Evaluation of small-scale vegetation in city region from high-resolution satellite images with different ground resolution

The authors have verified the possibility of an investigation of vegetation using images by the IKONOS satellite, which ground resolution as high as 4 m times 4 m for the multi spectral image and 1 m times 1 m for the panchromatic one. As a result, the images have a capability to extract small-scale vegetation covering as an area of about 1 m times 1 m. However, there is still a lot of small-scale vegetation in the city area not falling within this level of ground resolution. The Quickbird satellite has a higher ground resolution of 2.4 m times 2.4 m for multi-spectral images, and 0.6 m times 0.6 m for panchromatic one than the IKONOS satellite. Using Quickbird image, an attempt to extract the distribution of small scale vegetation was carried out. The extracted vegetation distribution was compared with that from IKONOS image. Small-scale vegetation was extracted from Quickbird image more in detail in proportional to the spatial resolution. These results were discussed with detailed ground truth as how large flower pot with miniature vegetation can be recognized. A class of spatial resolution as IKONOS or Quickbird enables us to evaluate distribution of small scale vegetation in city area effectively