Product Description

This popular book introduces the fundamentals of remote sensing from an earth resource (versus engineering) perspective. The author emphasizes the use of remote sensing data for useful spatial biophysical or socio-economic information that can be used to make decisions. Provides two new chapters on LIDAR Remote Sensing (Ch. 10) and In situ Spectral Reflectance Measurement (Ch. 15). Offers a thorough review of the nature of electromagnetic radiation, examining how the reflected or emitted energy in the visible, near-infrared, middle-infrared, thermal infrared, and microwave portions of the spectrum can be collected by a variety of sensor systems and analyzed. Employs a visually stimulating, clear format: a large (8.5” x 11”) format with 48 pages in full color facilitates image interpretation; hundreds of specially designed illustrationscommunicate principles in an easily understood manner. A useful reference for agriculture, wetland, and/or forestry professionals, along with geographers, urban planners, and transportation engineers.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #22405 in Books
• Published on: 2006-05-21
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 608 pages

From the Back Cover
This book introduces the principles of remote sensing from an Earth resource perspective. It describes a) the fundamental characteristics of electromagnetic radiation and how the energy interacts with Earth materials such as vegetation, water, soil and rock, b) how the energy reflected or emitted from these materials is recorded using a variety of remote sensing instruments (e.g., cameras, multispectral scanners, hyperspectral instruments, RADAR), and c) how we can extract fundamental biophysical or land use/land cover information from the remote sensor data. The history of remote sensing, the principles of visual photo-interpretation, and photogrammetry are also presented. Application chapters focus on remote sensing of vegetation, water, urban land use, and soil/rock and geomorphic features. The book was written for physical, natural, and social scientists interested in how remote sensing of the environment can be used to solve real-world problems. The following features make this book easy to comprehend and apply: a) it contains hundreds of illustrations specially designed to make complex principles easy to understand, b) a substantial reference list at the end of each chapter, c) the 8.5 x 11" format allows the remote sensing images and diagrams to be easily interpreted, d) 32 pages of color are used to display remote sensing images or biophysical information that may be extracted from remote sensor data, and e) an Appendix provides Internet addresses for the most important sources of remote sensing information. Exercises and book illustrations are made available to instructors via the author's website. This book is a companion to "Introductory Digital Image Processing: A Remote Sensing Perspective" (Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1996) which introduces the fundamentals of digital image analysis. It is ideal for undergraduate or graduate courses in airphoto interpretation and remote sensing.

Customer Reviews

Best overall coverage of the topic I've found
This text found its way into my collection during my undergraduate career as required for a Geography course in remote sensing. I ejoyed it as an introduction to the topic but later found myself returning to it time and again in graduate school working on a remote sensing thesis. I keep on finding new reasons to open it up in my business, at Terra Prints. It's exhaustive while not exhausting. Worth buying.
Roland Clark

excellent!
This book covers broad area of remote sensing; nature, physics, photogrametry, history, various types of sensors (multispectral, thermal, Microwabe..), earth resource perspective(vegetation, water, urban landscape, soil&mineral...). So if you want to learn how remote sesning are employed in this world, I strongly recommend to buy this book. if you want to learn digital image processing, you should buy the sister book "Introductory Digital Image Processing: remote sensing perspective".

All sections (especially vegetation) contains alot of infomation and easy to understand with nice figures and pictures.

Only one fault of this book is this price...

Cutting edge, but needs work
This text book is extraordinarily detailed, and provides not only the concepts, but the theory and nuance for beginning in remote sensing. While studying this book, in detail, I have run into the following complaints, though:

1) The glossary and index are so incomplete, they're desolate. Important and conceptual terms that are used are not in either - it makes using the book quite difficult.

2) There is WAY too much minutia - the text is very informative, but I've found that the explanations of most things are excessively verbose.

3) Remote sensing is a very visual field.... and this book doesn't utilize diagrams and images nearly as much as it could/should. I realize that generating diagrams is time-consuming, but it would help this book immensely.

4) Chapter summaries and concept-based questions at the end of the chapters would probably help students a lot, too (perhaps even teachers).

5) There's not nearly enough talk about which EM bands see what, and what they help with. That's the entire basis of remote sensing, and it isn't explored in the detail that it could be.

So, while I recommend this text, because it is one-of-a-kind, I do so with the warning that it is obviously not a fine-tuned text yet.