Landsat 8 Operational Land Imager On-Orbit Geometric Calibration and Performance

TLDR

Landsat 8, launched 11 Feb 2013, carried the Operational Land Imager (OLI) for moderate‑resolution imaging in visible, NIR, and SWIR bands. During a 90‑day commissioning period, on‑orbit geometric calibrations updated OLI‑to‑spacecraft alignment, sub‑image and spectral band alignment, and verified geolocation, product, band‑to‑band, and multi‑temporal registration accuracies. The updated calibration demonstrated that all measured geometric performance metrics met or exceeded the OLI system requirements.

Abstract

The Landsat 8 spacecraft was launched on 11 February 2013 carrying the Operational Land Imager (OLI) payload for moderate resolution imaging in the visible, near infrared (NIR), and short-wave infrared (SWIR) spectral bands. During the 90-day commissioning period following launch, several on-orbit geometric calibration activities were performed to refine the prelaunch calibration parameters. The results of these calibration activities were subsequently used to measure geometric performance characteristics in order to verify the OLI geometric requirements. Three types of geometric calibrations were performed including: (1) updating the OLI-to-spacecraft alignment knowledge; (2) refining the alignment of the sub-images from the multiple OLI sensor chips; and (3) refining the alignment of the OLI spectral bands. The aspects of geometric performance that were measured and verified included: (1) geolocation accuracy with terrain correction, but without ground control (L1Gt); (2) Level 1 product accuracy with terrain correction and ground control (L1T); (3) band-to-band registration accuracy; and (4) multi-temporal image-to-image registration accuracy. Using the results of the on-orbit calibration update, all aspects of geometric performance were shown to meet or exceed system requirements.