F0 estimation and Fourier analysis

[Qianchu L]

Hi

I’m just wondering whether we could use Fourier analysis to estimate F0? We could just pick the lowest frequency peak right? From my understanding Fourier analysis should be easier than autocorrection, or is it not as simple as that?

Thanks!

[Simon]

In theory, the method you suggest would work: the lowest harmonic is of course at a value of F0. But, in practice this doesn’t work as well as autocorrelation-based approaches because the FFT spectrum has a resolution determined by the analysis window length: for example, if there were 1024 FFT bins spanning 8000 Hz, that would mean that each bin was about 8Hz wide – this limits the resolution of the F0 estimate. To get good resolution, a rather long analysis window is needed (try it yourself in Wavesurfer)

The resolution of the autocorrelation function depends only on the sample rate of the waveform being analysed.

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