Spectral splatter

Spectral splatter refers to an artifact that can occur in digital signal processing, particularly in the context of audio and image processing. It describes the unintended spreading or smearing of signal components across the frequency spectrum, typically due to nonlinearities, quantization errors, or insufficient sampling rates. In audio processing, for example, spectral splatter can manifest when certain frequencies interact in ways that produce unwanted harmonics or overtones, often as a result of dynamic range compression, distortion effects, or clipping.