Modeling of Earth Resources Satellite Data

Abstract

In this chapter, we demonstrate how web grammars may be used to develop syntactic models for a complex class of images. The images considered are pictures of urban areas obtained by the Earth Resources Technology Satellite (LANDSAT). We shall address specifically two basic questions: 1) Can a human designer familiar with web grammar theory construct web models of real images? And 2), are the resulting models useful? Affirmative answers to these questions will demonstrate the utility of the grammatical modeling approach in a real and nontrivial picture processing application. Specifically, as we indicate in the following section, such an approach holds promise for improving our ability to make practical use of multispectral data collected by satellites—for inventorying our natural resources, for planning the orderly growth of our urban areas, and for otherwise monitoring the condition and utilization of our environment.