Photogrammetric exploitation of IKONOS imagery for mapping applications

The launch of IKONOS by Space Imaging opens a new era of high-resolution satellite imagery collection and mapping. The IKONOS satellite simultaneously acquires 1 m panchromatic and 4 m multi-spectral images in four bands that are suitable for high accuracy mapping applications. Space Imaging uses the rational function model (RFM), also known as rational polynomial camera model, instead of the physical IKONOS sensor model to communicate the imaging geometry. As revealed by recent studies from several researchers, the RFM retains the full capability of performing photogrammetric processing in absence of the physical sensor model. This paper presents some RFM-based processing methods and mapping applications developed for 3D feature extraction, orthorectification and RPC model refinement using IKONOS imagery. Comprehensive tests are performed to test the accuracy of 3D reconstruction and orthorectification and to validate the feasibility of the model refinement techniques.