Effect of soil surface roughness and scene components on soil surface bidirectional reflectance factor

Wang, Z., Coburn, C. A., Ren, X. and Teillet, P. M. 2012. Effect of soil surface roughness and scene components on soil surface BRF. Can. J. Soil Sci. 92: 297 313. Bidirectional Reflectance factor (BRF) data of both rough [surface roughness index (SRI) of 51%] and smooth soil surfaces (SRI of 5%) were acquired in the laboratory under 308 illumination zenith angle using a Specim V10E imaging spectrometer and an Ocean Optics non-imaging spectrometer mounted on the University of Lethbridge Goniometer System version 2.5 (ULGS-2.5) and version 2.0 (ULGS-2.0), respectively. Under controlled laboratory conditions, the rough soil surface exhibited higher spectral reflectance than the smooth surface for most viewing angles. The BRF of the rough surface varied more than the smooth surface as a function of the viewing zenith angle. The shadowing effect was stronger for the rough surface than for the smooth surface and was stronger in the forward-scattering direction than in the backscattering direction. The pattern of the BRF generated with the non-image based data was similar to that generated with the whole region of interest (ROI) of the image-based data, and that of the whole ROI of the image-based data was similar to that of the illuminated scene component. The BRF of the smooth soil surface was dominated by illuminated scene component, i.e., the sunlit pixels, whereas the shaded scene component, i.e., the shaded pixels, was a larger proportion of the BRF of the rough soil surface. The image-based approach allowed the characterization of the contribution of spatial components in the field of view to soil BRF and improved our understanding of soil reflectance.