Influence of scene topography on the observed correlation between thermal infrared and visible/near-infrared images of ground terrain

The influence of local ground topography on the observed correlation between reflective and thermal infrared images is presented and discussed. The existing model for thermal infrared image statistics fails to predict the observed correlation between images in these two bands. A modification of the model in order to consider the influence of local ground topography in the scene is presented. The predicted correlation shows a much better agreement with the experimental data. The effect of ground topography may lead to misinterpreted results when various classification methods such as principal component analysis and thermal inertia measurements are implemented.