# ABC News Using Stock ZebraHZ Preset



## KEM (Dec 1, 2021)

This documentary by ABC News has been trending recently and it looked intriguing so I decided to watch it, and 0:05 seconds in I started busting out laughing cause they literally used a stock preset from ZebraHZ, and they didn’t change a single thing either, it’s the same arp pattern and everything, I don’t know if that’s even legal but it sure is pretty funny!!


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## proxima (Dec 1, 2021)

The Dark Night..ly news.


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## KEM (Dec 1, 2021)

proxima said:


> The Dark Night..ly news.



Now if they would’ve used it in Gotham Tonight with Mike Engel I’d have found it tasteful and appropriate, but ABC News? Come on now…


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## proxima (Dec 1, 2021)

And while I'm no lawyer, it is legal. One of the lovely things about U-he software is how straightforward their EULA is. Every so often you see a license agreement (typically for loops, not synths) that prohibits being the only instrument playing, as a way to discourage people from just posting the loops played one after the other.


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## KEM (Dec 1, 2021)

proxima said:


> And while I'm no lawyer, it is legal. One of the lovely things about U-he software is how straightforward their EULA is. Every so often you see a license agreement (typically for loops, not synths) that prohibits being the only instrument playing, as a way to discourage people from just posting the loops played one after the other.



I just figured the legality of it would be questionable since it’s literally a motif directly out of The Dark Knight movies, it’s not the synth patch itself I was wondering about but the notes it’s playing, I figured Hans or Warner Bros or whoever else would own that specific theme


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## proxima (Dec 1, 2021)

KEM said:


> I just figured the legality of it would be questionable since it’s literally a motif directly out of The Dark Knight movies, it’s not the synth patch itself I was wondering about but the notes it’s playing, I figured Hans or Warner Bros or whoever else would own that specific theme


I don't know the details of the agreement between Hans and the u-he folks. But consider the following hypothetical scenario:

Two movie soundtracks use identical presets/sequences from a major synth, years apart. Does the first movie own the copyright to sound? No - they never did, they had a royalty free license to use that sound as part of a composition. Supposing the owners of the first movie sue the second movie, the second movie would just point to the original synth library and there's no case. 

Dark Zebra isn't as clean and simple, because it was created with Hans. But they clearly had some sort of agreement that ended up having u-he distribute the presets under the following license:

"You may not distribute resampled or otherwise replicated parts of The Dark Zebra in any product, commercial, free or otherwise. This includes, but is not limited to, sample libraries and sample-based synthesizers. You may, however, create such derivates for your own musical works as long as these derivates are only distributed in the context of the musical work."

which isn't quite as permissive as the EULA I linked before (which might be read as allowing the presets to be used in sample libraries? I'm not sure). But still, pretty clearly allowed use by ABC.


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## Pier (Dec 2, 2021)

KEM said:


> This documentary by ABC News has been trending recently and it looked intriguing so I decided to watch it, and 0:05 seconds in I started busting out laughing cause they literally used a stock preset from ZebraHZ, and they didn’t change a single thing either, it’s the same arp pattern and everything, I don’t know if that’s even legal but it sure is pretty funny!!



As someone who did a bit of work for tv, it wouldn't surprise me the person doing the music wasn't very happy about it either.

On tv deadlines are brutal.

Edit:

And when I say brutal I mean "it's 3am, you still have a ton of stuff to finish for your 10am delivery and you get a call for something extra" brutal.


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## KEM (Dec 2, 2021)

Pier said:


> As someone who did a bit of work for tv, it wouldn't surprise me the person doing the music wasn't very happy about it either.
> 
> On tv deadlines are brutal.
> 
> ...



Yeah I’ve heard tv is an absolute nightmare, with composers having to do hour long episodes in 5 days and stuff like that, sounds terrible

But ABC still could’ve done a lot better than a stock TDK preset


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## Pier (Dec 2, 2021)

KEM said:


> Yeah I’ve heard tv is an absolute nightmare, with composers having to do hour long episodes in 5 days and stuff like that, sounds terrible


I'm not sure how it is in the US, but when I did it here in Mexico (just once) I had to do two 45mins episodes per week. I lived on Red Bulls for 2 months and barely slept. Obviously the music I delivered was crap.

It wasn't just me, the whole production was a nightmare. I should have walked when I saw that coming, but I was younger and stupid(er) and I hadn't learned that I could say "no".

That was around 2010. The experience was so traumatizing that for years I just played around with synths and didn't write any music other than stupid loops on Ableton Live. I think the demo for my latest Zebra library is the first thing I've written since then.


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## Living Fossil (Dec 2, 2021)

KEM said:


> cause they literally used a stock preset from ZebraHZ,



The term "stock preset" in combination with ZebraHZ is quite quite an awkward wording.

The idea behind ZebraHZ was to release the sounds that were meticulously crafted by HZ and Howard Scarr for the DK trilogy: the bespoke "Dark Zebra" soundset. (basically HZ gave the sounds to Urs once the trilogy was finished)

And since it relied on a modified version of Zebra 2 with some additional features (like Diva filters etc.), this modified version was necessary for some of these sounds.

Therefore, what the responsible composer did in this clip, was to use a sound of one of the greatest soundsets that was ever released.
The problem that can be seen is a similar one as with lots of high quality loops: with these "press one note and hold it" sounds it's quite likely that different composers will use it which can cause confusion when it comes to copyright and royalties.

But the fact as such is not really new.
I remember when (over 20 years ago) an episode from the X-files featured an isolated loop from the then famous Distorted Reality Sampling CD. (which was produced by Eric Persing from Spectrasonics)


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## KEM (Dec 2, 2021)

Pier said:


> I'm not sure how it is in the US, but when I did it here in Mexico (just once) I had to do two 45mins episodes per week. I lived on Red Bulls for 2 months and barely slept. Obviously the music I delivered was crap.
> 
> It wasn't just me, the whole production was a nightmare. I should have walked when I saw that coming, but I was younger and stupid(er) and I hadn't learned that I could say "no".
> 
> That was around 2010. The experience was so traumatizing that for years I just played around with synths and didn't write any music other than stupid loops on Ableton Live. I think the demo for my latest Zebra library is the first thing I've written since then.



Sounds awful, exactly the kind of experience I don’t want but will probably have to go through anyways


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## KEM (Dec 2, 2021)

Living Fossil said:


> The term "stock preset" in combination with ZebraHZ is quite quite an awkward wording.
> 
> The idea behind ZebraHZ was to release the sounds that were meticulously crafted by HZ and Howard Scarr for the DK trilogy: the bespoke "Dark Zebra" soundset. (basically HZ gave the sounds to Urs once the trilogy was finished)
> 
> ...



Oh I’m fully aware of what ZebraHZ is, I use it everyday, but that preset comes with it, so therefore I’d consider it a stock preset. I don’t have anything against presets of course, my only issue with this use of it is that the arp pattern is a specific theme Hans wrote for TDK movies so it’s not that they’re just using a preset but that they’re pretty much using music that Hans wrote for a different franchise


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## Pier (Dec 2, 2021)

Living Fossil said:


> But the fact as such is not really new.
> I remember when (over 20 years ago) an episode from the X-files featured an isolated loop from the then famous Distorted Reality Sampling CD. (which was produced by Eric Persing from Spectrasonics)


Yeah. I remember hearing some Hollywood Edge effects on the first Ice Age movie I had been using just days earlier.

I don't think there's anything wrong with that. You have a tool, and you use it to the best of your capacity given a set of circumstances. Plus nobody in the audience (or most people in the production team) will ever know where stuff is coming from.


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## visiblenoise (Dec 2, 2021)

Not just stock preset, but the very one that is loaded by default when you load up ZebraHZ! (at least it is for me)

I have nothing against it, but it is amusing.


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## AndrewS (Dec 2, 2021)

My most stark "just slapped in a preset" moment was at the 9/11 memorial in NYC. There's a screening room you can go to where they show a documentary about the day and there was a cue that was comprised pretty much entirely of an untouched Bowing Titanium preset from Omnisphere (which, to be fair, is a killer preset). It was pretty jarring, especially in such a somber moment.

But at the end of the day, the only people who will know or care are other composers, so no problem I guess.


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## Living Fossil (Dec 2, 2021)

Pier said:


> Yeah. I remember hearing some Hollywood Edge effects on the first Ice Age movie I had been using just days earlier.



Back in the days when i had just bought the new brand new Roland D-50 it was alway a sensational feeling to hear its signature sounds in established productions.
(Like the Pizzagogo preset, or Digital Native Dance)
Then, the "Staccato Heaven" patch became mainstream in some styles and it started to sound annoying...


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## José Herring (Dec 2, 2021)

ABC probably pulled it from some library somewhere as they've layered a lot of junk under it that doesn't even fit. It could be that the music editor hired to cut in the library tracks also is a Zebra HZ owner and filled it in with the default first patch which is kind of funny really. Literally the patch that loads up when you load up ZebraHZ.

The sad thing is that nobody but us will notice or even care.


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## KEM (Dec 2, 2021)

Pier said:


> Yeah. I remember hearing some Hollywood Edge effects on the first Ice Age movie I had
> been using just days earlier.



I remember hearing those as well, granted I was only 4 years old seeing it in theaters with my mom, but even back then I could call out a preset when I heard one!!


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## doctoremmet (Dec 2, 2021)

I remember I was annoyed when LFO released their seminal techno hit "LFO" and all I could hear was the stock preset from my 1989 Kawai K1.


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## doctoremmet (Dec 2, 2021)




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## Nick Batzdorf (Dec 2, 2021)

There are plenty of great things about music technology.

This is utterly useless shite. So is the "documentary."


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## KEM (Dec 2, 2021)

Nick Batzdorf said:


> There are plenty of great things about music technology.
> 
> This is utterly useless shite. So is the "documentary."



Yeah I wasn’t too impressed, good for those kids but ABC didn’t do them any justice, and especially not with representing their story musically


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## Nick Batzdorf (Dec 2, 2021)

KEM said:


> Yeah I wasn’t too impressed, good for those kids but ABC didn’t do them any justice, and especially not with representing their story musically


Library music is much better.


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## KEM (Dec 2, 2021)

Nick Batzdorf said:


> Library music is much better.



Even though I loathe library music with a passion I’m inclined to agree in this case


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## AdamKmusic (Dec 2, 2021)

Ah yes, good old Batcaves Octaves - analog!


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## Pier (Dec 2, 2021)

doctoremmet said:


>



Here's the track in question!




@doctoremmet did you know that Mark Bell did a ton of stuff with Bjork? All the electronic beats in Homogenic and other records are from him.


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## doctoremmet (Dec 2, 2021)

Pier said:


> Here's the track in question!
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Thanks. Yes I was aware and I have come to terms with people building entire tracks around a preset. I would never do that, hence I hardly ever finish a track. It’s a curse haha.


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## Pier (Dec 2, 2021)

doctoremmet said:


> I would never do that, hence I hardly ever finish a track. It’s a curse haha.


Are you me? 😂

This year that I've focused on doing presets, I've found that momentum doesn't play a big role for me when doing sound design. I can stop working on a library project for weeks or months, and then pick it up very easily.

When writing music, that just doesn't work for me, at all. If I lose momentum for too long, I never pick it up again.

I just realized all this when writing this post btw.


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## doctoremmet (Dec 2, 2021)

Pier said:


> Are you me? 😂
> 
> This year that I've focused on doing presets, I've found that momentum doesn't play a big role for me when doing sound design. I can stop working on a library project for weeks or months, and then pick it up very easily.
> 
> ...


Same ✅


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## shadowsoflight (Dec 2, 2021)

Pier said:


> I'm not sure how it is in the US, but when I did it here in Mexico (just once) I had to do two 45mins episodes per week. I lived on Red Bulls for 2 months and barely slept. Obviously the music I delivered was crap.
> 
> It wasn't just me, the whole production was a nightmare. I should have walked when I saw that coming, but I was younger and stupid(er) and I hadn't learned that I could say "no".
> 
> That was around 2010. The experience was so traumatizing that for years I just played around with synths and didn't write any music other than stupid loops on Ableton Live. I think the demo for my latest Zebra library is the first thing I've written since then.



That's awful to hear. I'm glad you have made a track again; hopefully you'll find the support in this awesome community to keep the momentum going 🙂


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## Pier (Dec 2, 2021)

shadowsoflight said:


> That's awful to hear. I'm glad you have made a track again; hopefully you'll find the support in this awesome community to keep the momentum going 🙂


Thanks! 🙌

VIC is really a unique and awesome community. Best forum I've ever used (and I've used a lot).


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## cedricm (Dec 2, 2021)

Not a lawyer, but fairly sure it's legal.
The issue is that ABC won't be able to copyright the soundtrack, and usage tracking will be difficult since others will probably use exactly the same preset.

I hear more than one hit directly use presets from Nexus or VPS Avenger.


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## KEM (Dec 2, 2021)

cedricm said:


> Not a lawyer, but fairly sure it's legal.
> The issue is that ABC won't be able to copyright the soundtrack, and usage tracking will be difficult since others will probably use exactly the same preset.
> 
> I hear more than one hit directly use presets from Nexus or VPS Avenger.



Pretty much all of hip-hop right now is stock Omnisphere presets, and about 8-10 years ago it was all Nexus 2 presets


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## lux (Dec 2, 2021)

honestly, whats the point of having presets if you need to strictly avoid using them?

as a sound designer I'm cool listening stuff I programmed, used (no matter how good or bad) in real life situations. That's what they are crafted for. It shows some love for all the work that's behind sculpting a sound.


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## KEM (Dec 2, 2021)

lux said:


> honestly, whats the point of having presets if you need to strictly avoid using them?
> 
> as a sound designer I'm cool listening stuff I programmed, used (no matter how good or bad) in real life situations. That's what they are crafted for. It shows some love for all the work that's behind sculpting a sound.



I don’t have any problem with presets, as I stated earlier in the thread the problem is that they’re using a theme Hans wrote for The Dark Knight movies, it’s the sequence of notes the arp is playing


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## Pier (Dec 2, 2021)

liquidlino said:


> Funniest example of this is Spaceman by Baylon Zoo. The opening is literally the first patch that comes on when you turn on a Korg O1W


I was just listening to this track on Spotify when reading this 🤯


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## KEM (Dec 2, 2021)

Pier said:


> I was just listening to this track on Spotify when reading this 🤯



Spotify?! Come on man you’re better than this, get Apple Music!!!


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## Pier (Dec 2, 2021)

KEM said:


> Spotify?! Come on man you’re better than this, get Apple Music!!!


LOL you're such a fanboi

Also, the Apple Music desktop app kinda sucks.


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## KEM (Dec 2, 2021)

liquidlino said:


> Youtube music all the way. Why? Because for $22 a month my whole family gets advert free youtube videos and every song ever. It's so refreshing not having adverts on youtube whilst watching tutorials etc. I have Amazon Prime, and the music that comes with that is limited, and it keeps begging me on every single load to upgrade to full account. Which is more expensive than youtube.



Yeah it’s a great value but is it loseless audio?


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## KEM (Dec 2, 2021)

Pier said:


> LOL you're such a fanboi
> 
> Also, the Apple Music desktop app kinda sucks.



Spotify’s audio quality sucks, and that’s a much worse tradeoff


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## Pier (Dec 2, 2021)

liquidlino said:


> As a coincidence, or because of my post?


Total coincidence!


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## Pier (Dec 2, 2021)

KEM said:


> Spotify’s audio quality sucks, and that’s a much worse tradeoff


I'm 42 man, I can't hear anything above 16Khz 😂


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## Pier (Dec 2, 2021)

liquidlino said:


> It's not, but honestly, I bet you couldn't actually tell the difference in a blind test. Everyone thinks they can, but numerous blind tests with audio pros on pro gear have shown it not to be the case. It's mostly placebo effect.


Yep. 99% of people can't tell the difference between 192Kbps MP3 and lossless.

Most people can't tell the difference with 128Kbps and lossless...

BTW Soundcloud is 128Kbps and my hosting service will be 192Kbps.



liquidlino said:


> That's... really f'ing freaky. Why would you be listening to a 25 year old pop song at the exact same time???? The world moves in mysterious ways.


Someone mentioned it on Twitter and I was listening to it out of nostalgia. I hadn't listened to it in 25 years!


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## shadowsoflight (Dec 2, 2021)

Okay a bit late with this one, but I just found another band who pretty much just used a Zebra preset straight out of the box. Literally sounds like they just played with automation, added sound effects and called it a song. The nerve!



It's a group called "Pink Floyd" - they used the preset "HS Dark Side Run". It was a few years ago so it might have been using Zebra 1.

(Oh by the way, which one's Pink?)

Seriously though, Howard Scarr is such a master! It's pretty uncanny when you listen to them side by side.


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## Mr Greg G (Dec 3, 2021)

Lost intro was actually just one long F4 press on the keyboard. The preset was from Atmosphere (Armenian Sun).



I read somewhere that the show producers had to sign a special agreement with Spectrasonics for this theme because Spectrasonics terms of use prohibit (prohibited?) the use of their sounds without additional music or build up.


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