Corbin's tests are quite tough compared to other physics classes; but if you look at the previous quarters, his grade distribution is quite decent, giving around 25% A's. The key to doing well in his class is going to lecture and understanding the concepts and math behind every single step of his derivations/examples; if you can do that, it's not too hard to apply the same thinking to his exam problems, which usually aren't too different from his lecture problems. Do the discussion/review problems from the TAs, and I'd also recommend looking at Corbin's old exams as well as some of the Feynman lectures. IMO, reading the textbook/doing the recommended HW problems is mostly a waste of time.
If you work smart and reasonably hard, this class really isn't too bad, and Corbin does do a good job of teaching physics.

Corbin is a nice dude and pretty chill but this class almost killed me (and still might). His exams are extremely difficult and his office hours are usually unhelpful since so many people go and often times it's just expanding on what was went over in the lecture. I studied around 30 hours for one of the midterms and still got significantly below average. If you come from a background of not having much high school physics you're pretty much screwed since a lot of times he sort of assumes you already know certain things (and this is coming from a physics major).

Best professor UCLA has to offer. Would highly recommend.

I love Corbin, and chose to take him again for 1C. He's literally Jeff Bridges. Super laid back and fun, but also an incredible lecturer. He explains concepts better than anyone else, and takes the time to make sure you understand everything fully. That being said, his tests are incredibly difficult; I got a 17% on the second midterm. He frames exams as "an opportunity to learn from your mistakes," and purposefully makes it nearly impossible to do well. Everyone does poorly on them though so it'll be fine; my 17% got me a B. I highly highly highly recommend taking Corbin for every class you possibly can.

Like all reviews say, Corbin knows what he's talking about. Great lecturer as well, and often funny. His midterms were tight on time, so you have to be prepared because you don't have much time to waste remembering equations and stuff. The final was a lot longer, but more time per question which allowed for more thinking. Overall, his exams are very difficult, although there are parts which are straightforward, so make sure you don't miss those. I didn't think I did well at all, but I ended up with a B, so not too bad.

Cool professor, lovable homie.

This guy destroys my interest in physics. Don't take him.

Corbin is that professor everyone tells you to take because he gives you a great, solid foundation in physics, and he's a fantastic lecturer.

Unfortunately, I didn't really like his lecturing style and felt that he was a big arrogant at times. Nevertheless, he does cover a lot of material and make it all make sense in some ways, but never enough for midterms and finals.

It's expected to get low scores on midterms and finals, but honestly if you know a few things pretty well, you're guaranteed to average. But I felt that 90% of students (me included) were essentially trained to aim for partial credit and not really care about getting actual answers right.

Overall not a terrible instructor but just not the right professor for me. Nothing against Corbin or students who like him.

Seriously one of the best professors I've ever had. Genuinely interested in student learning and very approachable. Make sure you go to his office hours.

This man is the best physics professor I ever met, and I am glad to see every review on this page so far agrees with me.

I took Corbin after having inadvertently sat through his 1B lecture by mistake during Winter (when I was still in 1A), and realizing he was the man I wanted for 1B. Why? Well, for a start, his lectures are phenomenal. That's a bland qualifier, though, so let me be more specific: this man is not afraid of using his head. He does not shy away from mathematics proper (something I have seen far too many otherwise well-meaning professors do, not realizing just how detrimental it is in the long run), and does not believe that a physicist is a human calculator (something I gladly welcome; physics is not arithmetic or ridiculous computation, and anybody who thinks it is is severely mistaken).

In that vein, you will rarely, if ever, see him perform a calculation. What Corbin specializes in, and what makes him superior to many other professors, are derivations. Nor will these be ordinary derivations. For his final lecture in Spring, Corbin went so far as to derive the exact rate of precession for a charged sphere oscillating at an angular velocity around its axis in a magnetic field (which sounds complicated at first, but Corbin roots it completely in everything you've learnt over the quarter, so that when you see it, you'll kick yourself for not having thought of it sooner.)

Here's a list of what makes his classes unique:

1) He knows more than the book. He is not one of those professors who copies things wholesale from the text and proceeds to do exactly what's in it. Corbin teaches upper divs as well as graduate classes, and in his younger days worked at FermiLab, only the world's premier particle physics institute after CERN, and he brings all that knowledge to bear on the 1 series. He will correct the book on several occasions, teach you advanced stuff, and he will - I promise you this - make you like it, in part because he can actually make you understand and use it by yourself without too much help.

2) Corbin advocates self-sufficiency. He is one of those teachers who will go well and beyond the call of duty to make sure you understand what you're doing (he once let a struggling student actually bunk in his office in the days before the final to avoid distractions from studying), but his main intent and goal is to get you to the point where you could surpass even him. When discussing how to prepare for his midterms, he will ask you to go over your notes, and derive the equations firsthand for yourself. (I went even further, and came up with my own problems - it's really good practice, and will help you loads). He believes in this so much he even made the homework strictly optional: a lot of hard questions, and they're all upto you to do them - Corbin will grade you on the finals and the midterms only. Corbin also believes mathematics was invented for physics, and so it's physical intuition you need to hone - understand what's going on, and the math will work itself out, is what he always says.

3) Corbin is not, contrary to what everybody on this page claims, hard. If you actually go through his old midterms, you will be a little surprised to find they are all actually pretty straightforward - a standard Corbin problem merits no more than three lines of a solution (and if you think I'm joking, the solutions he hands out actually are just that long - that they also make complete sense simultaneously is simply proof that the difficulty of Corbin's problems are exaggerated).

What makes Corbin legendary for his midterms are a combination of factors: the time limit (fifty minutes is just not enough to solve three Corbin questions), the fact that they test more than one concept (including quite a bit of your math - Corbin is particularly fond of Taylor series, and will have you employ them where you can), that he likes pushing you into unfamiliar ground (on his final, he asked us about semiconductor devices, something which we had never covered) while making you realise just how much of it is actually familiar (on the same question, he asked us nothing about semiconductors, but only gave us certain properties and asked us to work out directly from these properties the effect it would have on the rest of the circuit), and finally, that they're just completely new. It takes skill to solve a completely new problem, one you couldn't have imagined in your wildest dreams, in just fifty minutes. By way of comparison, if all you've ever learned is Euclidean geometry and trigonometry, you're going to have no clue what to do when you have to solve for things on the surface of a sphere, even though everything about such a problem can be solved using Euclidean geometry and trigonometry (no joke, that's how Carl Gauss, the greatest mathematician who ever lived, did it at the tender age of sixteen). Simply put, Corbin is different, not hard, and won't have you go through the material you've already covered and memorized and could do in your sleep if he can help it.

4) Corbin is awesome at teaching. There simply is no other way to put it. Corbin is a man who likes stories, and for his part is an incredibly talented raconteur: no class goes by without him at least once bursting into some episode from his life that will make you laugh, and simultaneously cherish what he's teaching you. He makes those equations come to life, mainly because he is quite literally deriving them right there (no notes, occasionally from memory, but mostly just making things up as he goes along), and by telling you these amazing stories about the objects his equations describe that will make you in parts gasp, flinch and simply be left spellbound. There is magic to these objects, not rote - a certain splendor and sheer grandeur that many other professors seem to leave out. For this one ability alone, I rank Corbin above every teacher you might possibly meet in the Physics department.

5) He cares about his students. He is one of the few professors who holds office hours four out of five days of the week, responds to every email promptly and with incredible detail, tries to get to know them all, will never short-serve you on information, and will always, always, respond to your questions. Speak up in his classes; it's good for you.

6) His demo days are epic. Do not miss a single one: he showcases really cool stuff, and will do things you thought they only did in Hollywood.

7) Office hours are special. You can ask for help on homework problems if you want, but he likes using them to go beyond the stuff in the classroom. Expect to see problems beyond the standard of the textbook, and sometimes several days ahead of his own lectures. Also, pipe up with good questions.

And that's really all you need to know. Your only problem may be that Corbin is immensely popular - lines stretch from his office to the entrance of the building sometimes, and his office hours are packed with people, making it hard to get a one-on-one session with him. He also knows when he has a really good TA with him. This TA will be your lifeline. Also, he - rarely, but still there - makes statements that sound confusing and mystical ('Energy is conserved, except when it's not!'), and - still more rarely, but nevertheless - this can get in the way of seeing what he means, for a short while. Lastly, Corbin is a ribald man: don't be put off if he curses or describes how he comes to create midterm problems in a haze of drunken bleariness. That's just the way he is: a man of personality.