Atmospheric Correction of Hyperspectral Data Using Combined Empirical and Model Based Method

Atmospheric correction is a difficult procedure due to the complex nature of the atmosphere and yet it should be done with utmost care because it largely determines the usability of the final data. Atmospheric correction is usually done using either empirical or model based method. In this paper a combined method proposed. The proposed method has two phases. In the first phase hyperspectral radiance data is corrected using the model-based ATCOR 4 software. In the second phase the modelled reflectance data is corrected using Empirical-Line (EL) method. The accuracy of the method was tested using Pseudo Invariant Feature (PIF) targets. The average RMSE error of the PIF targets was 6.8% when the reflectance was derived using ATCOR 4 software. The average RMSE error of the PIF targets was 1.8% when the reflectance was derived using the combined method proposed in this paper. The proposed method produced better results especially in the wavelength regions 950-1100nm and 2300-2500nm.