English: The result of a constant-Q transform applied to the waveform of a C major chord played on a piano. The x axis corresponds to frequency mapped to the standard pitch names (increasing from lower pitches on the left to higher frequencies on the right). The y axis is time, with the start of the piano chord happening at the bottom and the release happening at the top (approximately 8 seconds later)
The darker areas correspond to higher values of the constant Q transform. The peak values are vibrating frequencies of the strings. The leftmost 3 strongest peaks are at the fundamental frequencies of the notes of the C major chord (C, E, G). The the remaining peaks to the right of the fundamental frequencies are overtones.
Note that Brown-Puckette algorithm on the showcqt uses kernels derived directly from frequency domain, the bandwidth calculation is actually variable-Q, and showcqt uses linear/nth root amplitude scaling rather than logarithmic.
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Constant-Q transform of a C major chord played on a piano. Generated using ffmpeg filter: ffplay -f lavfi 'amovie=piano-C-major-chord.ogg, asplit [a][out1]; [a] showcqt=timeclamp=1.0,fcount=10 [out0]'