Sound waves explained, for beginners! - Ep. 01

What is sound, physically? What do “amplitude” and “frequency” mean, and how do we perceive them? What is the Doppler effect? In this video, we’ll be looking at characteristics of sound waves, and it does not require advanced knowledge in physics and mathematics, so it’s beginner-friendly.

0:00 Introduction
0:28 Vibration of an object and propagation of sound
2:19 Pressure, atmospheric pressure, and Pascals
3:14 High and low pressure regions
4:37 Plot of a sound wave
5:38 Amplitude, loudness, and volume
6:09 Peak, RMS, and instantaneous amplitudes
9:23 Speed of sound in different media
11:09 General concept of frequency
11:52 How to measure frequency and period
14:15 Frequency of a wave
14:53 Human hearing range
15:20 Relationship between frequency and pitch
15:50 Period vs. wavelength
16:24 Visualization of wavelength
17:31 Doppler effect
18:25 Duration of a sound
18:41 Waveform and timbre
20:35 NES music visualization
21:52 Outro

References to images and animations:

[ancan]

Your videos are very useful. Thank you so much for sharing!

[karanagno]

Your videos are a treasure. Thank you!!

[paopis]

What an amazing resource I have just found! Thank you!

[heather]

Great video, LOVED the Zelda reference.

[zenon]

I love your videos! You should be a physics teacher or something

[Rene_Christensen]

Nice :-) But remember not to confuse signals and waves. When you plot something in Audacity, you are looking at a signal, not a wave, for example. You mention wave throughout, which is not always correct.