Audio Damage Panstation - Manual (Page 11)

apparent loudness and distance of the sound as it moves back and forth. Since Panstation is intended for
creating special effects, none of its pan laws is necessarily better than the others. Try different settings in
different situations and let your ears choose.
The following panning laws are available:
Equal Power – this setting uses a panning law similar to the panning controls on hardware mixers
and software mixers present in DAWs. It varies the amplitude of the signal as it moves from one side
to the other so that its perceived loudness stays approximately constant.
M500 – this setting uses a panning law reproduced from the Drawmer M500. The M500’s panning law
makes the signal seem louder at the extreme left and right positions, attenuating it fairly sharply at
the center of the stereo field. This emphasizes the motion of the auto-panner and typically produces
the most dramatic results among the PAN LAW settings.
Equal Distance – this setting varies the loudness of the signal so that its apparent distance from the
listener’s head stays constant as the signal moves back and forth. It’s similar to the Equal Power
setting but can produce slightly more interesting results in some contexts.
Linear – this setting uses a mathematically simple panning law that varies the relative amplitudes of
the left and right channels in a linear (straight-line) manner. A linear panning law typically isn’t used
for mixing purposes since it tends to produce the ―hole in the middle‖ effect, i.e. the sound is quieter
when placed at the center of the stereo field than when placed at either side. In Panstation, however,
it’s useful as an intermediate setting whose effect is somewhere between the Equal Power and M500
settings.
If you have the OFFSET control set near zero or 360 to create tremolo effects rather than panning, the PAN
LAW control will have some effect on how the loudness of Panstation’s output rises and falls. The Linear
setting usually creates the most obvious results, but try other settings as well.
Pan Shape
The Pan Shape popup menu selects one of several wave shapes for the low-frequency oscillators. Different
wave shapes create different panning or tremolo effects, making the sound seem to move back and forth in
different trajectories. The available shapes are: