My first and "the one" synth

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Which synth?

ZebraHz
38
39%
Falcon
24
24%
Omnisphere
36
37%
 
Total votes: 98

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fmr wrote: Sat Apr 27, 2019 12:18 pm If he his starting, then advsing him something as expensive as Omnisphere (which price can only be justified by the sample libraries in it, which he may or may not value) is absurd.
I don't actually disagree (and said as much in an earlier post). :)
Omnisphere may have a good synth engine, but it can't compete with DIVA in that aspect.
I do disagree here. I totally understand the comment, though; I used to think the same. But I A/B'ed 'em extensively. ...Omnisphere is every bit as good, quality-wise, if you pick the right filters. Diva is more ... immediately good, perhaps, I admit. It's hard to make Diva sound bad. ;) Omnisphere is easier to screw up. Yup. But it's worth the price with the extra features. For modulation alone, it would be worth it. But it also comes with a bajillion effects, a bajillion patches, top-notch wavetables, AND a huge ROM sound set to mix in. Totally worth it. It's Diva times 8. :) ...and uses a third of the CPU. :D

(Note: if you had said *RePro* has a better-sounding engine... I would agree with you. RePro actually sounds like hardware. It's amazing.)

Don't get me wrong! I love (!!!) Diva. And, yes, I agree it's a better starting synth: less overwhelming, less expensive, less of a risk.

Just had to defend Omnisphere a bit. It certainly has its haters, and I'm not sure it fair. ;)

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Introspective wrote: Sat Apr 27, 2019 12:08 pm
PieBerger wrote: Sat Apr 27, 2019 8:12 am Also the Avenger UI and workflow is a car crash in my opinion, but different strokes and all :D
Ha! Perhaps. I do have my niggles with it. (...chief among them the weird way it manages wavetables or samples scanning; it's not obvious where that's controlled... like, "where's the sample start knob?") The intro videos explain everything, though, so after you sit through those ... it's a well-designed tool. (I would argue that there is more value in having an elegant workflow than having an obvious one, every time. Avenger's interface is elegant.) For me, at least (and, yes, this is always subjective), there is no synth that screams "tweak me!" as loudly as Avenger does, and it's a joy to just drag and drop modulations* and the MM is very clear and super-powerful at the same time. And, man, the bajillion ways that you can jiggle a waveform in VPS ... it's breath-taking. :D Single most powerful oscillator section I've ever seen, *ever*. I'm a fan. ...I just really really really REALLY (!) wish it wasn't marketed to the Tranceheads as this "dance-floor ready" megasynth. It's a creative tool, not another hypersaw-laiden Virus** clone! Infuriating.


* Yes, I realize there are other synths that do this. I'm not calling it exclusive here, I'm calling it awesome. ;)
** Okay, honestly... I love the Virus. :) But still.
I did say a second synth after you had already learned the basics ie what a filter is, adsr and so. Zebra is literally only ever as complicated as it needs to be. This means it can be no more complex than the a lot of basic synths on the market. Load up the init patch and all you have is one oscillator, one filter, one env and one LFO, how can you say that is overwhelming, but suggest Avenger which is imo total parameter/options overload? I mean you can suggest anything you like it's a free forum :D it seems apparent that we have have quite different ideas about what is intuitive/easy to learn.
Always Read the Manual!

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Judging by the OP's name, I think they might be a she :D

The OP already turned down Avenger because it's a bit flaky on Mac.

To throw a spanner in the works, for Hip Hop and EDM, it's worth considering the Tone2 synths because Electra and Gladiator are really popular for Hip Hop and Trap etc, also Icarus is a really great alternative to other wavetable synths like Serum and Rapid. The thing that goes against Electra is the UI, I find similarly to Dune the UI isn't the most elegant.

Zebra is one of the first big synths I bought (along side Sylenth1 and Serum) and I've never regretted getting it, I definitely felt a bit overwhelmed by it at first, but its one I can go back to after improving my synthesis knowledge and tapping even more out of it, it's definitely one of the sound designers dream synths. U-he has a lot of video tutorials for Zebra, and there are tonnes of Zebra tutorials from ADSR etc. on YouTube.

But you definitely don't need to buy a synth to learn synthesis, you can start with free synths like Surge, Synth1 and TAL NoiseMaker! Those synths have more than enough to get anyone started.
After making the mistake myself by buying a bunch of big synths when starting out, I don't really agree with the idea of buying a synth and then learning it by heart - I would suggest learning the 3 free synths I mentioned off by heart and then let that guide your purchasing decision instead.

If you do want to buy something, I would suggest investing in Syntorial first, that was one of my best early purchases! After going through that I joined the One Synth Challenge and now I know enough about synthesis to really use the big synths I started out by buying :hihi:

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Out of the trio I'd choose omnisphere. Not that I think that any single synth can cover if only 15% of the endless possibilities that synthesis can offer but well .... as opposed to the crowd of the 'i can do it all' pretenders, it does a good part of what it does at a rather high level. Ymmv.
http://www.lelotusbleu.fr Synth Presets

77 Exclusive Soundbanks for 23 synths, 8 Sound Designers, Hours of audio Demos. The Sound you miss might be there

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Introspective wrote: Sat Apr 27, 2019 11:57 am
PieBerger wrote: Sat Apr 27, 2019 8:10 am
pdxindy wrote: Sat Apr 27, 2019 4:50 am Funny how opinions differ... I think Zebra is one of the very best synths to learn synthesis on. I think Zebra is worth the money just as a learning tool it is so good.
I agree to some extent, maybe not a very first synth, something like RePro or one your DAWs bundled synths, just to get a handle of the very basics, but after that Zebra wouldn't be a massive step up imo. It's one of the easiest to use "big do-it-all synths" on the market, due to it's flexible/scalable wysiwyg, one-page (kind of) architecture. Simple VA patches are still very easy to setup, with minimal menu-diving and tabbing and because it's scalable you can ramp up the complexity at your own pace.
Oh dear. No, no, no. That's like someone saying "hey, I think synth music is cool, how do I get started?" and pointing them at a modular system. Overwhelming.

Sure, if they're in college or something and they have someone holding their hand, explaining everything along the way... sure. In a situation like that, Zebra's great, 'cause everything you need is in one place and you can get familiar with it and grow with it. Sure.

But for someone just starting out, on their own? No way.
Zebra is easier than lots of simpler synths. The audio signal path is always visible in the grid. A new person can immediately see what is being used in a particular preset. All someone has to do is watch a couple of intro videos to understand the basic concepts and off they go.

And Zebra is outstanding for learning synthesis because it can do basic subtractive, FM, additive, wavetable and some physical modeling yet each of those is a simple implementation of that synthesis type... easy for beginners to grasp.

And since the OP asked about ZebraHZ, the presets from HZ plus the factory Zebra presets are a demonstration in amazing preset design by Howard Scarr. His presets are mostly simple and easy to understand and sound fantastic. It is worth the price just to learn from his presets.

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Well I'm glad we can agree to disagree about Zebra. :)

I just have to reiterate: I love Zebra. It so happens that in another Forum at the same time as this conversation where I am singing it's praises and calling it a potential desert-island synth. :D So it's ... a little weird to be here saying "Naw, man, don't get Zebra."

But seriously: don't. :D

Or ... I suppose ... download the demo and make a couple of patches. If you can get past the UI, then YES! It's quite possibly the best synth ever. Or maybe that's Omnisphere. But it's a *contender,* wither way! So if you see all the blank knobs and you think "cool! Assignable modulation!" instead of "WTF IS THIS?!?" ... if you find yourself reaching for that "PHA/SNC" tab to get gnarly... if you see a "MOD MIXER" module and think "ahhh, they must be controlling the volume here," then: yes. Bob's yer uncle. Great synth. I love it. Go for it.

I've also been meaning to add to this conversation the ultimate voice of reason:

It doesn't really matter which synth you get. These are ALL awesome. Any one of these will do you justice and will serve you admirably. (It's also very true, as many have said, that you WILL NOT stop at one.) ;) THE SYNTH DOESN'T REALLY MATTER. You matter. :) So pick one. Go with your gut. It'll be fine.

(No, it won't. You'll second-guess yourself in a few months and decide to go with a different one. But that's fine. It's part of the process. You'll come back to it later and say "man, I underestimated this synth!" and then it'll be all good again. That's part of the process, too. Welcome to the community.)

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Introspective wrote: Sat Apr 27, 2019 4:47 pmOr ... I suppose ... download the demo and make a couple of patches. If you can get past the UI, then YES! It's quite possibly the best synth ever.
Download the demo... and watch some u-he tutorial videos... you'll be rolling in no time. The UI is great... there is nothing to get past. The UI makes more sense for a novice than lots of simpler synths.

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In keeping with the OP 3 list: It also depends on your use for it. Given this choice, I personally would go for Zebra. However, it might not be the one I recommend to you. Omnisphere is probably easier to navigate and make your own split/layer combinations. It also has a canned character to it that makes it especially quick for productions that will wind up on TV/radio without having to really add anything to it. Almost foolproof for the first levels of use.
Like I said though, forced to make a choice, it would still be Zebra for me. Extremely flexible in sound and abilities. And while both let you dive in as deep as you want, the browser is far more flexible in all the U-he synths. That is, you can archive or even delete the entire factory library. Make your own folder system and take what you like from it and leave the rest on your drive. Not so with Omnisphere, everything is there whether you use it or not, and the tagging doesn't really help as much as they say in filtering the bloat. It does however have the sample edge over Zebra.

Falcon will never be on my system as long as they require iLok/PACE/Eden.
(So I can't give you anything on that.)

Ultimately, it depends on your use, tastes and abilities.

Chances are, you won't go wrong with what ever you choose. At the very least, you'll get more experience with whatever is the "one".

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pdxindy wrote: Sat Apr 27, 2019 2:14 pm To paraphrase:
(Howard Scarr's) presets in ZebraHZ (& Zebra2) are mostly simple and easy to understand and sound fantastic. It is worth the price just to learn from his presets.
A wise point indeed!

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With surge being free, I would go with that over damn near anything else. Zebra is my number one goto synth, but if surege had been free when it was released, the. I might have never bought zebra to begin with.

As far as zebra not being “good for hip/hop , edm, whatever genre etc” that’s just silly. I’ve had pretty big records out there where zebra was the only synth, and I don’t do much outside hip hop, club music and scoring.

Definitely grab surge, synth 1, and tal noisemaker before you get into much else. Between those and whatever your Daw comes with, you should be able to get your head wrapped around most standard synthesis techniques. Then you can grab a “flagship synth” if you really need some more bells and whistles.
Don't F**K with Mr. Zero.

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I'm not voting. I would say get Komplete 12 for a similar price.
There's a ton there on offer and can get some amazing sounds. Great for experimenting and inspiration.

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New Melda is quite a monster too..

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Too advanced synths make me "tweaking" forever. No good

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Igirl93 wrote: Fri Apr 26, 2019 4:03 am
NeoKortex88 wrote: Tue Apr 23, 2019 8:21 am Can Falcon sound analog like Diva?
I would also be interested in that.

@Jancivil: I hope i won’t be using one synth for the rest of my life. It’s more i don’t want to waste time learning one synth than finding out there’s something way better
I don't think even with all of these opinions you're going to be prepared really to put a lot of money into one synth.
I wouldn't recommend any of these as a first synth; but synthesis technique learned on any synth is abstract, it's a foundation of knowledge so it would apply per se, somewhere else.

Most typically "synths" around here refers to the subtractive paradigm. You don't know what you want really, so we can't know either. An all-round synth, it might be jack-of-all-trades, master of none or the Swiss Army Knife.

Out of these three, Zebra is the more basic. Falcon does so much, it's going to be not terribly conducive to focus. Omnisphere is kind of special.

At one time, and when I learned synthesis, there were no polyphonic synths. Some polyphonic synths make a good monophonic synth in it very easily, some do not. I would say you do need monophonic synth experience and understanding, but probably you won't want that all or even most of the time. So I can't really put myself in your shoes, I learned from having continuous access to a Minimoog. You could find Monark in Sell & Buy here for 50 bucks and this is the classic subtractive workflow. Then you'd want polyphonic.

But putting all your eggs in one basket (so many cliches now), particularly the economical risk of it, be careful.

On the other end of the spectrum is additive, and Yamaha (Chowning) FM which are paradigms unconcerned with subtracting from a given waveform.
I would say in general something like Falcon, which is all things to all people in potential, is perhaps too much/too soon.

My recommendation is Reaktor, because within that anything can exist and there's an enormous resource in its User Library, and the instruments will be specific, you wouldn't be looking at but one thing at a time but sky's the limit.
Some people will violently disagree with this assessment. :)

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those people are idiots :D

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