Sartajvir Singh* et al. / (IJAEST) INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF ADVANCED ENGINEERING SCIENCES AND TECHNOLOGIES Vol No. 7, Issue No.

1, 085 - 091

Comparison of Different Topographic Correction Methods using AWiFS Satellite Data

1

Sartajvir Singh1
M-Tech Student, E.C.E Deptt. R.I.E.I.T, Railmajra, S.B.S. Nagar, Punjab, India sartajvir.dhillon@gmail.com

Director, Engineering Deptt. R.I.E.I.T, Railmajra S.B.S. Nagar, Punjab, India sharma_jks@hotmail.com

Prof. J.K. Sharma2

Dr. V.D. Mishra3

Scientist (E), R.S. Research Group SASE, DRDO Chandigarh, India vd_mishra@rediffmail.com

I.

INTRODUCTION

The operational use of remote sensing techniques is often obstructed by problems originating from topographic effects on the sensor response. The topographic effect of satellite imagery generally refers to the influence from the apparent intensity of surface reflectivity, which is caused by the solar incidence, terrain slope and viewing angle. Such influences may be augmented when the terrain slope is steeper, especially for mountainous terrains. Due to atmospheric scattering, the sun elevation is also of importance. A surface perpendicular to the sun at a low sun elevation will receive less radiation than a surface perpendicular to the sun at a high solar elevation [1]. In other words, sun-facing illuminated slopes (south aspect) show more reflectance value, whereas the effect is opposite in shaded area (north aspect) show less reflectance value [2]. Differential illumination results in considerable variation in

Keywords: - Topographic correction, Cosine-C, SCS+, Smooth correction, Slope match.

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Abstract: - In general, the topographic effect is particularly evident for steep sloped Himalaya terrain because irregular shape of Himalaya causes variable illumination angles and thus diverse reflection values within one land cover type as low reflectance value in shadow areas and high reflectance value in sun illuminated areas. Therefore, effective removal or minimization of topographic effects is necessary in satellite image data of mountainous regions. Topographic correction methods try to compensate topographically induced illumination variations effect. In this paper, different topographic correction methods such as cosine, C-correction, smooth C-correction, cosine-C, SCS+C, C-Huang Wei, slope matching techniques have analyzed using AWiFS satellite imagery of Himalaya. The performance of different models is evaluated using (1) visual analysis and (2) validation with in situ observations of spectral reflectance. The objectives of this study are to assess the effectiveness of different topographic corrections on snow cover area of Himalaya terrain. The result shows that slope matching is superb technique as compared to the other topographic correction methods to compensate the effects of variable illumination angles.

A number of methods have been developed to correct the effect of topographic variation on satellite images, mainly divided into three main categories (1) Empirical approches such as two stage normalization [3] etc. (2) Lambertains methods such as cosine [3]-[5], cosine-T [4], C-correction [4], cosine-C [3], smooth C [2], SCS+ [6] etc. (3) Nonlambertain methods such as Minnaret [7] etc. It was concluded [8] that physically based cosine correction and SCS correction would overcorrect the shaded area in an image, whereas the correction methods involving experimental parameters such as the C, SCS+C correction perform better and these empherical algorithms have been applied more widely in practice. However it was found that these well develop algorithms are problematic in operation, and some of them cannot perform well enough in some situation [2], [6]. It is reported [9] that slope matching technique superb topographic correction technique in snow cover area of western Himalaya, which was compared with cosine, Ccorrection, Minneart correction and two stage normalization correction methods. Other topographic correction methods in optical satellite imagery are not investigated very extensively in the Himalayan terrain. The purpose of this paper was to compare the different topographic method such as cosine, C-correction, slope matching, smooth C-correction, cosine-C, SCS+C, C-Huang Wei on snow cover area of Himalaya terrain for topographic effects. The results obtained using different topographic methods are compared with the in-situ observations of spectral reflectance. Results suggest that Slope matching is true quantitative retrieval of spectral reflectance, especially in shady area on our study area where as other topographic correction methods overestimate or underestimate the parameters.

the spectral characteristics of similar snow and other land covers. Therefore, different topographic correction methods were developed to eliminate or at least reduce the topographic influence.

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II.

STUDY AREA

A cloud free satellite images of AWiFS of 08th January 2009 is used in the present work to study influence of different topographic correction methods. The salient specifications of AWiFS sensor are given in the Table 1. IV. D IGITAL ELEVATION MODEL GENERATION AND GEOMETRIC CORRECTION

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AWiFS Image Geo-referencing

III.

S ATELLITE D ATASETS

T
Atmospheric Corrections
Estimation of Reflectance 10 10 10 10 Maximum Radiance (mw/cm2/sr/m) 52.34 40.75 28.425 4.645

The study area is a part of Lower and Middle Himalaya and shown on AWiFS image (Advance Wide Field Sensor) lies between latitude of 32.254 degree to 32.999 degree North and longitude of 77.00 degree to 77.497 degree East with Azimuth angle 155.69 degree, and Elevation angle 43.79 degree as shown in the Figure 1. The lower part of the area is surrounded by forest and tree line exists up to 3100 m. The upper part (Middle Himalaya) is devoid of forest. The average minimum temperature in winter is generally observed to be 12oC to -15oC in lower Himalaya (Pir-Panjal range) and -30oC to -35oC in Middle Himalaya (Greater Himalaya range). PirPanjal receives the highest snowfall (average 15-20 m) as compared to Greater Himalayan range (12-15m) during the winter period between October and May. The altitude in the entire study area varies from 1900 m to 6500 m with a mean value of 4700 m. The slope in the study area varies from 1-86 degree with mean value of 28 degree and aspect ranges from 0-360 degree with mean values of 180 degree. Most of the slopes in the study regions are oriented to south aspect.

Figure 1 AWiFS image of study area (08th January 2009)

DEM Slope, Aspect

Illumination Angle
Estimation of coefficients

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Spectral bands B2 B3 B4 B5 Spectral wavelength (nm) 520-590 620-680 770-860 1550-1700
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A master scene of 56m spatial resolution of AWiFS (Advance Wide field sensor) of study area is prepared after rectification with high spatial resolution 23m of LISS-III (Linear Imaging self-Scanning) with 1:50,000 toposheet. A satellite image of AWiFS was than geo-coded with AWiFS to the EVEREST datum by ERDAS/Imagine 9.1 (Leica Geosystems GIS and Mapping LLC) software with sub pixel accuracy. From the DEM dataset, information about the slope, aspect and illumination according to the sun angle and elevation were generated for input to the topographic corrections algorithms. The Pre-processing and Topographic correction steps Shown in Fig.2.

A
Spatial Resolution (m) 56 56 56 56

Apply Different Topographically Corrections method

Different Topographically Corrected Reflectance

Figure 2 Flow chart of Pre-processing and Topographic correction.

Table 2 Salient Specifications of AWiFS Sensor

Quantization (bit) Solar Exoatmostpheric spectral Irradiance (mw/cm2/sr/m) 185.3281 158.042 108.357 23.786

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V.

T OPOGRAPHIC UNCORRECTED REFLECTANCE IMAGE

GENERATION

Without topographic consideration, the atmospherically corrected surface spectral reflectance under lambertian assumption for AWiFS is computed using the following equation [10, 11]:
( ( ) )

from the sun appearing brighter than sun-facing slopes due to diffuse sunlight being relatively more influential on the shady slope. B. Cosine-C correction Due to the problem of overcorrection in cosine correction, an improved version has been proposed by [3], which considers the average IL conditions. = Where * (
() ()

(1)

VI.

T OPOGRAPHIC C ORRECTION

A. Cosine correction

A
= ( )

In this method, the surface is assumed to have Lambertian behavior, i.e. to be a perfect diffuse reflector, having the same amount of reflectance in all view directions. Under the assumption of Lambertian surfaces, the cosine correction [16], [4] has been extensively used to correct for illumination variations [2], [17].

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(2) (3)

In this study, different topographic correction methods were analyzed. The methods are the cosine, C-correction, smooth C-correction, cosine-C, SCS+C, C-Huang Wei, slope matching correction techniques as explained in following sections

C. C-correction

Teillet [4] proposed the addition of a semi-empirical moderator (C) to the cosine correction. In this method, C is introduced to the cosine correction model as an additive term in (2). C-correction is calculated using (5). = ( ) (5)

Based on an examination of image data, a linear relationship exists between and in the form (6), called regression equation. (6) The parameters C are a function of the regression slope (m) and intercept (b) (7) The parameter C is said to be analogous to the effects of diffuse sky irradiance, although the analogy is not exact. The C value, which may also be obtained from the slope and intercept of the regression line from the statistical-empirical approach, exerts a moderating influence on the cosine correction by increasing the denominator and reducing the overcorrection of faintly illuminated pixels. The C-correction method has been shown to retain the spectral characteristics of the data and improve overall classification accuracy in areas of rugged terrain, and it can be derived easily [2], [17].

Where is the slope of the surface, and is the solar azimuth angle.

Although the Lambertian assumption is simple and convenient for topographic correction, there is a recognised problem in the corrected images. Thus when correcting the topographic effect under a Lambertian surface assumption, images tended to be over-corrected, with slopes facing away

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Where is spectral reflectance for horizontal surface, is spectral reflectance observed over the inclined terrain, is solar zenith angle and is illumination (IL) which is calculated using (2), proposed by [3], [18], [2].

aspects of the surface

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Where is the exo-atmospheric spectral irradiance (refer Table1), is the solar zenith angle and calculated for each pixel [12], d is the earth sun distance in astronomical units and calculated using the approach of [13], is the downwelling diffused radiation and assumed zero according to [14]. is the path radiance which has computed using [14,15].

)+

(4)

( ) is mean of illumination of study area.

These models are wavelength independent, since the correction is based on the same factor for all the bands. This assumption is not appropriate as far as diffuse irradiance concerns. Therefore, it should be more appropriate to propose band-dependent factors of topographic correction as per reported in [2].

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D. Smooth C-correction It is reported [2] that best results can be obtained with a variation of the C method, which takes into account the overcorrection of low illuminated slopes by the original C method. Smooth C is a variation of C-correction method based on a smoothed IL value. Most methods produce an overcorrection in those pixels where IL is low. Therefore, a variation in the calculation of the IL was carried out, by smoothing the original slope with a smoothing factor of 3, 5, and 7. Previously slope is calculated using (8), = arc This is transformed into (9) = arc ( ) (9) ( ) (8)

F. C-Huang Wei It is reported [8] that C-Huang Wei method is used for topographic correction under Lambertain methods developed by Huang Wei. It can be calculated using (11). =( )( )+ (11) is

Where minimum value of spectral reflectance, a minimum value of illumination. G. Slope match

E. SCS+C : A Modified Sun-Canopy-Sensor Topographic Correction

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= ( )
ISSN: 2230-7818

The SCS correction [19] improves on the cosine correction by normalizing the illuminated canopy area. It is reported [6] that SCS correction is equivalent to projecting the sunlit canopy from the sloped surface to the horizontal, in the direction of illumination. The cause of the overcorrection in the SCS model is similar to that with the cosine correction. As the angle of incidence approaches 90 degree, the correction factor becomes excessively large. In the C-correction, the parameter C has been shown to have a moderating influence on the cosine correction by emulating the effect of diffuse sky illumination [4], [17]. Soenen [6] proposed the SCS+C correction where the moderator C is derived using (6) and (7) but within the improved physical context of the SCS model. This addition is intended to be an improvement to the SCS correction in a similar way as the C-correction improves on the cosine correction. The formulation for this new SCS+C correction is defined by (10)

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(10)

Where X=3, 5, 7 is a smooth factor. After obtained the slope of corresponding factor, put it in (5) to calculate smooth Ccorrection. A smoothed correction does not alter reflectance values significantly, whereas a more extreme correction could introduce additional errors.

T
( )(

Nichol and others [20] was proposed slope-matching method who introduced certain modifications to Civcos (1989) model and considered the topographic corrections in two stages because they observed that Civcos [3] not provide the well results in shadow areas as per reported in [9]. The final reflectance for topographic correction is estimated using (12) proposed by Nichol and others [20]. ) (12)

is topographically corrected spectral reflectance, Where and is is spectral reflectance on the tilted surface, maximum and minimum spectral reflectance and estimated from topographically uncorrected reflectance image, is mean value of illumination on the south aspect. is normalization coefficient for different satellite bands and estimated using equation given in the literature [20]. (13)

Where is the mean reflectance value on sunlit slopes after first stage normalization, is the mean reflectance value on shady slopes in uncorrected image and is the mean reflectance value on shady slope after first stage normalization. All parameter required to calculate coefficient is shown in Table 2. The advantage of this method is that reflectance values in the corrected image are normalized to the mean illumination level of pixels on the sunny aspect rather than the overall mean illumination value of the entire image [20]. The slopematching method adjusts the brightness between northern and southern slopes. As such, its parameters depend on the image itself as reported in [21].

Where is terrain slope [19] and all other parameter are considered as in [section 2(C)].

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TABLE 2 P ARAMETERS FOR C ALCULATION OF

(COEFFICIENT) FOR SLOPE MATCHING

Spectral Reflectances in AWiFS bands Parameters South Aspect (after 1st normalization) North Aspect (after 1st normalization) North Aspect VII. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION Band 2: 520590 (nm) 0.824 0.866 0.461 Band 3: 620680 (nm) 0.810 0.847 0.442 Band 4: 770860 (nm) 0.814 0.830 0.425 Band 5: 15501700 (nm) 0.139 0.235 0.068

A. Estimation of Coefficient for Topographic Correction methods The coefficients for different topographic correction method (C-correction, smooth C with factor 3, smooth C with factor 5, Smooth C with factor 7 and slope match) have shown in Table 3. B. Model Validation The results obtained using different topographic models are compared with the in-situ observations of spectral reflectance recorded at the time of satellite pass at Indian

TABLE 3 COEFFICIENTS FOR D IFFERENT TOPOGRAPHIC NORMALIZATION M ODELS . Coefficients for AWiFS imagery of 08th January 2009 C-correction/SCS+C 16.84 15.94 15.25 16.66 Smooth C (with factor 3) 5.990 5.679 5.396 5.529 Smooth C (with factor 5) 3.475 3.267 3.098 3.142

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standard time (1130 IST) on 08th January 2009 for model validation. The pixel location of AWiFS imagery of 08th January 2009 was latitude (32.358791o) and longitude (74.119792o). The comparative analysis of different topographic results with in-situ observations in Table 4 shows that some of topographic correction methods overestimate and some of topographic correction methods underestimate but only slope matching method is unique among all the methods and is more suitable for snow cover area of Himalayan terrain. In literature [9], Slope match method performed superb as compare to cosine, C-correction, two stage normalization and Minneart. All topographic correction methods output images have shown in Fig. 3.

T
Smooth C (with factor 7) 2.350 2.206 2.083 2.10

TABLE 4 V ALIDATIONS OF TOPOGRAPHIC NORMALIZATION M ODELS WITH F IELD RESULTS OF S PECTRAL R EFLECTANCE USING S PECTRORADIOMETER . AWiFS Date: 08th January 2009, pixel location: latitude (32.358791o) and longitude (74.119792o). Spectral reflectances in AWiFS bands Band 2: 520590 (nm) Band 3: 620680 (nm) Band 4: 770860 (nm) Band 5: 15501700 (nm) Topographic Model Cosine-C 0.896 0.895 0.909 0.142 C-correction 0.979 0.978 0.977 0.150 Smooth C (with factor 3) 0.978 0.982 0.976 0.149 Smooth C (with factor 5) 0.982 0.956 0.980 0.151 Smooth C (with factor 7) 0.983 0.957 0.981 0.151 SCS+C 0.979 0.956 0.979 0.149 C-Huang Wei 0.685 0.661 0.663 0.109 Slope match 0.929 0.928 0.923 0.139 0.928 0.912 0.909 0.149 Field observation

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Slope match 0.8962 0.9086 0.9604 0.4251

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(d)

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(e) (h)
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(g)
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A
(i) Figure 3 Topographic corrected image (a) cosine, (b) cosine-C, (c) C-correction, (d) smooth C with factor 3, (e) smooth C with factor 5, (f) Smooth C with factor 7, (g) SCS+C, (h) C- Huang Wei, (i) slope match.
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(f)

(a)

(b)

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VIII.

CONCLUSION

In this paper, we have compared different topographic correction methods and concluded that all C methods do not provide well results as compare to slope matching in snow cover area of Himalaya terrain. We observed that slope matching method has advantages in the true quantitative retrieval of spectral reflectance, especially in shady area, compared to C-correction, cosine, cosine-C, smooth C, SCS+C and C-Huang Wei topographic correction methods. Topographic corrections are very useful for further applications as snow cover monitoring, change detection analysis, etc. Further research is needed with imagery on a global basis to derive guidelines on which method performs best under which situation. ACKNOWLEDGEMENT The authors would like to thank Director, Snow Avalanche Study establishment, Department of Defence Research and Development Organization. REFERENCES
[1]

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[12] F. Kasten, Table of solar altitudes for geographical effect on spectral response from nadir pointing sources. CRREL Spec. Rep. 57, 1962. [13] F. Van der Meer, Spectral mixture modelling and spectral stratigraphy in carbonate lithofacies mapping, ISPRS J. Photogramm. Rem. Sens., 51(3), 150162, 1996. [14] P. S. J. Chavez, Radiometric calibration of Landsat thematic mapper multispectral images, Photogramm. Eng. Remote Sens., 55(9), 1285 1294, 1989. [15] P. S. J. Chavez, 1996 Image-based atmospheric corrections revisited and improved; Photogramm. Eng. Remote Sens. 62 10251036. [16] B. Holben and C. Justice, The topographic effect on spectral response from nadir pointing sources, Photogramm. Eng. Remote Sens., 46(9), 11911200, 1980. [17] P. Meyer, K. I. Itten, T. Kellenberger, S. Sandmeier, and R. Sandmeier, Radiometric corrections of topographically induced effects on Landsat TM data in an alpine environment, ISPRS J. Photogramm. Remote Sens., vol. 48, no. 4, pp. 1728, 1993. [18] Y. Kawata, S. Ueno and A. Ohtani, The surface albedo retrieval of mountainous forest area from satellite MSS data, Appl. Math. Comput. 69 4159, 1995. [19] D. Gu and A. Gillespie, Topographic normalization of Landsat TM images of forest based on subpixel sun-canopy-sensor geometry, Remote Sens. Environ., vol. 64, pp. 166175, 1998. [20] J. Nichol, L. K. Hang and W. M. Sing, Empirical correction of low sun angle images in steeply sloping terrain: a slope matching technique, Int. J. Remote Sens. 27(34) 629635, 2006.