Geometric and radiometric evaluation of Razaksat medium-sized aperture camera data

Abstract

Razaksat, a high-resolution Malaysian remote-sensing satellite, was launched on 14 July 2009. It carries a medium-sized aperture camera (MAC) with one panchromatic and four multispectral bands, of 2.5 and 5 m spatial resolution, respectively. The satellite was placed in a near-equatorial orbit with a low inclination angle of 9° to enable an optimum 14 overpasses per day over the equatorial region (i.e. 9° N to 9° S) as compared to only three daily passes over Malaysia for near-polar orbiting satellites. This article reports on evaluation of the panchromatic and multispectral images of MAC: (i) a geometric evaluation of the panchromatic and multispectral MAC images; (ii) a radiometric evaluation, focusing particularly on the noise level and sharpness of the MAC images; (iii) an evaluation of the MAC panchromatic data for updating planimetric topographic features; and (iv) a classification of MAC multispectral data for land-cover mapping. The noise level within the image set was found to increase with the intensity, while the sharpness of edges tested on the images in all non-homogeneous targets was relatively marginal. However, the outcome of the analysis showed the utility and potential of high-resolution panchromatic and multispectral bands of the Razaksat as stipulated in the system mission for terrain mapping.

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank the Astronautics Technologies (Malaysia) Sdn Bhd, Malaysia Space Agency, and Malaysia Remote Sensing Agency for providing all the pertinent information rendered during the study. We also acknowledge the evaluations and comments made by the referees and respective editor, which have improved this article.

Notes

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