Effect Delay Field 16

s3g Effect Delay Field 16 consolidates the former Shard Scatter, Orbit Delay, and Cascade Taps plugins with a new Iterate model. It accepts stereo input and publishes one stable sixteen-channel host port while its format layer activates stereo, quad, eight, or sixteen ordinary output lanes.

Changing the model uses a 50 ms equal-power handoff. Every model always generates its complete sixteen-lane delay field. Format then performs an energy-preserving ring fold to sixteen, eight, four, or two outputs; it never replaces the model with a reduced-lane version. The direct stereo source is injected once after the fold instead of being copied into all sixteen lanes, so Direct and Wet remain meaningfully comparable in every format. Inactive host lanes remain exactly silent.

Workflow

1. Insert Delay Field on a track with sixteen channels and route the source to the plugin's stereo input.
2. Route the active lanes to the intended speakers, a direct panner, or a fold-down monitor and begin playback. Another effect may precede that destination when its build matches the sixteen-channel host bus.
3. Choose Shard, Orbit, Cascade, or Iterate with Model.
4. Choose Stereo Ring, Quad Ring, 8ch Ring, or 16ch Direct with Format.
5. Use Out Rotate for an equal-power fractional rotation around the active ring.
6. Use the sixteen activity meters to confirm that the complete delay field is running, then compare the IN and FOLDED OUT readouts. Leave host lanes above the selected active width disconnected.

Models

• Shard cuts a live buffer into grain-like fragments and distributes the overlapping reads around the active ring. Captured fragments continue after the input stops instead of being gated before their Guard and Scatter times arrive.
• Orbit builds a circulating feedback-delay cloud. Position, Spread, Width, Focus, and Rotation shape its lane energy, while the feedback ring continues naturally after a transient input.
• Cascade places a full-level first delayed copy at Position, then advances by Delay Step around the ring in the chosen Direction. Decay alone establishes the ordered falloff; Smoothing rounds interpolation and control movement without suppressing the first tap.
• Iterate repeatedly reads a recent stereo window with randomized timing, pitch, and amplitude. Sequential, reverse, palindrome, random, and random-cycle traversal assign each event to the active outputs.

Iterate Lineage

Iterate adapts an offline multichannel iterative lineage documented in the central References to realtime stereo input. Its repetitions can vary delay, pitch, amplitude, and multichannel destination independently. It maintains a bounded rolling history, launches overlapping windowed voices, and uses Random Cycle traversal to visit every destination once before reshuffling. Stereo Events can retain two-channel events; Split Stereo places their sides in opposing lane banks.

Output Formats

Routing

Set the REAPER track to sixteen channels and confirm the plugin pin mapping before auditioning. The first two track channels feed the input bus. The output port always remains sixteen channels so Format automation does not renegotiate the host bus; lanes above the active width are cleared to zero on every block. In Stereo Ring mode, outputs 1–2 contain contributions from every one of the sixteen internal delayed lanes plus the single direct L/R path. The activity meters show delayed lanes only, making it possible to distinguish an active field from direct passthrough.

Discrete, Not Ambisonic

Delay Field's outputs are ordinary lanes. Use Direct Panning or Bus Mixing / Routing to place or combine them. Do not send them directly to an ambisonic decoder unless they have first passed through an Ambisonic Encoder.