# Serum vs Zebra 2 for film / trailer music



## midi-et-quart

Hi there,

currently I'm learning a lot on sound design with both Serum and Zebra.
Actually, I like using electronic dance music sounds (risers / basses / FX) and mixing them with orchestral soundtrack music. 

From what I heard, Zebra's low end would get me faster to satisfying results but I could miss the wavetable functionality of Serum.

I recently went through a few courses on Evenant with @karelpsota who seems to use Serum a lot, and I like this one feature very much which consists in drag-n-dropping lfo's or envelopes to different parameters like volume levels / cutoff etc... This seems like a big time saver.

On the other hand, Zebra has a solid reputation in the realm of film music thanks to some of its users and the sounds they have made with it... Also, the fact that there are more presets for that genre available gets me interested (of course I would make my own ones, but learning from some great sound designers like The Unfinished or from presets of The Dark Zebra would surely be a course on its own..)

What would you recommend? 
I could imagine getting both at some point, but first I would like to focus all my energy on just one. Thanks!


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## AdamKmusic

Zebra & Zebra HZ all the way


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## charlieclouser

I have both, and while I do like the tone of ZebraHZ and the sound of its filters, there's no denying that Serum goes a bit further into futuristic territory with the wavetables, sample import/conversion, etc. The user interface on Serum is a little easier to deal with when setting up complex modulations as well - Zebra is a bit dated and suffers a little bit from age in the UI department. Not much, but a little. 

That said, I do wind up using ZebraHZ more than Serum - but that's mainly because I don't have much use for the kind of super-aggressive, futuristic wavetable type sounds that Serum excels at; I'm mostly looking for dark, thumping pulses and ZebraHZ really allows for some serious fine-tuning in that area of the frequency spectrum. It really has a wide sweet spot in the low end.

I've just gotten u-he's Hive synth, which is somewhere between Serum and Zebra. It's got a bit of the wavetable abilities of Serum and a bit of the rich low end of Zebra, in a simple user interface. A nice compromise and perhaps worth a look. But ZebraHZ and Serum are still the heavyweight champions.


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## Anders Bru

I've been using Serum for a long time, and love it. Very versatile, easy to use and a super clean sound (the sub in Serum is my go-to). But Zebra and ZebraHZ has over the years been established as a go-to for film scoring, and I think it might be easier finding preset packs etc. for Zebra. There's a lot of great packs for Serum as well (currently got my eye on _Supernova_ by Audio Imperia), but you might have to dig past a bunch of more aggressive dubstep packs before you find something that's more suited for your needs. But you can't really go wrong with either.


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## DivingInSpace

I've found they both have their uses. I find it easier to achieve more organic sounding simple synths with Zebra, and especially pads. To me zebra often ends up sounding more digital and, but i at the same time find it easier to make fx and soundscapes in serum. Both are great though.


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## Living Fossil

charlieclouser said:


> I've just gotten u-he's Hive synth, which is somewhere between Serum and Zebra. It's got a bit of the wavetable abilities of Serum and a bit of the rich low end of Zebra, in a simple user interface. A nice compromise and perhaps worth a look.



As has been mentioned in u-He's forum, a relevant factor of the typical Serum sound is the OTT compressor which is engaged in many sounds.
Luckily, the OTT compressor from x-fer also exists as a freeware plug in.
Inserting it behind Hive (or Zebra) easily transforms the sound character towards Serum.

https://splice.com/plugins/3788-ott-vst-au-by-xfer-records


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## Parsifal666

Zebra might be considered relatively passe because of the oversaturation of that sound in scores since Dark Knight (I could be wrong re the time of origin if so forgive me).

Then again, Serum has been pretty prevalent in scores for years now.

I use alternative synths now to help me stand out like XILS IV and Helix, plus NI's Rounds can yield some super-cool-to-tweak sequencing.


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## sostenuto

Living Fossil said:


> As has been mentioned in u-He's forum, a relevant factor of the typical Serum sound is the OTT compressor which is engaged in many sounds.
> Luckily, the OTT compressor from x-fer also exists as a freeware plug in.
> Inserting it behind Hive (or Zebra) easily transforms the sound character towards Serum.
> 
> https://splice.com/plugins/3788-ott-vst-au-by-xfer-records



Cool info, THX !!  New Update for Hive is notable and headed there first. 

Regards


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## karelpsota

U-he sounds better... but Serum gets the sounds out my head *faster*. And that's what ultimately matters for me.

*SERUM CONS:*
The *reverbs are pretty bad*. Zebra is clearly superior... and that's probably why it has a more "cinematic" etiquette.

Serum's stock presets suck. Usually too aggressive due to unbalanced OTT and little reverb. If you just want a synth to browse excellent patches - Zebra is your friend.

Like other's have mentioned, the multiband dynamics "*OTT"* is a bit abused. Too bad the "mix" knob is not an "amount" knob like in Ableton. There are massive phasing issues when you put Serum's OTT at 50%. In Ableton, the "amount" knob just adjusts all the ratios at once instead of running parallel signals.

*SERUM PROS:*
Serum really shines with *visuals*. I can actually see what bend+- does to the wavetables. The fact that I can drag LFO1 to 20 knobs is also ridiculous. The UI is a brilliant combination of function and simplicity. If you want to design sounds from scratch - Serum is your friend.

The *wavetable import and editor* is next level. You can take a kick, stretch it into a braaam. Emulate guitar tones. Make orchestral percussion out of nothing.

Here's a quick example. The sound ended up in a few Star Wars Battlefront Trailers (scored by the amazing @Blakus )

​

Thanks for taking my class @midi-et-quart too


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## Jeremy Gillam

charlieclouser said:


> I've just gotten u-he's Hive synth, which is somewhere between Serum and Zebra. It's got a bit of the wavetable abilities of Serum and a bit of the rich low end of Zebra, in a simple user interface. A nice compromise and perhaps worth a look. But ZebraHZ and Serum are still the heavyweight champions.



The default patch in the latest Hive update is so awesome in any register that I've barely used any of the thousands of others.


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## Living Fossil

poetd said:


> I think that might be one of those mocking things that has somehow been taken seriously?
> Not everyone using Serum is making dynamically squished dubstep, and it's a massive disservice to the synth to imply that's all it's capable off. U-he snobs, Heh.



My point was that you can get a different sound character out of Hive (and Zebra) when you insert the standalone OTT after the instruments. And btw, you don't need to use OTT in heavy settings.
But i guess, with enough will you can misunderstand every posting


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## Living Fossil

poetd said:


> (fwiw - I own both and have had them pretty much since first release, and love both for their own strengths, but to dismiss Serum as just any old synth plus some mband compression shows a massive lack of understanding.).



Stop trolling.
I was not dismissing Serum in any way.
Just because putting OTT behind Hive's Wavetable sounds shifts its sound towards (some) Serum sounds, doesn't mean that Serum is "just any old synth plus some mband compression" or that Serum is limited to a certain kind of sounds. I think Serum is a top synth with a huge potential.
So stop those stupid allegations.


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## EvilDragon

charlieclouser said:


> Zebra is a bit dated and suffers a little bit from age in the UI department.



Did you see the new and much improved skin in v2.8?  Nothing aged there. 


But yeah. I would also say Hive is great. Its wavetable engine sounds better than Serum's to me (you gotta play with the different interpolation modes - Serum has no realtime interpolation modes), plus where you can take it with UHM script is kinda insane. Yes, Serum also has math input for creating waves/wavetables, but UHM is easier, has more features, and yields better results overall. Oh and not to mention, Hive takes a lot less CPU than Serum! There's nothing to compromise if you just go with Hive, I'd say. It's full of easy wins.


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## D Halgren

charlieclouser said:


> just gotten u-he's Hive synth, which is somewhere between Serum and Zebra. It's got a bit of the wavetable abilities of Serum and a bit of the rich low end of Zebra, in a simple user interface. A nice compromise and perhaps worth a look. But ZebraHZ and Serum are still the heavyweight champions.


Charlie, I just bought Hive as well, and if you haven't checked it out, the free Tarot soundset by Hacke is bonkers! So many killer sounds in that.


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## Rapollo

EvilDragon said:


> Did you see the new and much improved skin in v2.8?  Nothing aged there.
> 
> 
> But yeah. I would also say Hive is great. Its wavetable engine sounds better than Serum's to me (you gotta play with the different interpolation modes - Serum has no realtime interpolation modes), plus where you can take it with UHM script is kinda insane. Yes, Serum also has math input for creating waves/wavetables, but UHM is easier, has more features, and yields better results overall. Oh and not to mention, Hive takes a lot less CPU than Serum! There's nothing to compromise if you just go with Hive, I'd say. It's full of easy wins.



+1
Especially with 2.0 just around the corner...


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## EvilDragon

Q2 isn't exactly "around the corner". We're not even properly stomped into Q1


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## midi-et-quart

Thank you very much for your comments and suggestions. 
Currently I still try to learn a lot about these synths (basically, both systems are pretty similar), I have Serum's demo installed and try to tweak a few things here and there.

Concerning the interface, I agree that Serum seems a bit more intuitive. 

Probably I'll end up using both


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## DivingInSpace

EvilDragon said:


> Q2 isn't exactly "around the corner". We're not even properly stomped into Q1


Sorry about my ignorance, but what exactly is Q2? (and 1.0 for that matter)


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## D Halgren

DivingInSpace said:


> Sorry about my ignorance, but what exactly is Q2? (and 1.0 for that matter)


Quarter 2, April through June. It's business speak.


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## DivingInSpace

D Halgren said:


> Quarter 2, April through June. It's business speak.


Oh, i thought it was related to Zebra haha.


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