Help Understanding Frequency Bands

Audacity Help Forum Windows
1

Hi,

Probably a simple answer out there, but I can’t get a good visual in my mind of what the term Frequency Bands refers to in general - or specifically in the documentation on Noise Reduction where it talks about “Frequency Smoothing (bands): At values of 1 or higher, this control spreads the noise reduction into the specified number of neighboring bands.” What does a “band” encompass?

I understand the concept of frequency, but does Frequency Band refer to a particular division/group of frequencies, maybe 1-10 Hz is a band, and 11-20Hz is another band, …

Just trying to get a better understanding.

Thanks if you are able to help explain.

Mike

2

The precise answer is complicated and very technical. It’s to do with spreading the attenuation of “noise frequencies” across neighbouring FFT bins.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fast_Fourier_transform)

In more practical terms, increasing the frequency smoothing tends to reduce the creation of bubbly metallic artefacts, but at the expense of removing more of the sound that you want to keep. The sweet spot is around “3” (default).