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Registration of visible and near infrared unmanned aerial vehicle images based on Fourier-Mellin transform

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Abstract

The combination of aerial images acquired in the visible and near infrared spectral ranges is particularly relevant for agricultural and environmental survey. In unmanned aerial vehicle imagery, such a combination can be achieved using a set of several embedded cameras mounted close to each other, followed by an image registration step. However, due to the different nature of source images, usual registration techniques based on feature point matching are limited when dealing with blended vegetation and bare soil patterns. Here, another approach is proposed based on image spatial frequency analysis. This approach, which relies on the Fourier-Mellin transform, has been adapted to homographic registration and distortion issues. It has been successfully tested on various aerial image sets, and has proved to be particularly robust and accurate, providing a registration error below 0.3 pixels in most cases.

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Notes

  1. Photoscan, Agisoft, St. Petersburg, Russia (www.agisoft.com).

  2. ERDAS Imagine, GEOSYSTEMS France SARL, Montigny-le-Bretonneux, France (www.geosystems.fr).

  3. MicMac, IGN, France (http://logiciels.ign.fr/?-Micmac,3-).

  4. VisualSFM (http://ccwu.me/vsfm/).

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Acknowledgments

The research leading to these results has received funding from the European Union’s Seventh Framework Program [FP7/2007–2013] under Grant agreement No. 245986.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Irstea, UMR ITAP, 361 rue J-F Breton, BP 5095, 34196, Montpellier Cedex 5, France

    Gilles Rabatel

  2. Irstea, UMR TETIS, 500 rue Jean-François Breton, 34093, Montpellier, France

    Sylvain Labbé

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  1. Gilles Rabatel
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  2. Sylvain Labbé
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Correspondence to Gilles Rabatel.

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Rabatel, G., Labbé, S. Registration of visible and near infrared unmanned aerial vehicle images based on Fourier-Mellin transform. Precision Agric 17, 564–587 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11119-016-9437-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11119-016-9437-x

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