On a send/aux bus, keep MIX at 100 % and automate SHAPE/SPEED — you get a moving spatial layer without touching the dry track.
What ORBIT is
ORBIT is a binaural spatialiser: it takes a mono point of sound and flies it on a real path around your head — a circle, an ellipse, a descending spiral, a pendulum. It is not a stereo widener and not a reverb. The position is computed from head-related filtering (HRTF) plus decorrelated early reflections, so the source actually sits outside the head, at a distance, moving — with optional real Doppler on the fly-by.
Where it shines It shines on synth leads, plucks, arps, FX hits and risers, on percussion you want orbiting the head, and on whole stems via a send. Built for headphones, but it stays mono-safe and has a SPEAKERS mode (crosstalk cancellation) so the spatialisation survives on a real PA.
Up and running in five steps
- Drop ORBIT on a mono source — or a stereo one, it sums to a mono point before spatialising.
- Pick a SHAPE (Ellipse is the musical default) and a RATE: leave it on Free and dial the SPEED knob, or lock to 1/4 · 1/2 · 1 bar to ride the tempo.
- Set RADIUS for how far the source sits, then open WIDTH until the movement reads on headphones.
- For a real fly-by, raise DOPPLER — the source rushes close at the front and falls away behind you, pitch and all.
- Add a touch of ROOM to push it fully out of your head, and flip to SPEAKERS output if you are not on phones.
How the signal moves through it
The input is summed to a single mono point source and stage-gained by INPUT. The Orbit brain turns SHAPE · RATE/SPEED · DIRECTION · RADIUS · HEIGHT · SPREAD · CHAOS · DOPPLER into a live azimuth + distance trajectory, synced to the host transport when RATE is a musical division. That trajectory drives the spatial engine: an HRTF/ITD pair places the source by ear, a 1/r distance law and DOPPLER modulate a zero-latency propagation delay (the pitch bend on a fly-by is real, not a pitch-shifter), and ROOM adds decorrelated early reflections that drop the interaural coherence so the sound externalises. WIDTH scales the spatial axis of the wet, MONO SAFE forces the lows to mono, and SPEAKERS mode applies RACE crosstalk cancellation so the binaural image translates over a stereo pair. A zero-latency limiter holds the peaks, MIX blends wet against dry, and OUTPUT trims the final level.
Every control, explained
Orbit Radar
The big left display — the source flying around your head, seen from above.
Read-only visualiser. Shows the live path, the current azimuth/radius, velocity, Doppler %, height and mono status in the four corner telemetry readouts.
Watch the dot to feel what SHAPE + SPEED are doing before you commit — the AZ and RAD readouts confirm exactly where the source is.
RATE
How the orbit's timing is driven.
Selector: 1/4 · 1/2 · 1 bar · Free · Fixed (default Free). The three musical divisions lock one full lap to the host tempo; Free runs the lap off the SPEED knob; Fixed parks the source at a static angle (no movement).
Use a division for rhythmic motion glued to the groove; use Free for slow cinematic drifts; use Fixed to place a source at one spot in 3D and leave it there.
SHAPE
The geometry of the path the source travels.
Selector: Circle · Ellipse · Spiral · Pendulum · Pendulum Back (default Ellipse). Circle is a steady lap; Ellipse squashes it by SPREAD; Spiral breathes the radius in and out (a vortex); Pendulum swings front; Pendulum Back swings through behind you.
Ellipse is the most musical default. Pendulum Back is great for sounds you want to pass behind the listener's head.
DIRECTION
Which way the orbit turns.
Selector: CW (clockwise) · CCW (counter-clockwise), default CW. Reverses the direction of travel; on Pendulum it flips the swing's lead side.
Pick the direction that moves away from your busiest element so the motion stays legible in the mix.
OUTPUT (Phones / Speakers)
The playback target the binaural render is tuned for.
Selector: Phones · Speakers (default Phones). Phones is the pure HRTF/ITD image. Speakers applies RACE crosstalk cancellation so the out-of-head placement survives on a stereo pair.
Leave it on Phones for headphone mixes; switch to Speakers when checking on monitors so the spatialisation doesn't collapse.
SPEED
Free-running orbit speed, in laps per second.
0.05–8 Hz (default 0.5), skewed for fine control down low. Only active when RATE is set to Free; otherwise the lap follows the host division.
Under 0.3 Hz gives a wide, slow cinematic drift; push it up for tremolo-like spin. For tempo-locked motion use a RATE division instead.
WIDTH
The spatial axis of the wet image.
0–100 % (default 50). 50 % is the natural binaural width; toward 100 % the panning gets exaggerated and 'flying', built on ITD/HRTF — not a fake widener.
Open it past 50 % for obvious head-circling motion; pull it back for a subtler, contained orbit. Check high settings in mono.
RADIUS
The base distance of the source from your head.
0–100 % (default 60). 0 is right at the ear, 100 is far away; it scales the 1/r direct level and feeds the externalisation, so far sources sound quieter and more 'out there'.
Higher RADIUS + some ROOM is the recipe for a sound that sits clearly outside the head rather than panned across it.
HEIGHT
Vertical elevation of the orbit.
−100…+100 % (default 0, bipolar). Negative drops the source below the ear line, positive lifts it above. 0 keeps the lap level with your ears.
Pair a negative HEIGHT with a Spiral and high DOPPLER for a sound that descends and rushes past — classic fly-by.
DOPPLER
Real fly-by pitch shift on the orbit.
0–100 % (default 0). Makes the distance eccentric — close at the front, far behind — and modulates a zero-latency propagation delay, so pitch rises on approach and falls on retreat. Bypassed at 0.
A little (20–40 %) adds life; high settings get cinematic whoosh. The wobble is physics from the moving delay, not a pitch-shifter — lower SPEED or DOPPLER to tame it.
ROOM
Decorrelated early reflections for externalisation.
0–100 % (default 30). Adds short, ear-independent (velvet-noise) reflections that lower the interaural coherence — the cue that pulls a sound out of your head. Not a reverb tail; latency-free.
Even 20–40 % is enough to externalise. Push higher for a sense of space, but it stays an early-reflection field, not a long reverb.
SPREAD
Eccentricity of the elliptical path.
0–100 % (default 35). On Ellipse it sets how squashed the orbit is (0 = near-circle, 100 = a long thin lap, eccentricity up to 0.9). Shapes the front/back vs left/right balance of the travel.
Raise SPREAD on Ellipse for a wide left-right sweep with a fast front/back cross; drop it for an even circular feel.
CHAOS
OVNI randomness — erratic speed and wobble.
0–100 % (default 0). Injects jitter into the orbit's velocity and a small azimuth wobble, so each lap drifts off the perfect path. At 0 the motion is clean and repeating.
A little (10–25 %) makes the movement feel organic and alive; a lot turns ORBIT into an unstable, drunken flight.
MIX
Dry/wet blend of the spatialised signal.
0–100 % (default 100), bottom rail fader. At 100 % you hear only the moving binaural source; lower it to keep a dry anchor in the centre.
Keep 100 % on a send/aux; on an insert pull back to 40–70 % to keep the dry punch while the wet orbits around it.
INPUT
Pre-engine input trim (drive).
−24…+24 dB (default 0), bottom rail fader. Stages the level going into the spatial engine before any processing.
Trim hot signals down a touch so the internal limiter isn't constantly catching peaks on fast, close fly-bys.
OUTPUT
Final output level trim.
−24…+24 dB (default 0), bottom rail fader, post-limiter. Sets the level leaving the plugin; the clip LED warns if you push past 0 dBFS.
Use it to match the wet back to your dry reference; watch the clip indicator if you raise it on dense material.
MONO SAFE
Forces the low end to mono for translation.
Toggle (default off), on the bottom rail. Collapses the bass to a mono-compatible path so nothing cancels when the mix is summed.
Turn it on for anything that has to survive a club PA, a phone speaker or a mono broadcast — it keeps the low end solid while the highs still orbit.
Tips & tricks
01
02
For tempo-locked motion, set RATE to a division (1 bar reads as obvious circling) instead of Free.
03
The externalisation recipe: higher RADIUS + a little ROOM + WIDTH around 50–70 % puts the source clearly outside the head.
04
Fixed RATE turns ORBIT into a 3D placement tool — park a backing vocal or pad slightly behind and above the listener and leave it there.
05
Build a riser with a Spiral, a negative HEIGHT and DOPPLER climbing to 80 % — the sound descends and rushes past at the drop.
06
A small CHAOS (10–25 %) keeps repeated laps from sounding mechanical; great under long sustained sounds.
Troubleshooting
It still sounds like it's inside my head, not around me.
Externalisation needs distance and decorrelated reflections. Raise RADIUS and add some ROOM (20–40 %), and listen on headphones. WIDTH alone only pans — it's the 1/r distance plus ROOM that pushes the source out of the head.
The spatial effect collapses on my monitors / phone.
The pure binaural image is tuned for headphones. Switch OUTPUT to Speakers for crosstalk cancellation on a stereo pair, and turn on MONO SAFE so the low end stays mono-compatible when summed.
I hear a pitch wobble on fast orbits — is that a bug?
No, that's the real Doppler. Pitch emerges from modulating the propagation delay as the source flies toward and away from you. Lower DOPPLER or SPEED to reduce it; it's physics, not a pitch-shifter.
The pan isn't following my tempo.
Set RATE to a musical division (1/4 · 1/2 · 1 bar). On Free the lap runs off the SPEED knob in Hz and ignores the host; on Fixed the source doesn't move at all.
Specs
Formats: VST3 · AU
Systems: macOS
Build: Universal (Apple Silicon + Intel)
Engine: Zero-latency binaural (HRTF + ITD)
Doppler: Real, delay-line based
Output: Headphones · Speakers (RACE crosstalk)
Presets: 40 factory
License: AGPLv3 · open-source