ASPRS

PE&RS January 2001

VOLUME 67, NUMBER 1
PHOTOGRAMMETRIC ENGINEERING & REMOTE SENSING
JOURNAL OF THE AMERICAN SOCIETY FOR PHOTOGRAMMETRY AND REMOTE SENSING

Peer-Reviewed Articles

49 Non-Differential GPS as an Alternative Source of Planimetric Control for Rectifying Satellite Imagery
Jay Gao

Abstract
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The objective of this study was to determine the feasibility of using uncorrected Global Positioning System (GPS) coordinates to accurately rectify satellite imagery. Sixty GPS positions were logged with a Trimble Geo-Explorer receiver at an interval of 5 seconds in three separate sessions for 20 ground control points (GCPs) around Auckland, New Zealand. The true coordinates of these GCPs were established by averaging 60 differentially corrected loggings. The coordinates of these GCPs were also read from large-scale topographic maps. All of these coordinates were used to rectify Landsat TM, and SPOTpanchromatic (PAN) and multispectral (XSL) images in a first-order polynomial transformation. It was found that image rectification accuracy in meters is inversely related to image pixel size, but positively correlated with the quantity of GPS loggings. Coarse-resolution imagery can be rectified to within 1-pixel size accuracy using two thirds of the selected GCPs based on coordinates averaged from 30 sequential loggings for TM  and SPOT XSL. SPOT PAN  imagery is more difficult to be accurately rectified using uncorrected GPS coordinates. Its satisfactory rectification requires a minimum of 30 integrated or 60 sequential loggings. GPS coordinates averaged from as few as 30 sequential loggings can achieve a consistently higher rectification accuracy than that from 1:20,000-scale map coordinates. It is concluded that non-differential GPS  coordinates can serve as a reliable alternative to planimetric control for rectifying satellite imagery of Earth resources.

57 An Edge-Preserving Filter for Imagery  Corrupted with Multiplicative Noise
H.C. North and Q.X. Yu

Abstract
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In the segmentation of natural imagery, differentiation at feature boundaries is of crucial importance. The high-amplitude, multiplicative speckle noise present in synthetic aperture radar (SAR) data demands a high level of filtering, yet this noise must be removed without destroying the critical feature boundary information. We previously designed the minimum coefficient of variation (MCV) filter to meet the twin demands of noise removal and edge preservation in SAR imagery. MCV-filtered images exhibit clear feature boundaries, but the filter's strong edge-preserving nature also introduces step edge artifacts in areas of intensity gradient and texture. We present the modified MCV filter (MMCV) which is able to significantly reduce the occurrence of filtering artifacts, while retaining an edge-preserving character. The MMCV filter is compared to existing filters by operating them on SAR imagery and deriving edge maps from the filtered imagery. Though the MMCV-filtered image is not the most visually pleasing, the linework derived from it is the most useful in terms of clean, continuous feature boundaries.

65 An Uncertainty-Based Method of Photointerpretation
Benoît Thierry and Kim Lowell

Abstract
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In the creation of forest type maps, photointerpreters first identify features that are the most certain, and subsequently identify features that are less certain in order to complete the map. In the present study, a method of photointerpretation is proposed in which only those features that an interpreter believes to be -100 percent certain£ are identified. This results in interpretations that are not polygonal and that do not cover an entire photograph but that are instead treated using spatial interpolation to produce surfaces containing fuzzy membership values (FMVs) for all map classes at all locations in the area under study. These FMV surfaces can then be manipulated to produce thematic maps in which areas have a known certainty. The method is demonstrated using a synthetic image. It is concluded that maps resulting from this alternative method of photointerpretation are no more or less accurate than those produced from conventional polygon-based photointerpretation procedures. However, the alternative method provides considerable time savings and also provides an estimate of the certainty of each area on the final thematic map -- something that the conventional photointerpretation method does not produce.

73 Spatial Prediction of Fire Ignition Probabilities: Comparing Logistic Regression and Neural Networks
Maria José Perestrello de Vasconcelos, Sara Silva, Margarida Tomé, Margarida Alvim, and José Miguel Cardoso Pereira

Abstract
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The objective of this work was to develop and validate models to predict spatially distributed probabilities of ignition of wildland fires in central Portugal. The models were constructed by exploring relationships between ignition location/cause and values of geographical and environmental variables using logistic regression and neural networks. The conclusions are that (1) the spatial patterns of fire ignition identified can be used for prediction, (2) the spatial patterns are different for the different causes, (3) the logistic models and the neural networks both reveal acceptable levels of predictive ability but the neural networks present better accuracy and robustness, (4) the maps produced by the two methods are similar, and (5) the information contained in the spatial position of ignition events can be used to gain predictive capability over an important phenomenon that is difficult to characterize and, for that reason, has not been included in most of the currently used fire danger estimation systems.

83 Measurement and Monitoring of Urban Sprawl in a Rapidly Growing Region Using Entropy
Anthony Gar-On Yeh and Xia Li

Abstract
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Rapid urban development and dramatic change of landscape have been recently witnessed in some developing countries as a result of rapid economic development. The measurement and monitoring of land-use changes in these areas are crucial to government officials and planners who urgently need updated information for planning and management purposes. This paper examines the use of entropy in the measurement and monitoring of urban sprawl by the integration of remote sensing and GIS. The advantages of the entropy method are its simplicity and easy integration with GIS. The measurement of entropy is devised based on two locational factors -- distances from town centers and roads -- to capture and reveal spatial patterns of urban sprawl. The entropy space can be conveniently used to differentiate various kinds of urban growth patterns. The application of the method in the Pearl River Delta, one of the fastest growing regions in China, has demonstrated that it is very useful and effective for the monitoring of urban sprawl. It provides a useful tool for the quantitative measurement that is much needed for rapidly growing regions in identifying the spatial variations and temporal changes of urban sprawl patterns.

91 An Automatic Method for Vine Detection in Airborne Imagery Using the Wavelet Transform and Multiresolution Analysis
Thierry Ranchin, Bernard Naert, Michel Albuisson,  Gilbert Boyer, and Pär Åstrand

Abstract
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The problem of automatic vine detection from airborne Infrared Color (IRC) images is addressed. An automatic method was designed, based on a separate modeling of the textural and spectral information extracted from the data. A multi-resolution analysis associated with a wavelet transform allows the separation of spectral and spatial information. After a description of the vine detection problem, the automatic method is described. An example application is proposed and a quantitative evaluation of the results achieved is presented. The analysis of the results demonstrates the efficiency of the method. The square system of planting is the main source of errors. But this growing technique is now nearly abandoned in France due to mechanization. Thus, this method may help photointerpreters in the updating or definition of agricultural registers of vineyards as defined by the European Commission.

99 Integration of Aerial Remote Sensing,  Photogrammetry, and GIS Technologies in Seagrass Mapping
Vanina Pasqualini, Chistine Pergent-Martini, Philippe Clabaut, Hervé Marteel, and Gérard Pergent

Abstract
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With a view to implementing a sound management of littoral plant formations, and more particularly that of seagrass beds, it would appear of interest to test the potentiality of image processing for various types of photographs (color, infrared, and black and white). The present study was carried out within the Gulf of St-Florent (Corsica, France) on a Posidonia oceanica reef platform. Over the last 40 years, no major diachronic evolution has been observed within this plant formation. An erosion of the coastline has been noted inland of these seagrass beds, however, with erosion values of up to 40 m. The use of photogrammetric techniques, which are new to the marine environment, allows the possibility of obtaining a numeric model of a given site. The comparison of cartographic and bathymetric data, brought together in a geographic information system, allows the spatial distribution of seagrasses to be evaluated for the first time.

107 CAD-Based Object Reconstruction Using Line Photogrammetry for Direct Interaction between GEMS and a Vision System
Guoqing Zhou and Deren Li

Abstract
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The paper presents an algorithm for reconstructing Geometric Element Modeling System (GEMS)-based industrial objects using line photogrammetry (LP) in order that there can be direct interaction between GEMS and a vision system. In the GEMS system, each object is constructed by Boolean set operators of constant solid geometry (CSG) primitives, each face of which is described by a Boundary presentation (B-pre); and straight lines, curves, planes, and curved surfaces are described by parametric equations. Based on this type of data structure and representation, the geometric elements which describe industrial objects in GEMS, are taken as unknowns, and are directly solved for by matching images (2D) and objects (3D). Compared to traditional photogrammetric DEM products, the advantage of this algorithm is that the product of reconstruction is parameters describing the industrial object, which can be directly fed back to the GEMS system. It is convenient to communicate between GEMS and the vision system without any transformation. On the other hand, the developed mathematical model can be used not only for line-to-line correspondences but also for line-to-surface or surface- to-surface correspondences. A number of simulations and practical experiments demonstrated that this algorithm is feasible and reliable in industrial computer vision.
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