Comparison and Integration of Radar and Optical Data for Land Use/Cover Mapping |
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| Authors: | Nathaniel D Herold Barry N Haack |
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| Institution: | 1. NOAA Coastal Services Center , 2234 South Hobson Ave, Charleston, SC, 29405-2413, U.S.A. E-mail: Nate.Herold@noaa.gov;2. George Mason University, Department of Geography , MS IE2, Fairfax, VA, 22030-4444, U.S.A. E-mail: bhaack@gmu.edu |
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| Abstract: | Abstract This study examined the complementarity of spaceborne radar and optical data for surface feature identification. RADARSAT data sets were assessed independently and in combination with Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM) multispectral data. The primary methodology was spectral signature extraction and the application of a statistical decision rule to classify the surface features for a site near Kericho, Kenya. Relative accuracy of the resultant classifications was established by digital integration and comparison to reference information derived from field visitation. Speckle filtering was a great improvement over the poor results achieved with the unfiltered, original radar data but still not adequate for accurate land cover classification. The extraction and use of Variance texture measures was found to be very advantageous. The overall results were not significant improvements over speckle removal (6% increase) but several individual classes, forest and urban, had excellent results with texture. Combinations of radar with Landsat TM greatly improved results, achieving near perfect classification of all individual classes. The highest overall accuracy was achieved with a merger that included the best individual texture image and six reflectance bands of the TM data. The systematic strategy of this study, determination of the best individual method before introducing the next procedure, was effective in managing a very complex, almost infinite set of analysis possibilities. |
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