Sea SAR image analysis by fractal data fusion

SAR images from space-borne platforms have proved to be helpful data for identification of oil spills and other surface anomalies, such as low wind areas, man-made targets, and natural films. The use of fractal dimension, which is related to the concept of surface "roughness", as a feature for classification, improves the detection of anomalies, since enhances texture discrimination. In the particular case of oil slicks, the surface tension of seawater is increased and the surface wave motion is significantly depressed. This effect relatively reduces the sea surface roughness, decreases the radar backscattered energy and enables oil slicks to be discernible from the radar image. Several algorithms may be applied for local fractal dimension estimation, but most solutions are tailored for specific applications and are characterized by estimation accuracies depending on the adopted image model and also on the value being estimated. This paper describes a decision-based fusion approach for local fractal dimension estimation of SAR images of the sea surface. Three different estimation algorithms are considered and the three resulting fractal maps are fused by means of a weighted average. The weights are calculated from the performance characteristics of the three algorithms measured on synthetic fractal surfaces. The experimental results carried out on ERS-2 SAR images prove the effectiveness of the proposed decision-based fusion approach