Discrete Fourier Transform

And
Discrete Time Fourier Transform

Guzman, Dustin Jones L.

Manait, Karl Jason B.

Submitted in partial fulfillment of the

Requirements for Digital Signal Processing

Mapa Institute of Technology

August 2015

Chapter 1

INTRODUCTION
Fourier Transforms are a very powerful tool used in physics to determine for
example frequency components of a time signal, momentum distributions of
particles and many other applications. It is basically a decomposition of a function
into sinusoids, usually expressed as complex exponentials. This decomposition
usually requires a continuous set of frequencies or wavelengths except in the case
where the original function is already periodic. Computers can perform Fourier
transforms of functions but because they can only deal with discrete quantities, the
Discrete Fourier Transform is introduced as an approximate numerical method for
computing the Fourier Transformation of a function. When signals are sampled by a
computer system, those signals are neither continuous-time nor have the possibility
of containing non-redundant information with an infinite bandwidth. Additionally, an
infinite transform is simply useless on a computer that works with finite constructs.
This topic is to inform readers the main significance of Fourier transform in
our daily lives. [1] It is very common for information to be encoded in the sinusoids
that form a signal. This is true of naturally occurring signals, as well as those that
have been created by humans. Many things oscillate in our universe. For example,
speech is a result of vibration of the human vocal cords; stars and planets change
their brightness as they rotate on their axes and revolve around each other; ship's
propellers generate periodic displacement of the water, and so on. The shape of the
time domain waveform is not important in these signals; the key information is in
the frequency, phase and amplitude of the component sinusoids. The DFT is used to
extract this information.

Discrete Fourier transform takes a finite number of

samples of a signal and transforms them into a finite number of frequency samples

of that signal. The discrete Fourier transform does not act on signals that exist at all
time and continue to time infinity, the DFT applies to signals that exist at a finite
number of time points and products a finite number of frequency points.
The paper limits the readers to the main concept of Discrete Fourier
Transform as well as Discrete Time Fourier Transform and its corresponding
application in Digital Signal Processing. The mathematical part of the said topic will
not be further discussed.

Chapter 2
REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE AND STUDIES
Carl R. Nave [2] explains how Fourier transform is used in analysis of sound.
It is important to assess the frequency distribution of the power in a sound
because the human ear exercises that capacity in the hearing process. The
following illustrations describe the sound of a London police whistle both in
the time domain and in the frequency domain (by means of the FFT).

Whistle A
Labeling the two pipes of the whistle A and B, the illustration at left shows the
sound of Whistle A alone. The top graph is the ordinary display of signal voltage
from the microphone vs time. The bottom
graph is the fast Fourier transform (FFT) of
that signal. It shows that most of the power
is at one frequency, approximating a sine
wave. The fact that the peak showing most of
the power is at position four just reflects the
fact that four periods were chosen for the FFT
sample.

Whistle B
This is the same kind of display with whistle B
alone. Three periods were chosen for the FFT
this time, resulting in a main peak at position
3.

Whistles A and B
When

whistles

simultaneously

A
the

and

are

time

plot

sounded

shows

the

characteristic beat frequency pattern. The FFT

shows the two distinct frequencies of the
individual pipes.

Yao Wang [3] explains how Fourier transform is used in analysis of image through
the block diagram below and its actual example.

Figure
4

REFERENCES:

[1] Steven W. Smith, Ph.D., The Scientist and Engineers Guide to Digital Signal
Processing 1997-1998
[2] Carl R. Nave, HyperPhysics 2012
[3] Yao Wang, Zhu Liu, Onur Guleryuz, and Gonzalez/Woods, Digital Image
Processing, 2ed