zero risk of being distracted by all the
other Zebra2 features! Zebralette has its own user guide.

Tip: You can load Zebralette programs into Zebra2!


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FMO main panel

FMO stands for Frequency Modulation Oscillator, and this module is indeed closely related
to the famous Yamaha DX7. Compare the Zebra2 preset HS DY7 Add Pad with the typical
DX7 e-piano sounds of the 1980s, which were often layered with analogue pads.

the FMO module panel

TYPE (input mode)
FM by input: The FMO is modulated by its input, and the FM knob controls input level.
FM self (+): The FMO modulates itself for a brighter tone approaching a sawtooth. Note
that FM values above 50% can produce some interesting digital noise.
RM input: The FMO is actually ring-modulated with its input. No FM here!
Filtered FM: Like FM by Input mode, except that the FM knob opens a lowpass filter in-
stead of setting the input level (which is fixed at 100%). This results in a warmer tone.
FM self2 (+): Like FM Self (+) except that the input signal is the output squared. Great
for triangular / squarish tones, including a pure ‘shark-fin’ wave when the FM depth is
somewhere between 25 and 30.

Mono / Stereo
Like the OSC module, the FMO can also run in stereo mode. This is hardly noticeable
unless the FMO is detuned and Width is turned up because, unlike OSC modules, the
phase of an FMO is always reset to zero when a note is played.

Tune
FMO pitch offset (+/- 48 semitones).

Detune
If the FMO is in mono mode, Detune lowers or raises the pitch by +/- 50 cents. In stereo
mode, it is a detune spread – it sharpens the left channel and flattens the right channel
at the same time. Of course you can still fine tune the FMO via Shift+Tune.

Width
Stereo spread while the FMO is in stereo mode.

Vibrato
The amount of pitch modulation directly from LFO1 (0 – 100). The maximum depth here
is only +/- 50 cents. If you need deeper vibrato, click on the assignable knob below
‘Tune’, select LFO1 from the list and set the amount to about 1.00.

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Pan
Shifts the stereo position to the left or right. Works for mono or stereo (see above).

Volume
Output level.

FM
Generally FM depth / input level – see TYPE on the previous page for details.


FMO lower panel

Like the standard oscillators, the FMOs use the lower panel for extra parameters. Unlike
the standard oscillators, all four FMOs share the same panel:

part of the FMO lower panel

Generator Mode (rectangular icon)

Click to select from a list of alternatives to the standard sine wave. The current mode
appears to the right of the graphic – for the FMO1 in this screenshot it is pure sine, for
FMO2 it is quadric shift.

Key Scale Pitch (unlabelled horizontal slider)

MIDI note to FMO pitch, -200 to 200 centred around the note E2. A bipolar ‘KeyFol’ for
the FMO modules. Double-click to set the default 100 (perfect semitones).

KEY SCALE / GAIN

MIDI note to FMO gain scaling. The horizontal axis is the full 8 octaves of MIDI notes
and the vertical axis is the volume of the FMO from 0 to 100%, independent of the
FMO’s regular Volume setting. This feature can be used to balance volumes across the
keyboard, for instance, or to define ‘keyboard splits’.

VELOCITY / GAIN
Velocity to FMO gain scaling. The horizontal axis is MIDI velocity from 0 (actually 1) to
127 and the vertical axis is the volume of the FMO from 0 to 100%, independent of the
FMO’s regular Volume setting. This feature can be used to create velocity cross-fades
between oscillators or even define velocity-switching (see FMO1 in the above image).


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Noise
Noise has traditionally been used for percussive sounds, wind effects, explosions etc..

Noise module panel

TYPE
A choice of four different flavours of noise:
White is a random signal with equal power across the spectrum.
Pink is darker – high frequencies are attenuated by 3dB / octave.
Digital is a square wave with random polarity, like a very lo-fi oscillator. It can be played
in tune if LP Cutoff is modulated by KeyFol with the amount set to 64.00.
Crackles produces random impulses, like a Geiger counter or a worn-out vinyl record.

Mono / Stereo
Even the noise modules can be stereo. See Width below.

LP Cutoff, HP Cutoff
Lowpass and highpass filters. In both White and Pink modes, the LP is 6dB/octave, as
is the HP. In Digital mode, the LP is actually pitch, while the HP adds more irregularities.
In Crackles mode, the HP reduces the probability of impulses.

Pan
Shifts the stereo position towards the left or right channels.

Volume
Noise output level.

Width
Controls stereo spread if the stereo switch is on. See Mono/Stereo above.


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VCF
VCF stands for Voltage Controlled Filter. Although there are no high voltages in Zebra2
pushing and pulling electrons around, but most of Zebra’s VCF types are almost as ‘alive’
as their analogue forbears. Note: The VCF modules are less CPU-hungry than the XMF
modules (see 2 pages down).

VCF module panel

Filter Types

24dB lowpass, with a frequency-dependent exciter as Drive,

LP Xcite
adding high frequencies.

CPU-friendly 24dB lowpass, with a strong resonance and smooth

LP Allround
coloration via Drive.

Boosts mid-range frequencies via Drive, good for leads that can
LP MidDrive
cut through the mix.

Adds even-numbered harmonics, for a vintage sound bordering on

LP OldDrive
‘cheesy’!

Vocal filter type combining a non-resonant 12dB/octave lowpass

LP Formant with a resonant formant stage. The Formant parameter replaces
resonance, and the vowel parameter morphs through A–E–I–O–U.
Great for ‘singing’ voices and vocoder-like pads. Note: The mod
target of the righthand assignable knob is the Vowel parameter!

LP Vintage CPU-cheap analogue-modeled transistor ladder with 24dB rolloff.

LP 12dB A 12dB version of LP Allround

LP 6dB A simple lowpass with a very shallow rolloff, non-resonant

BP RezBand A resonant 12dB bandpass model

BP QBand Another resonant bandpass, with a different character

HP 24dB Resonant 24dB highpass

HP 12dB 12dB version of the above

BR Notch 24dB band reject

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Peak / reject filter, like parametric ‘mid’ on a mixer. Res controls

EQ Peaking the slope of the peak. Gain has a range of -20dB (deep notch) to
+24dB (strong peak). This type has little or no effect if Gain is zero.

Two shelving models, to complete the trio of ‘parametric EQ’ filters.

EQ LoShelf
Like in EQ Peaking, Gain attenuates or boosts the frequency
EQ HiShelf
range (low or high), and the Res parameter controls the slope.

The two phasing models use 4 or 8 stage all-pass (AP) filters to

AP Phaser4 generate typical phasing effects. Cutoff controls the center fre-
AP Phaser8 quency, and Res controls intensity. In the Phaser8 model, the Split
parameter detunes the 8 stages.

LP Vintage2 CPU-intensive version of LP Vintage, capable of self-oscillation.

Not really a filter, this is a sample-rate reduction processor. The

SR Decimate Cutoff parameter controls rate, meaning it can be tuned harmoni-
cally (set KeyF to 100). Neither Res nor Drive are used.
TyrellN6’s state variable lowpass. An octave higher than other
LP TN6SVF *
types!

LP MS2035 * Early version of Diva’s rev1 BITE lowpass

LP S20SK * Early version of Diva’s rev2 BITE lowpass

* The last 3 were included by mistake in a previous version of Zebra, and reintroduced for
compatibility reasons. Note: the CPU hit is significantly higher than the other types.

Controls
Cutoff
The Cutoff determines a filter’s edge-frequency. Like all frequency parameters in Ze-
bra2, the scale is in semitones, as tuning cutoff in musical terms makes more sense
than the very scientific ‘Hertz’. With KeyF (key follow) turned down, the cutoff values of
most filter types correspond to MIDI note numbers minus 12 (one octave). For instance,
with cutoff set to 81.00 a filter would resonate at 440Hz (middle A).

Resonance
Resonance is an internal feedback loop that emphasizes the cutoff frequency. In some
filter types (e.g. EQ Peaking), this parameter is actually a Q-factor, the slope of a band
centred around the cutoff frequency.

KeyF
The ‘key follow’ parameter adjusts how strongly the cutoff follows MIDI notes (the higher
the note, the higher the cutoff). At 100%, it follows semitones precisely.

Drive / Gain
The Drive or Gain parameter of a filter usually adds some kind of distortion. In Zebra’s
VCF this is more of a generic ‘flavour’ parameter – see the remarks in the above list.

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XMF
The XMF (cross-modulation filter) module is an extremely flexible multimode filter featuring
self-oscillation, input-dependent distortion and audio-rate FM via the extra input. The XMF
is more CPU-intensive than any of the VCF models. For more details, see the flow dia-
grams towards the end of this document.

XMF module panel

There are 15 filter types / combinations, but you actually have two of these in stereo, with
differential cutoff. So if you ever need a 3-pole allpass in parallel (or series) with a 2-pole
bandreject / lowpass combination... no problem!
Distortion in the XMF is highly dependent on the level of the input signals – they affect the
sound as much as Overload does. You should try e.g. oscillator volumes as low as 2%!

Filter Types
From top to bottom, the four switches in the window are: Type1, Routing, Type2, Driver.

Type1
LP4, LP3, LP2, LP1 .........Lowpass modes, 4 slopes (24, 18, 12 and 6 dB per octave).
HP3, HP2, HP1 .................Highpass models, three different slopes
BP4, BP2..............................
Bandpass, two different slopes.
BR2 .........................................Bandreject, 2-pole only
AP3..........................................
Allpass, 3-pole only
HP3LP, HP2LP ...................Combination of 3-pole or 2-pole highpass + 2-pole lowpass
BR2LP ...................................Combination of 2-pole bandreject + 2-pole lowpass
AP3LP .................................... Combination of 3-pole allpass + 2-pole lowpass.

Routing (R)
Each XMF module has two stereo filters, which can be routed in four different ways:
single ...............Standard mode. Actually two filters with stereo-splittable cutoff values for
spectacular panning effects – try modulating Offset with an LFO.
serial .................Type1 filter is fed into the Type2 filter.
parallel.............
Type1 and Type2 filters are output separately.
diff’ed ..............The difference signal (Type1 minus Type2). Note that if the two types are
the same and there is zero offset, the result is total cancellation.
Type2
same ................Type2 adopts the Type1 setting. For all other options, see the Type1 list.

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Driver (D)
Five options for the resonance / overload character. Note that output volumes can vary
depending on the Resonance and Overload values (see below).
XMF ..................Standard high-quality – plenty of bite.
analogue ........Classic ladder filter overdrive – warm / dark.
biased ..............Diode-like asymmetrical distortion, for more even-numbered harmonics.
eco. ...................CPU-friendly version of analogue, lower quality Overload (see below).
folded ..............Positive peaks that would otherwise clip are folded back down.

Controls
Cutoff
Cutoff determines the filter’s edge-frequency. Like all frequency parameters in Zebra2,
the scale is in semitones – tuning cutoff in musical terms makes more sense than the
more scientific ‘Hertz’. Cutoff values correspond to standard MIDI note numbers minus
12 (one octave), so 81.00 means a middle A (440Hz) before any modulation.

Res (resonance)
Resonance is an internal feedback loop that emphasizes the cutoff frequencies. High
resonance is very interesting in combination with Overload. Set Resonance to maxi-
mum, and the filter will self-oscillate (see Click below).

KeyF
KeyFollow, the depth of cutoff modulation from MIDI note / keyboard. At 100%, it follows
semitones perfectly. Note that the breakpoint (the key that doesn’t change) here is E2.

Offset
Splits the cutoff values of the two channels, in semitones (+/-48). Great for panning ef-
fects with the standard single routing, or for multiple resonances in serial, parallel or
diff’ed mode (see the previous page). Offset has a assignable modulation knob.

FM
For audio-rate cutoff modulation (‘Filter FM’) from the XMF’s second input. By default,
the FM source is the same as the input signal, but using a different FM source can be
highly rewarding: right-click on the [XMF] cell to change the sidechain input to another
lane – and put something in that lane! FM also has a assignable modulation knob.

Over (overload)
Pushes the filter ‘too far’! For interesting distortion effects and general oomph. Note that
high overload can amplify the signal a lot – you might need to reduce the level else-
where e.g. the volume control of the lane you are using. See also Character above.

Click
Injects a short impulse into the filter at the start of each note. Turn up for harder attacks
or more instantaneous self-oscillation.

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Comb
Comb ‘filters’ are based on ultra-short delay lines with feedback. Even if the input is a very
short impulse, the feedback can turn it into a slowly decaying or even sustaining tone. The
frequency response curve resembles a regular row of spikes, hence the name.

Comb module panel

You can create envelope-driven polyphonic flangers, realistic plucked and bowed strings,
flutes, mallet and other percussion instruments… but remember to turn up Feedb!

Switches
MODE
Comb ...............A simple stereo delay tuned to the played note. Note: In this mode, neither
Tone nor Flavour have any effect.
Split Comb ....Any input is summed to mono and fed to the first of two delays, which then
cross-feed each other. In this mode, Tone is the ratio between the delay
times, while Flavour controls the amount of input signal fed directly into the
second delay. The output is split: the left channel is delay 1 and the right
channel is delay 2.
Split Dual .......The same as Split Comb except that input signal is not summed to mono.
Diff Comb.......The same as Split Dual except that the second ‘delay’ is actually an all-
pass filter. This mode is especially good for strange, complex sounds. The
Flavour parameter is the feedback of the allpass filter. As non-harmonic
frequencies can dominate, you may have to tune this one very carefully.
Dissonant ......A 4x4 feedback delay network. Metallic. The Tone and Flavour parameters
both affect the delay ratios (i.e. the pitches), but Distort is unused.
Cluster.............Experimental, included for compatibility reasons: Use at your own risk!
Blown...............This mode uses a bandpass filter in the feedback path to accentuate
harmonics rather than the fundamental. Modulating the Flavour parameter
is especially interesting. You can get very realistic flutes and trumpets etc.,
but it does require careful tuning.

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PREFILL TYPE
The comb has an impulse generator so it can generate sound without requiring an input
signal. The impulse can be one of three different waveforms:
Noise ..........a short burst of white noise, different for each note
Saw .............a single cycle sawtooth (full / warm)
Square .......a single cycle square wave (hollow, nasal)

SOUND, OUTPUT
These tabs swap out the bottom row of knobs – see the next page.


Main controls

Comb panel, main controls

PreFill
The level of the internal impulse signal. See Impulse above.

Tune
Nominal pitch. The range is +/-24 semitones.

Detune
For Split Comb this is normal fine tuning. In other modes it detunes in both directions.

Vibrato
Amount of pitch modulation directly from LFO1 (0 – 100), with a range of +/- 50 cents.

Input
Input level. Negative values invert the signal to be processed, so you can use the Comb
module as an audio signal inverter.

Damp
A 6dB lowpass filter in the feedback path simulates how a plucked string is naturally
dampened by various physical constraints.

Feedbk
Bipolar feedback level control. Negative values lower the pitch by an octave, and the
timbre is more hollow.


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SOUND

Comb panel, SOUND sub-panel

Tone
The function of this parameter changes from mode to mode. Usually a ratio between
delay times. For details, see MODE above.

Flavour
The function of this parameter changes from mode to mode. Usually a level within one
or more feedback paths. For details, see MODE above.

Distort
Distortion adds harmonics into the feedback. Use with caution!

KeyScale
MIDI note to pitch, centered around the note E2. Effectively a bipolar ‘KeyFol’ for the
comb. Leave at 100.00 for semitone steps (a double-click takes you straight to 100). For
flanging and resonance effects, set KeyScale to 0.00 and take the Tune value down.

OUTPUT

Comb panel, OUTPUT sub-panel

Volume
Comb output level. Careful! If this reaches zero either through modulation or simply by
turning down the Volume knob, the Dry signal suddenly shoots up to 100%. Whether
this is a feature or a bug, it can make interesting rhythms – try modulating Volume from
an LFO, and adjusting the Volume knob.

Pan
Panorama shifts the stereo position of the processed signal towards the left or right.
Pan does not affect the position(s) of the Dry signal.
Dry
Unprocessed “throughput” from whatever is fed into the Comb.

Width
Stereo separation of the processed signal. Does not affect the Dry signal.

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SB (Sideband)
The Sideband module is a stereo frequency shifter, the origins of which go back to the ear-
ly days of radio. Related to ring modulation in which two signals are multiplied, resulting in
two ‘sidebands’. The Sideband module can also lend the signal a metallic character, as
frequencies are shifted by a constant (e.g. 100Hz) instead of a factor (e.g. 2.00 times).
While the ‘beating’ effect of mild oscillator detuning can become irritatingly fast when you
play higher up the keyboard, frequency shifting keeps this effect constant.

SideBand module panel

Range
The SB module offers 3 bipolar frequency range options, which all start at 0Hz (center):
10Hz ...........for relatively slow-moving cyclical effects e.g. stereo phasing.

200Hz ........for low-frequency effects e.g. deep bells, rumbles... or even phone dial-tones

4kHz ...........for high-frequency or very wide range effects

Freq
Bipolar frequency shift. Positive values make the upper sideband louder.

Offset
Bipolar offset between left and right channels. Great for stereo rotary effects. Offset can
be used for a special kind of phasing that continually rises in the left channel, while con-
tinually falling in the right channel. Check this out in headphones: Set the range to
10Hz, Freq to zero, Offset to 2.00, Mix to 50 – and feed it a medium dose of pink noise!

Mix
Bipolar cross-fade between the original signal and the frequency-shifted signal. Nega-
tive values invert the processed signal. For maximum phasing effects, set to +/-50.

Shape
The Shapers are input level dependent distortion units with a choice of 4 algorithms.

Shaper module panel


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TYPE
Shape ........Classic waveshaper. The Depth parameter adds a DC bias before the
shaper, making it positively asymmetrical (for even-numbered harmonics like
‘tube’ distortion). Note that the DC bias can considerably reduce signal level.
T-Drive .......Frequency-dependent waveshaper, like a transformer. Can boost ‘presence’.
Crush .........Bit-reduction via Depth knob. Neither Input nor HiOut are used in this mode.
Wedge .......A high-order waveshaper with foldback function (loud signals can become
silent or even phase-inverted). The Depth knob boosts the input signal, con-
trolling the distortion amount. Positioned after a resonant filter this type can
emulate ‘acid basslines’.

Depth
Distortion threshold, effectively a distortion amount control. Like a guitar amplifier, every
knob in this module affects the amount of distortion in some way or other!

Edge
The main tone control.

Input / Output
Attenuate / boost the input and output signals. Also affects tone...

HiOut
Attenuates / amplifies high frequencies – the final tone control in this module!

Distortion
The Distortion module creates traditional analogue-type saturation. If used in the FX Grid,
it can mimic a complete guitar amplifier and speaker cabinet.

input amp → pre tilt filter → distortion → post tilt filter → post filter → output amp

Distortion module panel

TYPE
Tube Class A ...........Simulates a complete tube preamplifier. Class-A is the 'traditional'
type of tube distortion, creating both odd and even harmonics by us-
ing a single tube and applying DC bias. Due to the asymmetry of the
operational curve, Class A distortion sounds relatively warm.
Tube Class AB........Simulates a preamplifier with two tubes in a ‘push-pull’ arrangement,
which leads to symmetrical distortion with no even-harmonic partials.

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Tube 2 Stages ........Mimics a tube amplifier with two class-A stages in series. Like class
A, this also creates odd and even harmonics, but the results are rich-
er and more dynamic. This mode applies additional internal filtering
and feedback for more sonic complexity. At high gain settings you
should hear more pronounced treble roll-off and more bass lift.
Hard Clip ...................This mode simply chops off the top and bottom of the waveform.
Rectify.........................Full-wave rectification. The negative half-wave becomes positive and
the resulting waveform is fed through a DC-blocking filter. Interesting
note: A pure triangle wave will be simply doubled in frequency, with-
out altering the waveform.
Foldback....................Also known as 'fold-over distortion'. Foldback is similar to soft clip-
ping, except that increasing the gain does not slam the signal against
the ceiling (it reduces the gain instead). Listen out for strange inter-
modulation artifacts!

Input, Output
Sets the gain (in decibels) at the input

Output
Sets the final output gain. Note that this stage includes soft clipping, which can create
even more distortion when turned up ‘too high’

Pre Tilt
A combination of low and high-shelving EQ is applied to the input signal, and Pre-Tilt
makes the distortion frequency-dependent (at zero, the response remains flat). Nega-
tive Pre-Tilt strengthens the bass and dampens the treble, positive values strengthen
the treble and dampen the bass.

Center Freq
Combined low and high shelf frequency control.

Post Tilt
Use this to balance the tone (in a similar manner to Pre-Tilt) after the distortion.

Low and High

In Dual-Band Shelf mode (see Post Filter below), these knobs control the gains of the
shelving filters. In Guitar Cab 4x12 mode they determine the amount of cabinet reso-
nance i.e. bass and speaker 'edge'.

POST FILTER
Dual-Band Shelf: This is a simple corrective EQ – a low shelf fixed at 100Hz and a high
shelf fixed at 10kHz. See Low and High above.
Guitar Cab 4x12: This mode mimics the frequency response of a very popular vintage
speaker cabinet, producing its typical mid-range focused sound (including peaks and
dips caused by resonance within the cabinet as well as the effects of close miking).


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Ring
Ring modulation is a variant of amplitude modulation (AM):
Two input signals are balanced so that they disappear com-
pletely, leaving only the sum and difference frequencies.
These frequencies are seldom harmonically related, so ring
modulation is often used for bell-type sounds. For the purest
results, use sine waves – FMOs and/or SpectroBlend OSCs.
The ring modulators in Zebra2 don’t require a panel, but they
do need two input signals. The image to the right is the result
of right-clicking on the ‘Ring1’ cell. SideChain 2 is selected so
that FMO1 is being ring modulated with OSC 1.
The circuit originally used to implement this technique in ana-
logue devices had the shape of a ring, hence the name. With
today’s computers, ring modulation is very easy to achieve:
the two signals are simply multiplied.

Mix
This modules can mix two signals, it can be used for cross-fading (‘Mix’ is a modulation
target) or for reducing stereo width: Select ‘Pan Mono’ and set Mix to 100 – you will only
hear the sidechain signal now, fully mono.

Mix module panel

Mixers can often be avoided. In the lefthand

image here, Mix1 was added so that the unfil-
tered signal could be sent down lane 2 to be
treated separately (FX). However, the mixer
isn’t actually necessary for this patch, as the
arrangement on the right does the same job.

PAN MODE
Bal L-R, Pan L-R, Bal R-L, Pan R-L and Pan Mono.
With the Pan knob set to the center, the two Balance modes have 0dB of gain for both
channels – only one channel is attenuated as the control is moved away from the center
position. The Pan L-R and Pan R-L modes, however, mix one channel onto the other
while adhering to the Pan Law (google those two words!)

Pan, Mix
The stereo position and relative levels of the two inputs.

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Fold
A ‘wavefolder’ is a special kind of waveshaper which maps the input signal onto a sine,
folding it back on itself multiple times. Like hardware wavefolders, Zebra2’s Fold sounds
best when applied to signals with very little high frequency content – try a pure FMO first.

Fold module panel with 6 Ripples, 22% Folds, 30% Bias and maximum Slope

Ripples
The total number of cycles, from 1 to 7.

Live View
This button activates realtime animation of any Folds and Bias modulation. If you need
to save CPU, leave it disabled.

Folds
The percentage of Ripples used. Note: As it is effectively an input level control, setting
Folds to zero without any modulation will result in silence.

Bias
This parameter shifts the used section of the curve to the left or right. Bias modulation is
applied in opposite directions per stereo channel, resulting in a unique stereo effect.

Ratio
The relative level of the ripples, effectively an output boost control.

Slope
Tilts the curve downwards or upwards.

Soft Clip
The smoothness of the two ‘knees’ to the left and right of the ripples.

Note: Fold is highly sensitive to variations in signal levels and phase between the various
sample rates. If your preset sounds too different after switching to a higher sample rate, try
adjusting the Folds parameter, then save as “name-of-preset (96k)” or similar.


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Modulators
Modulation is what we use to turn static tones into interesting instruments or soundscapes.
Zebra2 lets you modulate practically any ‘target’ parameter in the synth. As well as LFOs
and envelopes, the list of modulators include standard MIDI messages for external control:
pitchbend, mod-wheel (CC#01), polyphonic or channel aftertouch, velocity and Gate.

Notes: Practically all the controls can be automated. Using the X/Y performance pads is
the best way to control a lot of parameters at once, and they can also be automated.

List of Modulation Sources

ModWhl modulation wheel (CC#01)

PitchW pitch wheel / pitch bender

CtrlA MIDI control A, default = Breath (CC#02)

CtrlB MIDI control B, default = Expression (CC#11)

LfoG(1,2) global LFOs

Gate note on/off

KeyFol(2) key follow (center = E2) + glide. (2) includes glide offset

Velocity MIDI note velocity

ATouch channel or key (polyphonic) aftertouch, smoothened.

ArpMod(1,2) arpeggiator modulation

Env(1-4) standard envelopes

MSEG(1-4) Multi-Stage Envelope Generators

Lfo(1-4) voice LFOs

MMap(1,2) modulation mappers

MMix(1-4) modulation mixers



For a complete list of all modulation targets, go here.


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Modulation Matrix
All generator panels include assignable knobs (unused ones appear with an ellipsis … as
label) for setting up local modulation. The mod matrix is where you can set up any kind of
modulation – the image below shows just three of the twelve modulation slots...

SRC
The lefthand knob selects the primary modulator and sets its (bipolar) amount.

VIA
The righthand knob sets the amount that a secondary modulator affects how much of
the primary modulator reaches its target. Odd behaviour: When the VIA source is at
minimum, negative amounts of VIA scale the modulation depth from 100% to 200%.

TARGET
The parameter to be modulated. Because of the recently implemented drag & drop
function (see below), opening the list of modulation targets now requires a right-click.

Two examples: In slot 10, Env2

decay is negatively modulated by
Aftertouch: The harder you press,
the shorter the decay.
In slot 11, Env2 modulates oscilla-
tor detuning, at 100%. However,
this amount is partially scaled by
the mod wheel – the amount of
Env2 reaching its target will be less
than maximum until the mod wheel
is at maximum. If ‘VIA’ is set to
+100% instead, none of the Env2
signal will reach the oscillator un-
less the wheel is pushed.

Drag & Drop

As a quick alternative to selecting a target from the menu, you can use Drag & Drop.
Left-click on a Target selector, drag the crosshair onto a control in the Synthesis page
then release the mouse button.
Of course you don’t have drag & drop access to any of the controls in the lower pane
(Global, Osc 1, Osc 2 etc.), but these are available in the target’s context menu.

Tricky Intervals
Setting precise pitch intervals in the modulation matrix requires a bit of arithmetic, as
the 96 semitone range (+/- 4 octaves) is mapped onto 100 steps. For instance:
12 semitones (octave) 100 / 96 x 12 = 12.50 absolutely precise

7 semitones (a fifth) 100 / 96 x 7 = 07.29 also try 07.30 and 07.31

1 semitone 100 / 96 = 1.04 more precisely 1.04167

Note: If the modulation source is bipolar e.g. an LFO, you should halve the modulation
amount, as the 96 semitone range is mapped onto 200 steps instead (-100 to +100).


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ENV
When you load init, envelope 1 is already visible in the modulators pane because in this
preset it is designated as the audio envelope for all 4 lanes of the main grid.

an ENV module in v-slope mode

Although it looks like a regular ADSR with just a few extras, the ENV module has several
tricks up its sleeve: It is syncable, loopable, and offers 2-stage attack or release…

Switches
TIME BASE
8sX ........................up to 8 seconds, knob scale is exponential (mid-position is 1 second)
16sX .....................up to 16 seconds, knob scale is exponential (mid-position is 2 seconds)
10s .........................up to 10 seconds, knob scale is linear, so 20.00 means 2 seconds etc.
1/4,1/1, 4/1 ........times are relative to song tempo (beat, bar, 4 bars), knob scale is linear

MODE
Specifies the curvature of all time-based envelope stages. There are 3 options:
quadric .................exponential curves. Attack is convex, Decay and Release are concave
linear .....................straight lines. Linear envelopes can sound unnatural
v-slope .................exponential curvature via slider: the far left position is very concave, -50
is close to quadric, the center is linear, the far right is very convex

NOTE ON NOTE OFF NOTE NOTE OFF

ON

INIT ATTACK DECAY SUSTAIN RELEASE DELAY ATTACK DECAY SUSTAIN RELEASE

Main ADSR envelope stages, here with Init and Delay Pre-Attack (see the next page)


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Controls
Pre-Attack
Although it resembles assignable modulation, the top lefthand knob actually controls
one of two parameters at the beginning of the envelope:
Init: The Attack stage starts at a level other than zero (see left-hand image above)
Delay: The Attack stage is delayed (see right-hand image above)

Attack
The time it takes for the envelope to rise from zero (or the Init value) to maximum

Decay
The time it takes to drop from maximum to the Sustain level

Sustain
The level after Decay. Normally remains at that position until the note is released

The extra envelope stages below can be tricky. If you prefer regular ADSRs, simply ignore
the following options...

F/R (Fall / Rise time)

Negative values: either fall to zero, or fall/rise to the Sust2 level (see Post-Sustain)

Positive values: either rise to maximum, or fall/rise to the Sust2 level

Post-Sustain
This knob is NOT for assignable modulation, but for the following extra options:
Sust2 ..........a second Sustain level, after F/R
LoopA ........loop back to Attack
LoopD ........loop back to Decay
LoopS ........loop back to Sustain
Rel(nn) .......extra release stage (the ‘nn’ numbers are percentages of maximum level)

Note: The diagrams below are simplifications. For example, Release (or Rel25/50/75/100)
can start at any point within the envelope, as it is initiated by a MIDI Note Off message. 


NOTE NOTE OFF NOTE NOTE OFF

ON ON

+ F/R
F/R
-

ATTACK DECAY SUSTAIN RELEASE ATTACK DECAY SUSTAIN SUST2 RELEASE

Normal F/R behaviour, no Sust2 stage F/R behaviour when there is a Sust2 stage

(two possible Sust2 values shown here)


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NOTE NOTE
ON ON

+ +
F/R F/R
- -

ATTACK DECAY SUSTAIN LOOP A ATTACK DECAY SUSTAIN LOOP D

LoopA: Time to return from end of F/R LoopD: Time to return from end of F/R

(100 or zero) to zero (start of Attack). (100 or zero) to 100 (start of Decay)

NOTE NOTE NOTE OFF

ON ON
100

+ 75
F/R
- 50

25

ATTACK DECAY SUSTAIN LOOP S ATTACK DECAY SUSTAIN REL nn RELEASE

LoopS: Time to return from end of F/R Rel25/50/75/100: Time to rise or fall from

(100 or zero) to Sustain level. Sustain to 25/50/75/100%, followed by the

normal Release stage.

Release
The time it takes to drop to zero after a note is released. See also Rel(nn) above.

Velocity
For dynamic envelopes – keyboard velocity scales the envelope’s output level.

VELOCITY SCALE and KEY SCALE

To see these controls, click on the [+] icon in the top righthand corner of the panel.

ENV module, with scaling sub-panel open

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All these knobs correspond to the parameters in the upper sub-panel. For instance, posi-
tive Velocity Scale for Decay will lengthen the decay times as you play harder, and nega-
tive Key Scale for Release will shorten the release times of higher notes, etc..

MSEG
The Multi Stage Envelope Generator is a complex modulation source offering total shape
control as well as continuous rate control. Click on the MSEG 1 button in the lower bar…

Many different uses for MSEGs can be found in the factory presets. A few examples:
Rhythms: 6 Lupins / Twangle

Pitches: 6 Lupins / Seven of Eight (MSEG 3)

Multiple attacks: 8 Perkers / Drums of Mordor+ (MSEG 1 and 2)

Combinations: 2 Leaders / I am Zebra (All 4 MSEGs)

Snappy envelopes: 6 Lupins / How Money More Times

Twisted regularity: 7 Noises / Combotor (MSEG 2, MATRIX slot 02)

Controls
Preset (unlabeled)
Like the oscillators, MSEGs can be loaded and saved. Click on the long button to load
from the mini-browser, or right-click to select from a menu or save to the current folder.
The MSEG browser’s context menu includes ‘reveal’ and ‘refresh’ functions – use these
whenever you want to transfer MSEG templates.

Time Unit
Selects the unit that will correspond to integer steps in the editor’s time-line. Note that
the timing can always be shifted by setting non-zero Attack, Loop or Release values.
Sixteenth / Quarters / Notes: These are note lengths, synchronized to song tempo.

Seconds: Units are 4 seconds long. For seconds, set Attack / Loop / Release to 2.00.

Trigger
poly .............standard polyphonic

single ..........only retriggers after all notes are released (like organ “percussion” register)

mono ..........standard monophonic

Attack
Slows down / speeds up everything before the loop. -1.00 is half speed, 1.00 is double
speed, 2.00 is quadruple speed etc..


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Loop
Loop speed: -1.00 is half speed, 1.00 is double speed, 2.00 is quadruple speed etc..

Release
Slows down / speeds up everything after the loop. -1.00 is half speed, 1.00 is double
speed, 2.00 is quadruple speed etc..

Velocity
For dynamic envelopes – velocity controls the MSEG output level, as a percentage.

Editor functions
Expand
For a larger EDITOR, click on the vertical label to the left of the data area. To exit again,
click on the same button (conveniently renamed “CLOSE”).
While an MSEG is expanded, the lower pane becomes an editable list of all its uses,
either as assignable knobs in the panels, or in the modulation matrix. Modulation depths
can be adjusted here, either by moving the slider left-right or the VALUE vertically.
Source assignments can even be added by clicking on the Add button. To remove an
assignment, click on the [x] button to the right.

Edit Mode Switches

Above the MSEG1 selector button are three small icons. From left to right, these are:
Single .........moves individual handles, the other handles remain fixed

Shift ............moves individual handles, all following handles also move

Draw ...........moves multiple handles vertically – click on a handle and ‘draw’
Note that handles will jump to the nearest unit snap and value snap positions if these
are defined (see Context Menu on the next page).

Create New Handle (max. = 33)

Mac .............cmd + click on the background

Win ..............alt + click on the background

Curvature
Click on a line and drag it in any direction to adjust the curvature. S-curves are also
possible: Hands-on experience is better than a detailed explanation here. To straighten
a curve, left-click on it and release immediately.

Zoom & Scroll

To zoom in or out, click on the background and drag up or down. For ‘optimum’ zoom,
double-click in the background. To scroll to invisible sections of the envelope, click and
drag left / right.


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Context Menu (right-click in the background)

Copy / Paste .................clipboard functions

Half Size ..........................shortens the envelope

Double Size ...................lengthens the envelope

Upside Down ................inverts the envelope

Unit Snap ........................horizontally restricts new input to 3, 4, 6 or 8 steps per unit
Value Snap .....................vertically restricts new input to 12, 24, 36, 48 or 15 levels
Quantise to Snap ........ quantizes all points to the nearest step (see unit snap)
Unit Spacing .................distributes all points to successive units
Even Spacing................
evenly distributes all points

Pointer off .......................to save CPU, hide the position indicator

Pointer coarse ..............default resolution of the position indicator

Pointer fine ....................higher resolution of the position indicator

Context Menu (right-click on a point)

Remove Point (min. = 2), Loop Start and Loop End are self-explanatory. To make a loop
of zero length, delete the point currently set as ‘loop end’. MSEGs continue looping after
the note has been released if the loop end is set to the very last point.

LFO
Alongside envelopes, low frequency oscillators represent THE classic modulators – for vi-
brato or any cyclic movement e.g. a slowly drifting tonal change:

This is called a ‘voice’ (or polyphonic) LFO because, unlike the LFOG, it is instantiated per
voice – every note you play gets its own LFO. The main advantage over the LFOG is that
different notes in a chord can have different amplitudes, phases and rates.
In all OSC, FM and Comb modules, ‘Vibrato’ is permanently connected to LFO 1. To set up
traditional vibrato control via mod-wheel, click on the knob to the left of ‘Amp’, select
‘ModWhl’ and turn the knob up... and turn up the ‘Vibrato’ levels!

WAVEFORM
sine ......................... pure sine wave
triangle ..................pure triangle wave
saw up ..................rising saw (‘ramp’)
saw down ............falling saw
sqr lo-hi ................square wave, restarted at the lower level
sqr hi-lo ................square wave, restarted at the higher level
rand hold ............. random steps
rand glide ............random curves
user ........................up to 32 steps, user-drawn…

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User mode options

The MODE buttons on the right select either discrete levels (steps) or connecting lines:

The STEPS selector specifies the number of points, from 2 to 32.

Note that SYNC (see below) sets the length of each step, so a complete cycle in the
upper example would be 16 * 1/16 = 1 bar in 4/4 time.
A right-click anywhere in the LFO’s edit window opens the same context menu as in the
modulation mapper, with the same set of useful drawing tools. Try them!

SYNC
0.1s, 1s, 10s.......
absolute time in seconds, three ranges

1/64 – 8/1 ............synced to song tempo (includes dotted and triplets, maximum 8 bars)

RESTART
free: the LFO starts at a random position within its wave every time a note is played 

gate: the LFO always starts at the same position in its wave (see Phase below)

SLEW
Smoothness: off can produce clicks, while fast and slow smooth out sharp transitions.

Rate
LFO rate. This bipolar control scales the value set by the SYNC parameter.

Amp
Amplitude i.e. output level of the LFO. For typical “vibrato via modulation wheel”, click
on the assignable knob and select ModWhl as source. Note that the assignable control
scales the existing Amp value, it does not add to it.


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Phase
Sets the phase (i.e. the position within its cycle) at which the LFO will be restarted every
time a note is played. This parameter is meaningless if Restart is set to free.

Delay
Fade-in time. Typically used for so-called ‘delayed vibrato’.

LFOG
The “LFO Global” module is simpler than the normal LFO: The assignable knobs and the
Delay are missing, and the LFOG doesn’t restart per voice – it is practically ‘monophonic’.

LFOG module, sine wave, synced to ‘beats’ and retriggered every 3 bars

WAVEFORM
The LFOG offers the same waveform options as the LFO (see the list above).

SYNC
Basic rate (see Rate knob below).
0.1s, 1s, 10s.......
absolute time in seconds, three ranges

1/64 – 8/1 ............synced to song tempo (includes dotted and triplets, maximum 8 bars)

RESTART
Automatic restart after the specified number of bars (off i.e. no restart, or 1 to 32).

SLEW
off can produce clicks, while fast and slow smooth out any sharp transitions.

Rate
LFOG speed. This bipolar control scales the basic rate set by the SYNC switch.

Amp
Output level.

Phase
Sets the phase i.e. the position within its cycle at which the LFOG restarts. Ignored if
RESTART (see above) is set to off.


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MMap
The 4 Modulation Mappers are
general purpose tables which
can hold up to 128 user-defined
values. Maps have a wide vari-
ety of uses, e.g. meticulously
adjusting the tone of each note
on across keyboard, as in this
example (used in HS Ligetimat).

...or for ‘round-robin’ effects. Old

polysynths had a limited num-
ber of voice circuits, and the
tuning of e.g. pitch and cutoff
was also fixed (via trimmers) for
each voice. The example here
simulates six of those trimmers
(used in HS Poppington).

...or for remapping a modulation

source. In this example (used in
HS Seed), aftertouch has zero
effect until the keys are pressed
hard enough to reach the point
where the curve starts to rise.

MODE
Specifies how the map is controlled. Note that the two Map modes won’t do anything if
you haven’t defined a Modulator.
Key ...............................the 128 MIDI notes (although nobody owns a keyboard that long)
Map Smooth ...........the 128 modulator values, interpolated for smooth transitions
Map Quantize.......... the 128 modulator values, not smoothed
Increment ..................played notes step through the map

MODULATOR
This selector specifies a modulation source (LFO, envelope, whatever) to be mapped in
either of the two Map modes. In Key or Increment mode, this setting is ignored.

Expand
Click on the ‘window’ icon to expand the map. In the first example above, precision isn’t
a problem as points can be selected by playing MIDI notes and the bars are ‘magnetic’.
While a map is expanded, the lower pane becomes a list of all its uses. Modulation
depths can be adjusted here, and source assignments can even be added by clicking
on the Add button (please note that the current version doesn’t allow assignments to be
edited afterwards). To remove an assignment, click on its [x] button.

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Selection / Drawing Tools

To edit a map, draw in the windows by clicking and dragging. To highlight a selection,
hold down the SHIFT key while dragging. The various functions are restricted to the se-
lection, if one exists. To deselect everything, either click in the background (i.e. away
from the selection) or right-click and choose ‘deselect’ from the selection sub-menu…
Right-clicking on the modulation mapper’s edit window opens a long list of editing tools.
Shift is used for selection, and alt (Win) or cmd (Mac) is used for applying the selected
draw option. Note: All these options also apply to LFO and LFOG in user mode!

Copy / Paste .......Clipboard functions for the map data. You can Copy
use these to transfer maps between presets.

Shapes
Shapes...................
Draw Ramp, Triangle, Sine, Cosine, Root, Quadric
Cmd-Draw
or Spectralize. The latter interprets the map as
Selection
amplitudes of harmonics in the harmonic series, Reverse
then replaces the map with the calculated wave- Invert
form (see Spectralize in the Tips & Tricks). If you Randomize
use fewer than 128 values (see 2-128 below) the Soften
shape will be repeated to fill all positions.
Normalize
Make Unipolar
Cmd-Draw ...........Modify the shape by dragging in the editor while
Straighten
Reset
Alt-Draw ................holding cmd (Mac) or alt (Win). The options are
erase (set zero), scale (multiply), shift (2D move) or Quantise 4
Quantise 6
warp (2D bend).

Quantise 8
Selection ...............Applies functions to the selection: invert, shift left, Quantise 12
Quantise 16
shift right, every 2nd/3rd/4th. If nothing is select-
Quantise 24
ed, only the ‘every’ options will appear.

2
Reverse .................Flips the current selection horizontally 3
4
Invert .......................Flips the current selection vertically
5
Randomize ...........Adds random offsets to the selection
6
7
Soften.....................
Interpolates between values 8
9
Normalize .............Expands vertically to minimum / maximum
10
11
Make Unipolar ....shifts all values to positive, rescaling if necessary
12
16
Straighten .............Draws a straight line for the selection / window
24
Reset ......................Sets all values in the map to zero 32
48
Quantize (n) .........Adjusts values to an equally-spaced grid. Tip: 64
Select ’12’ here and use the map for pitch modu- 96
lation (set the modulation depth in the osc to 12). 128

Lock
2–128 ......................Map size i.e. number of values shown/used


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TOC MODULATORS

MMix
Zebra’s Modulation Mixer processes up to 3 modulation sources in one of three ways...

The 3 MMix modes

MODE
sum modulations .............. All 3 modulation sources plus the value of CON (constant) are
added together – which saves work and Matrix slots if (for in-
stance) you want to modulate several parameters at the same
time from the same bunch of modulators!
scale sum by const.......... The same as sum except that the result is multiplied by CON.
fade 1/2 by 3xC .................The constant determines how much of the Mod3 signal cross-
fades between Mod1 and Mod2.

MOD1, MOD2, MOD3

Selectors for the 3 modulators.

CON
The constant is added to the output in sum modulations mode, it scales the output in
scale sum by constant mode, or scales the amount of Mod3 in fade 1/2 by 3xC mode.
Note that the CON value can be modulated, as it is a target in the modulation matrix.


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TOC OUTPUTS + FX

Outputs and Effects

The FX Grid
Whenever you select Global in the lower bar, you will see the FX Grid in the middle of the
lower pane. The principle is the same as the main grid, but with effect modules. For how to
route signals from the main grid into the FX grid, see the section about the Lane Mixer.
To add a new module, click on an empty cell. Double-click a module to switch it on/off.
Right-click to select input(s) or remove the module.
Seven of the FX module types are the same as ‘processing’ generators available in the
main grid: Shape, Mix, Ring, VCF, SB, XMF and Dist. The other six types – ModFX, Delay,
Rev, Comp, EQ and NuRev – are described below.

FX Grid with example routing

Output controls
Send1 and Send2
These two knobs feed the unprocessed input of the MAIN lane into BUS 1 and BUS 2.
In the image above, Send2 is feeding the SB3 module, and pushing the mod wheel
turns the amount down to zero. See the flow diagram on page 111.

FX BYPASS
Click on this button (it turns dark orange) to temporarily deactivate all effects in the grid.
The BYPASS status is truly global – you won’t hear any effects in any of your presets on
any day of the week until you deactivate this!

MAIN, BUS 1 and BUS 2

Output levels for the left, center and righthand lanes of the FX grid. Note that these ap-
pear as Master, Return1 and Return2 in the data display and modulation matrix: Ignore!

OUTPUT
The final volume, the sum of MAIN, BUS1 and BUS2. OUTPUT is one of those few pa-
rameters in Zebra2 that cannot be modulated. Normally set to 12 o’clock (100%), a pre-
set’s volume can be boosted up to 200% if necessary.
Note: This mirrors the OUTPUT knob in the upper bar – watch them move in tandem.

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TOC OUTPUTS + FX

A note about modulating effect parameters

Zebra lets you use any source in the Matrix to modulate global parameters such as reverb
size or delay feedback. However, many of the available modulators are instantiated per-
voice (e.g. envelopes and LFOs). To avoid conflicting values, the effects only use the
modulation provided by the most recently played voice. Depending on the modulation
source, target and depth, this can result in audible glitches. We recommend using global
sources such as the wheels, LfoG or MSEGs (in single or mono mode) wherever possible.

Modulation FX
Analogue purists may shudder at the mention of built-in chorus (which suggests a lack of
‘beef’ in other departments), but we believe no synthesizer should be without one:

ModFX panel, Chorus mode, equalizer On

MODE
Chorus ............chorus / flanger using short delay lines

Phorus .............chorus / flanger using allpass filters

Phaser .............classic phaser unit

Feedback
Bipolar feedback control for ‘flanger’ type resonances.

Center
Nominal delay time / allpass cutoff.

Depth
Amount of Center modulation from the integrated LFO. See Speed below.

Stereo
LFO phase offset between the two stereo channels.

Note that 50% often delivers the widest effect.

Mix
Balance between the dry and wet signals.

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TOC OUTPUTS + FX

Speed
The rate of the ModFX module’s own LFO (0.1Hz to 1Hz).

Quad
The volume of an additional chorus effect, with independent LFO.

Q-Phase
Modulation LFO phase offset (see Stereo above) for the Quad effect.

EQUALIZER
A pair of low and high filters between the dry and chorused signal. These can be used
to preserve the stereo position of bass frequencies while softening the chorus.

ON/OFF (unlabelled)
Switches ModFX equalization on or off

LO FREQ / LO BOOST
Low crossover frequency and gain for the dry signal.

HI FREQ / HI BOOST
High crossover frequency and gain for the dry signal.

Delay
The delay in Zebra2 is, as you should already have begun to suspect, very flexible. It has
four delay lines, each with time scaling and pan controls. Two flavours of feedback with
inserted low and highpass filters can run at the same time, feeding each other...

Delay module in stereo 2 mode (ping-pong regeneration via x-back)

MODE
stereo 2 ................stereo delay, uses delay 1 and 2 only
multitap 4 ............all four delays in parallel
dubby 2+2 ..........like two instances of stereo 2 in series
serial 2 ..................ping-pong delay, uses delay 1 and 2 only
For more details, see the flow diagrams towards the end of this document.

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TOC OUTPUTS + FX

Feedback & X-back

Normal regeneration and cross-regeneration amounts. In multitap 4 mode, the X-back
routing is 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 1 etc..

Lowpass, Hipass
Simple filters in the feedback paths affect the tonal quality of successive repeats.

Mix
Cross-fades between the dry and wet signal

Sync, Ratio & Pan

The button above each Ratio and Pan knob sets either a synchronized value (1/64th to
1/1 triplet) or absolute time (1 second). The Ratio knob scales this from 0% (4 samples
long) to 200%. Pan is of course the stereo position of each delay line.
Tip: Try using a tiny amount of random LFOG to modulate one or two of the Ratios

Reverb
Zebra’s original Rev1 reverb unit. See also NuRev.

Reverb panel, ‘Reverb’ mode

The upper row is the usual set of reverb parameters, and the lower row has a similar set of
controls for the DIFFUSOR (diffusion adds more reflections, increasing reverb density).

Mode
Reverb is Zebra’s standard model while Metalverb sounds more artificial and wider.

PreDelay
A delay before the reverb starts. Useful for retaining the presence of the dry signal while
using lots of reverb. Or for slap-back effects with short Decay and small Size.

Range, D-Range
Reverb / Diffusion length i.e. delay times, from ‘very short’ to ‘rather long’! Together, the
Range and Feedback parameters shape the impression of room size.

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TOC OUTPUTS + FX

Feedb, D-Feedb
How much of the reverb signal is fed back into the reverb input. If Range and Feedback
are set to maximum and Damp is at zero, the reverb will carry on almost indefinitely.
Damp
A simple low pass filter in the feedback loop causes higher frequencies to fade faster
than low frequencies, imitating the ‘warming’ effect of carpets, curtains etc. in a room, or
the audience in a concert hall.
D-Mix
The amount of diffusion.

Speed, D-Speed
The rates of the LFOs modulating Range and Feedback / D-Range and D-Feedb.

Mod, D-Mod
The levels of the LFOs modulating Range and Feedback / D-Range and D-Feedb.

Dry, Wet
Separate controls for unprocessed and processed signal levels – modulating individual
levels is more flexible than cross-fading dry/wet.

Compressor
Zebra’s compressor module. If you are familiar with modular synthesizers, you can think of
this as a stereo VCA being negatively controlled by an envelope follower.

The compressor in smooth mode

TYPE
eco ..............original lo-fi version, with very low CPU-hit.
smooth ......smooth compression, the best choice for most sounds.
strong .........very powerful compression, best for bold percussive sounds.

Threshold
Threshold sets the level above which compression will be applied, and below which
compression will be released – so lower values will result in more compression than
higher values.

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TOC OUTPUTS + FX

Comp
Sets the amount of compression. Think of this as a dry/wet crossfade.

GR
Gain reduction indicator.

Attack
The time it takes to reach maximum compression after the threshold has been crossed.
Attack can affect brightness: very fast values cause the compressor to reduce the gain
immediately, which can dull the attack of the original sound. Note: When set to zero, the
Attack is only one sample in length.

Release
Recovery time i.e. the time the compressor takes to return to unity gain after the input
signal has fallen below the threshold. Very short Release can distort low-frequency in-
put, overly long Release can ‘clamp’ the sound down and not release enough before the
next ‘attack’ arrives. When set to zero, Release is only one sample in length.

Input
Adjusts the input level before the signal is compressed.

Output
Adjusts the output level to compensate for gain differences caused by the compression.

EQ
This module is a 4-band parametric equalizer. Drag the handles to set frequency and gain.
Right-click on a handle and drag vertically to adjust the Q (width/slope) of the band. Right-
click in the background for basic editing functions: copy, paste, clear (flatten).

Equalizer module, bass+treble boost, dip around 1 kHz

Alongside compression, equalization is the audio engineer’s important “Swiss-army knife”

used to ensure that tracks work well together in the context of the song.
In Zebra2, equalizers are very useful for tweaking the final tonal character of a preset –
make it generally brighter or duller, boost or cut certain frequencies...


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TOC OUTPUTS + FX

Freq LowShelf All 12 parameters (frequency, gain, slope) of the EQ are available in
Q LowShelf the Matrix as modulation targets. The highlighted entry in the menu
Gain LowShelf here is actually the horizontal position of point 2:
Freq Mid1 Point 1 = LowShelf

Q Mid1 Point 2 = Mid1

Gain Mid1 Point 3 = Mid2

Freq Mid2 Point 4 = HiShelf
Q Mid2
Gain Mid2 Example: To use the EQ shown on the previous page as a swept
Freq HiShelf band reject filter (sounds a bit like phasing), you need to modulate
Q HiShelf point 3 to the left and right. The modulation target is Freq Mid2.
Gain HiShelf

NuRev
A smooth plate reverb with pre-delay. See also the original Reverb.

The NuRev module

PreDelay
A delay before the reverb starts. Useful for retaining the presence of the dry signal while
using lots of reverb. Or for slap-back effects with short Decay and small Size.
Damp
A low pass filter in the feedback loop causes higher frequencies to fade faster than low
frequencies, imitating the ‘warming’ effect of carpets, curtains etc. in a room,.
Decay
Reflectivity of the room. Effectively how long it takes for the reverb tail to fade to silence.

Size
Room dimensions, from “sardine can” to infinity and beyond. Balance this with Decay...

Tone
Strong ‘tilt’ equalizer. Bipolar. Use in combination with Damp to “colourize” the reverb.

Width
Stereo spread of the reverb signal.

Dry/Wet
Balance between the dry and processed signals. At maximum, the dry component is
faded out completely, allowing NuRev to be used for colourful ‘guitar body’ type reso-
nances: Try setting PreDelay to minimum, then fine-tune the Size around 5.00.

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TOC PERFORMANCE

Performance
Arpeggiator / Sequencer Programming

The arpeggiator is activated in the GLOBAL panel – see step 5 below and the voice mode.
If you would like to experiment with an existing arpeggio, load How Money More Times (for
example) from the ‘Lupins’ folder and play with all settings…

Arpeggiator settings used in the preset ‘How Money More Times’

…or you can follow these steps

Hands-on tutorial
1. Right-click on the data display and select init.
2. Click below the OSC1 cell and add VCF1. The Synthesis window automatically opens.
3. Set VCF1 Cutoff to minimum, click on an assignable knob in the VCF and select Env1
4. Set the amount of ‘Env1’ cutoff modulation in the VCF to about 110, the Sustain of En-
velope 1 to minimum, and Release to 50.
5. Click on the GLOBAL tab in the lower bar and select the arpeggiator voice MODE.
6. Play a low note…
7. In OSC1 change the STACK mode to ‘dual’, and Detune it to taste.
8. Play a low note and adjust VCF1 Resonance to about 10 (or higher if you prefer).
9. We should now have a simple bass arpeggio. Click on the ARP/SEQ tab in the lower
bar to open the arpeggiator...
10. Change Steps to 4 and SYNC to 1/8. Change Transp (transposition) of the 3rd step to
1 and the 4th step to 7. Hold a note or two...
11. Change the leftmost triangle to a different icon. Why is it an 8-note sequence now? 

Experiment – listen to what happens if you change one or two of the other triangles.
12. Play a chord. Change the first four ‘Voices’ to 6 (roll your mouse wheel to do this)
13. Play a high chord. If it distorts, turn down the volume in Lane 1.
14. Click on the remaining assignable knob in the VCF, select ‘ArpMod’ and set the
amount to +20. Click on the +A button next to the SEQ button and move the first four
‘A’ sliders to different values. Play and listen.

Now try adjusting all Lengths, Gates etc.. Then add ‘1/8 dot’ delay, of course!


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TOC PERFORMANCE

Selectors
That block of controls on the left...

SEQ, +A, +AB

At the top of the panel are 3 mutually exclusive ‘radio buttons’: Show the sequence only,
also include step modulator A, or include both arpeggiator modulators.
These bipolar values appear as ArpMod and ArpMod2 in the matrix, and can be used
for modulating anything you like (e.g. filter cutoff) in step with the arpeggiator.

Sync
1/64 – 1/1 trip: The duration of the default ‘semiquaver’ step. See Length below.

Steps
The number of steps used. Note that e.g. a 3-step arpeggio can create a 15-note se-
quence (or even 24 in fb or bf loop mode!) if you set Oct to 2 and play a 5 note chord.

Order
Incoming notes are ordered within a note buffer in one of two ways. The buffer is then
played back in the direction set by the Loop parameter (see below).
by note............ notes are reordered according to MIDI note number

as played....... the original order in which notes were played is retained

Octave
0, 1 or 2 times: This switch sets how often the octave is shifted up after all notes in the
buffer have been played back.

Loop
The direction the note buffer is played back (see Order above). The Loop setting does
not affect the direction of the arpeggiator, which is always forwards, nor does it affect
note transposition. See Transp on the next page. The options are:
f ==> forwards 

b <== backwards

fb <=> forwards / backwards

bf >=< backwards / forwards
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TOC PERFORMANCE

Slide
When Slide is switched On, any Glide or Glide2 set in the GLOBAL panel will only be
applied to connected notes (see Gate below).

Step parameters
The main area of the panel shows the 16 steps, with 5 settings each:

Step
Specifies which note is retrieved from the buffer for this step.
play the next note
play the same note
play the first note (see Order above)
play the last note (see Order above)

Tip: For typical monophonic arpeggios, set all used steps to last.

Length
Step lengths are defined as multiples of the Arp Sync value:
= 1x
= 2x
= 3x
= 4x

Gate
As arpeggiators automatically play / release notes, the gate times need to be defined:
0, 1 ,2, 3, 4..........from very short to almost the length of ArpSync

5 (arrow) ..............tie i.e. connect to the next step (see also Slide above)
Note that a tie only connects to the first voice of the following step. If the following step
plays multiple voices, these will be triggered.

Voices
The maximum number of notes that can be played simultaneously per step.

Transp
Pitches may be jumping about already, but the individual steps can also be transposed
+/-12 semitones… unpredictability is therefore to be expected!

Arp Modulators
The optional bipolar sliders labelled A and B can be used to modulate any targets (e.g.
VCF cutoff and Glide rate) in step with the arpeggiator. For reasons that shall remain a
mystery, the corresponding modulation sources are called ArpMod and ArpMod2.


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TOC PERFORMANCE

XY Pad Programming
Click on the XY1 tab in the lower bar...

XY programming panel

Programming the PERFORM pads may seem daunting at first, but it really is quite easy.
Especially after following this tutorial:

Quick insight tutorial

Don’t enter the PERFORM page yet, stay in the SYNTHESIS page for now.

1. Load init by right-clicking on the data display.

2. Right-click on OSC1’s Tune knob and select assign to / X1.
3. Click on XY1 in the lower bar and see the new assignment there.
4. Click below OSC1 in the grid and select VCF1. Leave the Cutoff at maximum.
5. In the righthand ‘Y’ area of the XY1 panel, right-click on the topmost ‘none’ and select
Filter1 / Cutoff. Double-click 3 times on that grey segmented bar to set the limit mark-
ers appropriately: Y1 will now span the entire cutoff range, with low values at the bot-
tom and high values at the top.
6. While watching that bar in Y1, move Cutoff up and down in the filter panel. You will see
the bar moving in the opposite direction from Cutoff. Leave Cutoff at maximum again.
7. Click on PERFORM, move the handle around the XY1 pad while playing. Watch the
movement in the lower area until you understand everything that’s happening there.
Note that only the lower half of the Y axis affects cutoff…
8. ...so grab the righthand bar and move it to dead center. The data display should read
“Filter1 Cutoff, 75.00”. If necessary, hold down SHIFT for fine control. Double-click on
the bar 3 times to reposition the limit markers.
9. Play with the XY1 pad again. Positive Y values affect cutoff now because by moving
the bar up you turned the cutoff knob down. Open the SYNTHESIS window and
see for yourself, then go back to the PERFORM window.
10. Double-click in the empty field above the pad to the right of the two symbols, enter the
text “PITCH & CUTOFF” and click on the Apply button. Next, double-click in the large
empty field to the left and enter “X = pitch” and “Y = cutoff” on separate lines. Apply.
11. Try assigning XY2 to other targets e.g. filter resonance and oscillator vibrato. Adjust
the triangular limit markers manually instead of double-clicking on the bars this time.
You can assign up to 8 targets per axis. You will only see targets for modules that are
used in the preset… add more modules and look again!


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TOC PERFORMANCE

Controls
X and Y knobs
The 8 knobs in the center mirror the X/Y controls pads in the PERFORM page: Moving
a knob will also move the handle in the corresponding pad, and vice versa. Use them to
MIDI-learn the X/Y pads for remote control, or for X/Y automation. See MIDI Learn.

Target Selectors and Range Controls

The main area of the XY assignment panel is divided into two blocks: the left half is for
the X-axis and the right half is for the Y-axis.
The 16 Target Selectors (all set to ‘none’ by default) open a nested menu containing
everything that can be modulated in the current preset. As more modules are added to
the grids, more targets will appear. Note that you can use drag & drop assignment here
– simply click on a target selector and drag upwards…

target selectors bipolar (top) and unipolar (bottom) range bars

with limit markers (the triangles)

Targets can also be selected from the SYNTHESIS window or effects panels by right-
clicking on a knob and choosing ‘assign to / (X1...Y4)’ from the context menu.
As soon as a target is selected, a range bar representing the full range of the target pa-
rameter appears to the right, with a pair of limit markers (the triangles).
Important: In the dead center of this area you will see a vertical line. This represents
the current value, and moving the range bar adjusts that value. Go to the SYNTHESIS
window and watch the target parameter move in the opposite direction as you slide the
range bar left and right. Or vice versa – adjust that knob and watch the range bar.
The two triangular limit markers set the minimum and maximum values. You can invert
the control by setting the upper marker to the left and the lower one to the right.
Double-clicking on a range bar switches between 3 preset ranges for the limit markers:
full range, inverted full range and zero range at the current value.


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TOC CONFIGURATION

Configuration

Click on the cogwheel icon at the top righthand corner to open the global configuration
pages where you can adjust the UI size and brightness as well as connect Zebra parame-
ters to MIDI continuous controllers. A row of 4 buttons appears:

These are MIDI Learn (L), MIDI Table (≣), Preferences (“tools” symbol) and Close (X).
Tip: Right-click anywhere within the row of buttons to set the current page as default.

About MIDI CC
CC, which now officially stands for Control Change (no longer Continuous Controller) is a
multi-purpose message format used for editing and performing presets. CC isn’t the only
kind of MIDI performance data. For instance, there are different messages for note on/off
(including velocity), pitch bend and two kinds of aftertouch.

Although the MIDI Manufacturers Association (MMA) was kind enough to leave most of the
128 CC numbers undefined, two of them have specific meanings that Zebra2 recognizes:
01 = modulation wheel

64 = sustain pedal

Previous versions of Zebra2 also offered the CC controls Breath (CC 02) and Expression
(CC 11). These two have been replaced by user definable CC sources CtrlA and CtrlB.
See the Preferences.

Note that you don’t actually need a breath controller (for instance) or an expression pedal
to make use of CC messages! Most of the names are purely convention these days – you
can use anything that can send a definable CC e.g. some knobs or sliders on your MIDI
keyboard, or a controller lane in your MIDI sequencer.

Later MMA revisions to the MIDI spec even included a bunch of esoteric CC definitions
such as ‘Celeste Detune Depth‘, probably at the request of a home organ manufacturer or
two. We can safely ignore all such definitions.


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TOC CONFIGURATION

MIDI Learn
Zebra can be remote-controlled / automated via MIDI messages from a hardware
controller unit or from your sequencer program. Click on the configuration button
then the L to open this view…

The overlay shows all MIDI-learnable elements as selectable outlines. Controls that are
already assigned appear filled, like the OSC 1 ‘Wave’, ‘Tune’ and ‘Detune’ controls in the
above image. The currently active element i.e. the one waiting to be learned is highlighted
– like OSC 2 ‘Wave’ here.
Try it: Click on the OSC 1 ‘Tune’ knob and send some MIDI CC data (move a knob or slid-
er on your MIDI controller). The ‘Tune’ knob becomes opaque and remote-controllable.
The GUI switches (e.g. those in the lower bar) remain active so you can MIDI-learn all pa-
rameters without having to exit and switch over.
Tip: If you ever have problems with parameters magically resetting themselves, the usual
reason is an accidental MIDI learn! Open the MIDI Table and have a look...


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TOC CONFIGURATION

MIDI Table
Click on the cogwheel and select the [≣] icon to open an editable list of all current
MIDI CC assignments:

Parameter
The first field displays/selects one of Zebra’s many parameters, which are sorted into
sub-menus. Click on the ‘Add’ button at the bottom and experiment with this option.

Channel / Controller
The next two fields are for MIDI channel and CC number (see About MIDI CC above).

Mode
Specifies the range and/or resolution of values:
Normal .......full range, continuous
Integer .......full range, whole numbers only
Fine .............0.01 steps between the two integers closest to the current value

Type
Specifies the output from knobs / sliders on your hardware controller. Continuous 7bit is
by far the most common, but you should check your hardware specifications anyway:
Encoder127 ...................‘relative mode’ endless knobs that repeatedly send the CC value
1 when turned up, or 127 (interpreted as -1) when turned down

Encoder64......................
‘relative mode’ endless knobs that repeatedly send the CC value
65 when turned up, or 63 when turned up
Continuous7bit ............ 7-bit MIDI CC (normal resolution, common)

Continuous14bit..........
14-bit MIDI CC (high resolution, less common)

Removing Assignments
To remove individual assignments, click on the [X] to the right of each line. To remove
all assignments at once, click on the Delete All button at the bottom.

Last Clicked (experimental feature)

Click on the ‘Add’ button. At the very bottom of the Parameter menu you will see two op-
tions called Last Clicked Control and Last Clicked Control Fine. Select Last Clicked
Control, enter a suitable controller (MIDI CC) and exit the configuration pages. Which-
ever knobs or switches you click on now, the most recent one will respond to that CC!
The Fine option is similar, but has a very narrow range so you can program a pair of
knobs to remote-control anything “coarse” as well as “fine”. Work in progress.

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TOC CONFIGURATION

Per Instance Control

Control A, Control B
Local versions of the Preference settings Control A Default and Control B Default (see
below). These are not saved with each preset, but per instance with the project.

Preferences
Clicking on the cogwheel then the [TOOLS] icon will open the Preferences window,
where you can specify various global settings…

CONTROL
Mouse Wheel Raster
If your mouse wheel is rastered (you can
feel slight clicks as you roll it), switch this
on and parameter values will increment in
‘sensible steps’ e.g. integers.

Scroll Horizontal
Folders containing more files than can be
shown in the window (e.g. ‘02 Leads’) can
be scrolled page-wise via mouse wheel.
Opinions differed about the direction, so we
made this optional.

APPEARANCE
Default Size
Sets the UI size for each new instance.
Note that you can temporarily change the
size by right-clicking in the background.
Default Skin
Sets the skin for each new instance (you
can temporarily change the skin by right-
clicking in the background). The default is
‘DotEight’, but you might prefer ‘DarkEight’.
Gamma
The default brightness.

Text Antialiasing
Smoothing of all labels and values. Usually
left on, in rare cases switching this option
off can improve readability.

Wavefolder Graph
Appearance of the FOLD module’s graph: eco, fast or glow, in order of CPU usage.


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TOC CONFIGURATION

PRESETS
Auto Versioning
If this option is switched on, an index is appended to the preset name and automatically
incremented each time you save it. For instance, saving ‘Space’ three times in a row
would give you three files: ‘Space’, ‘Space 2’ and ‘Space 3’.
Save Presets To
Choosing ‘user folder’ here causes all saved presets to land in the User folder instead
of the currently selected one.
Scan On Startup
Whether the preset library should be scanned and the database recreated when the first
instance of Zebra2 is started, e.g. when you reopen a project.

AUDIO
Base Latency
Only disable this option if you are 100% sure that your audio system – hardware as well
as software – uses buffers that are a multiple of 16 samples. Otherwise you should
leave it at ‘16 samples’ to prevent crackles.
Note that a new Base Latency setting will only take effect when the host allows e.g. on
playback or after switching the sample rate. Reloading Zebra2 will always work.

ABOUT THOSE BUFFERS

Internally, Zebra processes audio in chunks of n x 16 samples. This so-called
‘block processing’ method significantly reduces CPU load and memory usage.
For instance, if the number of samples to be processed is 41, Zebra will
process the first 32 and keeps the remaining 9 in a small buffer (16 samples is
enough). Those 9 samples are then processed at the start of the next call.
Note: The extra buffer is only necessary if either the host or the audio driver is
processing “unusual” buffer sizes. In the many host applications that process
buffers of 64, 128, 256 or 512 samples (all multiples of 16), try switching it off
so that Zebra can process latency-free.

Control A/B Default

The list of modulation sources in earlier versions of Zebra2 included the fixed MIDI CC
Breath (CC#02) and Xpress (expression pedal, CC#11). Since version 2.8 we have re-
placed these with the user-definable CC sources CtrlA and CtrlB, retaining Breath and
Expression as the default CC to ensure compatibility with older presets.

MIDI Control Slew

The strength of parameter smoothing for all performance control sources: PitchW (pitch
wheel), ModWhl (modulation wheel), CtrlA, CtrlB as well as ATouch (aftertouch i.e.
channel pressure or poly pressure). The default setting is ‘fast’.


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TOC TRICKS

Tips & Tricks

Motion viewer for modulators
Thanks to Brian Rzycki for this tip: Load init then assign MMap1 as modulation source for
something, e.g. Lane 1 Pan (the target doesn’t actually matter for this experiment). A mod-
ulation mapper will appear in the modulators panel:

Change the MODE to Map Smooth. Select LFO1 as MODULATOR (it’s unfortunate that
we can’t select MMix1 here!) Click on the window icon to expand the map, set the extreme
left and right values both to maximum, right-click and select Straighten. CLOSE the ex-
panded map. It should now look like this:

Play a note and turn down the LFO rate (this trick only works well if the modulator is rela-
tively slow). Also works fine with envelopes or MIDI input such as aftertouch.

Spectralize
The modulation mappers’ context menu includes a function inherited from u-he synths that
can use the maps as audio waveforms (e.g. ACE, Bazille): Spectralize interprets the map
as the first 128 partials of the harmonic series, then converts the data into the actual wave-
form. In Zebra, this is an easy way to create a smooth, complex curve.

Try this: Load init, click on the OSC1’s Tune modulation knob and select MMap1. Right-
click in MMap1 and select Reset. Right-click again and restrict the size of the map to 5.
Move those 5 values up or down, right-click once more and select Shapes / Spectralize…

To scan in one direction only, set the waveform of the modulator (LFO2 here) to saw up.

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TOC TRICKS

Modulation inverter
It is sometimes necessary to invert unipolar modulation sources, for instance if you want to
cross-fade between two lanes of the main grid. Here’s how to do that:

Alternatively, a Mix module can cross-fade between two signals at source e.g. individual
oscillator volumes. However, the solution here is generally more flexible as it can convert
unipolar to bipolar and lets you create non-linear curves.

Absolute value

This example always outputs positive pitch wheel values - a minus times a minus is a plus.

Vibrato under control

When the mod-wheel is at minimum, output is all ATouch, and when at maximum, output is
all ModWhl – so the sum of the sources always adds up to 100%.
Especially ‘Prog-Rock’ keyboard wizards will understand the reason for this one. It lets you
add vibrato using either modulation wheel or aftertouch or any mixture of the two in the
same preset, without letting vibrato get too deep. So you can take that solo using the
wheel, then get back to playing two keyboards at once and use aftertouch instead.

More MSEG points

If you really need more points that the 33 available in each MSEG, try using a couple of
MSEGs in series. Here’s how: Extend the very last segment of the first MSEG to the total
length of the second MSEG, then extend the first segment of that MSEG to the length of
the first MSEG minus that long segment. Add them together using a modulation mixer.


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TOC ZEBRIFY

Zebrify
Introduction
The ‘effects’ version of Zebra2. Zebrify includes several features that transcend what you
would normally expect from an insert effect, for instance audio oscillators. With carefully
programmed pitch-detection, Zebrify can even be used as a powerful guitar synthesizer!
Like the effects section in Zebra2, Zebrify is not polyphonic but ‘single voice’.

Zebrify’s Synthesis window, showing all generator and effect modules in a single grid

Zebrify uses the main patching grid for all modules. It has fewer of these than Zebra2...

EnvFol1 Pitchness Essness Transient

...but four additional modulation sources:

VCF (4) Ring (1) Rev (1) Dist (1)

FMO (2) XMF (2) Comp (2) Fold (1)

Comb (2) SB (2) EQ (2) NuRev (1)

Shape (2) ModFX (2) OSC (2)

Mix (2) Delay (2) Noise (2)

Note: Zebrify’s equivalent of KeyFol is called PitchTrk (pitch tracking).

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TOC ZEBRIFY

MIDI
Click on the ‘Midi’ tab in Zebrify’s lower bar to open this panel:

Zebrify’s MIDI panel, with KeySource menu

Together with the Pitch Detector (see a few pages down), this panel is mainly concerned
with Zebrify’s own monophonic version of KeyFol, the key-follow modulation source.

Important: Several DAWs (e.g. Cubase and Reaper) automatically route MIDI into insert
effects. Others, however, use more complicated methods – you might have to spend some
time searching in the appropriate documentation for information on how to do this!

Glide
Smooths KeyFol when KeySource is set to ‘MIDI’…

KeySource
Determines how Zebrify derives its note data i.e. KeyFol and envelope gate.
MIDI ............KeyFol uses incoming MIDI notes with last note priority, like in Zebra2’s
effects section. Envelopes and MSEGs can only be triggered in this mode.
Input ...........Detects the pitch, KeyFol is a continuous variable.
In Qtz ..........Detects the pitch, KeyFol is quantized to the nearest semitone.

Output
Zebrify’s main output level control.

Keyboard
Displays detected or MIDI notes (see KeySource above). Notes derived from input sig-
nals with ambiguous pitch content (e.g. chords) can cause the keys to jump wildly.
The keyboard can also be used to trigger/gate envelopes and MSEGs manually (espe-
cially useful if your sequencer is incapable of routing MIDI data into effect plugins).


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TOC ZEBRIFY

Input
Click on the ‘Input’ tab in the lower bar. The input pane contains three panels: Input Mixer,
Envelope Detector and Pitch Detector...

Input Mixer
Zebrify’s grid has four lanes, and each has its own input...

Zebrify’s Input Mixer panel

Input1 ... Input4
Input levels. Input1 goes to the lefthand lane of the grid, Input2 to the next lane etc..

Input selectors
Stereo, left, right or mono-sum for each input. For instance, setting Input1 to ‘left’ and
Input2 to ‘right’ lets you split the two channels of a stereo signal between lanes 1 and 2.

Envelope Detector
The Envelope Detector continuously analyses the input signal level and outputs the modu-
lation source EnvFol1 (envelope follow). EnvFol1 can then be used to control targets that
would typically be modulated by a standard envelope e.g. the output level of a lane in the
grid. Note that envelope detection is independent of the Input Mixer settings.

Zebrify’s Envelope Detector panel

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TOC ZEBRIFY

MODE
Follow ................... EnvFol1 is an envelope follower, proportional to input signal level
AR Env ..................EnvFol1 is an Attack-Release envelope triggered at the Threshold

CURVE
linear ......................EnvFol1 is linear – good for modulating levels e.g. lane volumes
exponential ......... EnvFol1 is exponential – for modulating frequencies e.g. filter cutoff

Attenuation
Gain control for the envelope detector only, independent of Input Mixer levels. See also
Threshold below.

Attack
Rise time after the signal level has reached the threshold (see Thresh below).

Release
Fall time after the signal level drops below the threshold.

VU
Input level display.

LVL (level)
Realtime display of EnvFol1 output level.

Threshold
This knob adjusts the level at which the envelope follower is ‘on’. Use together with the
Attenuation parameter (see above).

Smooth
Smooths both Attack and Release.

FILTER TYPE
Zebrify’s envelope detector includes an input filter so it can be set up to react to certain
frequencies only. See Filter below.
signal ...............No filter
bandpass .......Isolate a particular frequency
lowpass ..........Isolate low frequencies e.g. bass drum
highpass .........Isolate high frequencies e.g. hi-hat

Filter
Cutoff frequency of the envelope detector’s input filter.


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TOC ZEBRIFY

Pitch Detector
Input signals with a strong fundamental can be used to control the pitch of Zebrify’s oscilla-
tors. Patch up your own guitar synthesizer or voice-controlled ‘Theremin’.

Zebrify’s Pitch Detector panel

MODE
percussive ........... for strong attack signals: acoustic guitar, tuned percussion etc.
voiced ................... for breathy / noisy signals: vocals, flutes etc.
clear ....................... for mostly pure signals: monophonic synth lines etc.

SOURCE
Input selector for pitch detection – stereo, left, right or monosum.

Sense (Input)
The main input gain for all parts of the Pitch Detector, with an indicator that lights up
whenever the signal is strong enough for pitch detection.

TRANSIENT Decay
Controls how quickly Transient decays to zero.

TRANSIENT Sense
This threshold determines the level at which transients (short-lived jumps in volume) will
be recognized as such. The output of this section is the Transient modulation source...

ESS on/off switch

Adds detected transients to the Ess modulation source. See ESS Sense.

ESS Sense
Ess frequency cutoff, from 4 to 8 kHz (‘esses’ are sibilants, high-frequency noises with
little or no pitch content). The output of this section is the Essness modulation source.

PITCHNESS Sense
The opposite of Essness – it reacts to pitched signals. Set low values for meticulous but
slow pitch detection, and higher values for signals with clear pitch content. The output is
the Pitchness mod source, a smooth gate that opens as long as pitch is detected.

PITCH HiNote, LowNote

Limits pitch detection to a range of notes (standard MIDI note numbers).


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TOC ZREV

ZRev
Despite its austere appearance, ZRev is the mother of non-convolution reverb units. It is a
tool for hand-tuning delay coefficients in feedback delay and allpass networks. Exactly how
it works is a well-kept secret – to quote Urs Heckmann:

“Before tweaking any knob on Zrev one should google the following terms: comb allpass
filter, feedback delay network, jot householder matrix, and schroeder moorer reverb.”

Assuming you didn’t just spend hours searching those words, the following should help:
The left section is a feedback delay network with damping, and the right section is two
cascades of nested allpass filters with adjustable feedback for each set.

ZRev is a challenge. If enough people try enough different coefficients for a long enough
time, somebody might just stumble upon a great-sounding set. The ZRev challenge should
not be seen as a “chimps on typewriters” scenario – in theory, ZRev is capable of emulat-
ing any artificial reverb, and it’s up to you to work out the best strategy! However...

The relative values affect the room quality – the more irregular, the better. Some claim that
prime numbers or other special ratios are necessary, but so far the best tactic still appears
to be simple trial-and-error. If you have a set of values that produces zero metallic ringing,
please contact anybody@u-he.com immediately!

Although ZRev itself has no Save button, you can save your settings in the native format of
the host application (there should be a Save button somewhere at the top of the window).

Note: Right-clicking on knobs lets you MIDI-Learn “the old way” for remote control via CC.
Select “MIDI Learn” and move a hardware control that is sending MIDI CC to ZRev.


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TOC MOD TARGET LISTS

Modulation Target Lists

Generators
Target names are in alphabetical order. Knob names are in bold. “Modulation amount”
means the degree to which another modulator affects its target.

OSC
Tune Tune in semitones

Key Scale Pitch KeyS (lower panel)

TuneModDepth (assignable) Tune modulation amount

Phase Phase/PW

PhaseModDepth (assignable) Phase modulation amount

WaveWarp Wave index

WarpModDepth (assignable) Wave modulation amount

Vibrato Vibrato

SpectraFX1 Val spectral effect 1 value

SFX1ModDepth (assignable) spectral effect 1 modulation amount

SpectraFX2 Val spectral effect 2 value

SFX2ModDepth (assignable) spectral effect 2 modulation amount

Detune Detune

Volume Volume

VolumeModDepth (assignable) Volume modulation amount

Pan Pan

PanModDepth (assignable) Pan modulation amount

SyncTune Sync

SyncModDepth (assignable) Sync modulation amount

Poly Width Width (for dual, quad, eleven)

Normalize Normalize (lower panel)

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TOC MOD TARGET LISTS

Noise
Filter1 LP Cutoff (lowpass)

F1 ModDepth (assignable) Lowpass modulation amount

Filter2 HP Cutoff (Highpass)

F2 ModDepth (assignable) Highpass modulation amount

Volume Volume

VolumeModDepth (assignable) Volume modulation amount

Pan Pan

PanModDepth (assignable) Pan modulation amount

Width Width

VCF
Cutoff Cutoff

Resonance Res

Drive * Drive / Vowel / Split

Gain * Gain

ModDepth1 (assignable) Cutoff modulation amount 1

ModDepth2 (assignable) Cutoff modulation amount 2

KeyFollow KeyF

* depending on filter Type

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TOC MOD TARGET LISTS

FMO
Tune Tune in semitones

Key Scale Pitch Key Scale Pitch (lower panel, unlabelled horizontal slider)

TuneModDepth (assignable) Tune modulation amount

FM Depth FM

FM ModDepth (assignable) FM modulation amount

Vibrato Vibrato

Detune Detune

Volume Volume

VolumeModDepth (assignable) Volume modulation amount

Pan Pan

PanModDepth (assignable) Pan modulation amount

Width Width

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TOC MOD TARGET LISTS

Comb
Tune Tune (semitones)

key scale KeyScale

TuneModDepth (assignable) Tune modulation amount

Detune Detune

Vibrato Vibrato

Feedback Feedbk

FBModDepth (assignable) Feedback modulation amount

Damp Damp

DampModDepth (assignable) Damp modulation amount

PreFill PreFill

Input Input

InputMod (assignable) Input modulation amount

Tone Tone

ToneMod (assignable) Tone modulation amount

Flavour Flavour

FlavourMod (assignable) Flavour modulation amount

Distortion Distortion

Dry Dry

Volume Volume

VolumeModDepth (assignable) Volume modulation amount

Pan Pan

PanModDepth (assignable) Pan modulation amount

Width Width

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TOC MOD TARGET LISTS

Shape
Depth Depth

D_modDepth (assignable) Depth modulation amount

Edge Edge

Edge ModDepth (assignable) Edge modulation amount

Input Input

Output Output

HiOut HiOut

Mix (ChannelMix)
Pan Pan

Mix Mix

PanMod Depth (assignable) Pan modulation amount

XMF
Cutoff Cutoff

Resonance Res

Freq mod1 (assignable) Cutoff modulation amount 1

Freq mod2 (assignable) Cutoff modulation amount 2

KeyFollow KeyF

FreqOffset Offset

FreqOffMod (assignable) Offset modulation amount

FilterFM FM

XFMmod (assignable) FilterFM modulation amount

Overload Over

Click Click

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TOC MOD TARGET LISTS

SB
Frequency Freq

FModDepth (assignable) Freq modulation amount

Offset Offset

OModDepth (assignable) Offset modulation amount

Mix Mix

MModDepth (assignable) Mix modulation amount

Distortion
Input Input

Output Output

Pre Tilt Pre Tilt

Post Tilt Post Tilt

Center Freq Center Freq

Low Low

High High

Fold
Folds Folds

Fold Mod (assignable) Fold modulation amount

Bias Bias

Bias Mod (assignable) Bias modulation amount

FoldRatio Ratio

FoldSlope Slope

Clip Angle Clip Angle

Voice Circuit
Portamento Glide (GLOBAL/GLIDE panel)

Portamento2 Glide2

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TOC MOD TARGET LISTS

Modulators

Envelopes
Init (assignable) Initial level before the Attack stage

Attack Attack

Decay Decay

Sustain Sustain level

Fall/Rise F/R

Sustain2 (assignable) Sust2 level (if Sust2 is active)

Release Release

Velocity Vel

Vel2I Velocity Scale initial level amount (if Init is active)

Vel2A Velocity Scale to Attack amount

Vel2D Velocity Scale to Decay amount

Vel2S Velocity Scale to Sustain amount

Vel2FR Velocity Scale to F/R amount

Vel2S2 Velocity Scale to Sust2 amount (if Sust2 is active)

Vel2R Velocity Scale to Release amount

Key2I Key Scale to initial level amount (if Init is active)

Key2A Key Scale to Attack amount

Key2D Key Scale to Decay amount

Key2S Key Scale to Sustain amount

Key2FR Key Scale to F/R amount

KeyS2 Key Scale to Sust2 amount (if Sust2 is active)

Key2R Key Scale to release amount

Slope Slope (if the envelope is in v-slope mode)

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TOC MOD TARGET LISTS

MSEGs
Velocity Velocity amount

Attack Attack time

Loop Loop time

Release Release time

LFO
Phase Phase

Rate Rate

Amplitude Amp

Delay Delay

DepthMod Dpt1 (assignable) Amp modulation amount

FreqMod Dpt (assignable) Rate modulation amount

MMix
Constant CON

Voice Mix
Pan1 PAN (in lane mixer)

Pan Mod Dpt1 MOD (in lane mixer) = assignable pan modulation depth

Volume1 VOL (in lane mixer)

Mod Depth1 MOD (in lane mixer) = assignable volume modulation depth

etc.. for lanes 2-4

Send1 Send1 (in GLOBAL / centre panel)

SendDepth1 (assignable) Send1 modulation amount

Send2 Send2

SendDepth2 (assignable) Send2 modulation amount

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TOC MOD TARGET LISTS

Global

LFOG (LfoG)
Phase Phase

Rate Rate

Amplitude Amp

Master
Return1 BUS 1

Return2 BUS 2

Master MAIN

Effects

ModFX
Center Center

Speed Speed

Stereo Stereo

Depth Depth

Feedback Feedbk

Mix Mix

LowCut Freq Low Freq

HiCut Freq High Freq

Quad Quad

QuadPhase Q-Phase

Low Boost dB Boost (low)

High Boost dB Boost (high)

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TOC MOD TARGET LISTS

Delay
Mix Mix

Feedback Feedback

X-Back X-back

Lowpass Lowpass

Hipass Hipass

Ratio1 ... Ratio4 Ratio 1 ... Ratio 4

Pan1 ... Pan4 Pan 1 ... Pan 4

Shape
Depth Depth

D_modDepth (assignable) Depth modulation amount

Edge Edge

Edge ModDepth (assignable) Edge modulation amount

Input Input

Output Output

HiOut HiOut

Mix (ChannelMix)
Pan Pan
Mix Mix

PanMod Depth (assignable) Pan modulation amount

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TOC MOD TARGET LISTS

Reverb
Dry Dry

Wet Wet

Feedback Feedback

Damp Damp

Range Range

Speed Speed

Modulation Modulation

Diff Feedback D-Feedb

Diff Range D-Range

Diff Mix D-Mix

Diff Mod D-Mod

Diff Speed D-Speed

PreDelay PreDelay

Comp
Compression Comp

Threshold Threshold

Attack Attack

Release Release

Input Input

Output Output

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TOC MOD TARGET LISTS

EQ (Equalizer)
Freq LowShelf (1) horizontal position

Q LowShelf (1) slope

Gain LowShelf (1) vertical position

Freq Mid1 (2) horizontal position

Q Mid1 (2) slope

Gain Mid1 (2) vertical position

Freq Mid2 (3) horizontal position

Q Mid2 (3) slope

Gain Mid2 (3) vertical position

Freq HiShelf (4) horizontal position

Q HiShelf (4) slope

Gain HiShelf (4) vertical position

VCF
Cutoff Cutoff

Resonance Res

Drive * Drive / Vowel / Split

Gain * Gain

ModDepth1 (assignable) Cutoff modulation amount 1

ModDepth2 (assignable) Cutoff modulation amount 2

KeyFollow KeyF

* depending on filter Type


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TOC MOD TARGET LISTS

SB
Frequency Freq

FModDepth (assignable) Freq modulation amount

Offset Offset

OModDepth (assignable) Offset modulation amount

Mix Mix

MModDepth (assignable) Mix modulation amount

XMF
Cutoff Cutoff

Resonance Res

Freq mod1 (assignable) Cutoff modulation amount 1

Freq mod2 (assignable) Cutoff modulation amount 2

KeyFollow KeyF

FreqOffset Offset

FreqOffMod (assignable) Offset modulation amount

FilterFM FM

XFMmod (assignable) FilterFM modulation amount

Overload Over

Click Click

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TOC MOD TARGET LISTS

Distortion
Input Input

Output Output

Pre Tilt Pre Tilt

Post Tilt Post Tilt

Center Freq Center Freq

Low Low

High High

NuRev
Pre-Delay PreDelay

Damp Damp

Decay Decay

Size Size

Tone Tone

Width Width

Dry/Wet Mix Dry/Wet

Pan (hidden parameter – no visible control)

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TOC FLOW DIAGRAMS

Flow Diagrams
Delay Modes
See Delay1/Delay2 on page 67. Thanks to Ed Harvey for the originals of these diagrams!

stereo 2

L
Feedback Mix

Pan 1
Delay 1 LP HP +

X-Back

Delay 2 LP HP +
Pan 2

Feedback Mix
R

multitap 4

L
Mix
D1

X-Back
D2

Pan
X-Back &
D3 sum

X-Back
D4

X-Back
Mix
R

D1 / D2 / D3 / D4 Feedback

Delay 1 LP HP

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TOC FLOW DIAGRAMS

dubby 2+2

L
Feedback Mix

Pan 1 Pan 3
Delay 1 LP HP + Delay 3 LP HP +

X-Back

Delay 2 LP HP + Delay 4 LP HP +
Pan 2 Pan 4

Feedback Mix
R

serial 2

L
Mix
Feedback
+

Pan 1
Delay 1 LP HP

X-Back
+

Delay 2 LP HP
Pan 2

Mix
R

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TOC FLOW DIAGRAMS

XMF Modes
See XMF on page 46.

single serial

L F1 L F1 F2

Offset Offset

R F2 R F1 F2

parallel diff’d

F1 F1

L Offset + L Offset -

F2 F2

F1 F1

R Offset + R Offset -

F2 F2

The only difference between the parallel and diff’d modes is that in diff’d, the F2 signal
is subtracted from F1 instead of added to it.


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TOC FLOW DIAGRAMS

FX Grid
See The FX Grid on page 69.



main bus 1 bus 2 …from the main grid

Send 1 Send 2

MAIN BUS 1 BUS 2

OUTPUT
(Master) (Return1) (Return1)

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TOC NKS

NKS
This version supports Native Instruments NKS format so that Zebra2 can be integrated
into the Komplete Kontrol or Maschine environments. The factory presets are (optionally)
also installed as tagged .nks files. A few pages of performance controls mapped to com-
mon parameters are automatically generated and saved together with each .nks preset.

Saving as .nks is only possible in the VST2 version

Mac owners can use (temporarily) if necessary – any host that supports VST2

Saving in NKS format

While the native, h2p and h2p extended options cause Zebra2 to save presets into the
currently selected preset directory, .nks files go directly into the preset location used for
Komplete Kontrol or Maschine, so they do not appear in Zebra2’s preset browser. To make
them visible in Komplete Kontrol, open its preferences and rescan the preset locations.

Batch conversion
Right-click the [SAVE] button and set the target format to nks. Via cmd-click (Mac) or alt-
click (Win), select all presets in the current folder you want to convert, then right-click any
of the selected presets and choose convert to nks. The original files are not affected.

What to do if Zebra2 doesn't appear in Komplete Kontrol / Maschine.

First, make sure your NKS software is up to date: Komplete Kontrol V1.5+ or Maschine
V2.4 are the minimum requirements for u-he. In Windows, Komplete Kontrol must know
the Vstplugins folder containing Zebra2: Open the Komplete Kontrol preferences, go to
Locations and add your Vstplugins directory if necessary, hit Rescan and check whether
Zebra2 appears. Maybe the NKS preset folder is empty? If so, please reinstall Zebra2 with
the correct VST path and the NKS-option checked. Here are the preset folder locations:
Mac Macintosh HD/Library/Application Support/u-he/Zebra2/NKS/Zebra2/
Win C:\Users\*YOU*\Documents\u-he\Zebra2.data\NKS\Zebra2\

Perhaps the XML-File is missing from this location:

Mac Macintosh HD/Library/Application Support/Native Instruments/Service Center/u-he-Zebra2.xml
Win C:\Program Files\Common Files\Native Instruments\Service Center\u-he-Zebra2.xml

A re-install with the NKS-option checked should also remedy this issue.

What to do if Komplete Kontrol / Maschine is unable to load Zebra2

Either the VST2 version of Zebra2 wasn't installed, or the path wasn’t correct.
Mac Macintosh HD/Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/VST/u-he/
Win <User VST Folder> / (path as set for the VST plug-in during installation)

If Zebra2’s VST plug-in cannot be found in these locations you should run the installer
again, making sure that you set the correct path and activate ‘VST’ during installation.


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TOC TROUBLESHOOTING

Troubleshooting

Random Notes
Problem
Zebra goes “out of tune” after 10 to 15 minutes.
Solution
That’s Zebra’s demo-mode restriction! Reload the plug-in or purchase a license.

Parameter Reset
Problem
“I'm on [computer platform and OS version] using [DAW]. I load Zebra2 into a project,
and whenever I play the song or try to record, it resets [parameter] to [value]”.
Solution
That sounds like an unwanted MIDI learn – a controller has somehow been assigned to
that parameter, and restarting the song resets all assigned controllers. Simply remove
the offending connection from the MIDI Table.
Note: MIDI Learn assignments are global for all presets in all instances of Zebra2, and
are stored at the following locations:
Win
C:\Users\[you]\Documents\u-he\Zebra2.data\Support\com.u-he.Zebra2.midiassign.txt
Mac
~/Library/Application Support/u-he/com.u-he.Zebra2.midiassign.txt

NKS troubles
Please refer to the previous page, and contact Native Instruments’ support if necessary.
If all else fails, there’s our online support at www.u-he.com. Not open at weekends, but
otherwise fairly quick to respond!

The End

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