When in orbit, spliced satellite optical cameras are affected by various factors that degrade the actual image stitching precision and the accuracy of their data products. This is a major bottleneck in the current remote sensing technology. Previous geometric calibration research has mostly focused on stitched satellite images and has largely ignored the inter-chip relationship among original multi-chip images, resulting in accuracy loss in geometric calibration and subsequent image products. Therefore, in this paper, a novel geometric calibration method is proposed for spliced satellite optical cameras. The integral geometric calibration model was developed on inter-chip geometry constraints among multi-chip images, including the corresponding external and internal calibration models. The proposed approach improves uncontrolled geopositioning accuracy and enhances mosaic precision at the same time. For evaluation, images from the optical butting satellite ZiYuan-3 (ZY-3) and mechanical interleaving satellite Tianhui-1 (TH-1) were used for the experiments. Multiple sets of satellite data of the Songshan Calibration field and other regions were used to evaluate the reliability, stability, and applicability of the calibration parameters. The experiment results found that the proposed method obtains reliable camera alignment angles and interior calibration parameters and generates high-precision seamless mosaic images. The calibration scheme is not only suitable for mechanical interleaving cameras with large geometric displacement among multi-chip images but is also effective for optical butting cameras with minor chip offset. It also significantly improves uncontrolled geopositioning accuracy for both types of spliced satellite images. Moreover, the proposed calibration procedure results in multi-chip satellite images being seamlessly stitched together and mosaic errors within one pixel.

geometric calibration; inter-chip geometry constraints; optical butting camera; ZiYuan-3 (ZY-3) satellite; Tianhui-1 (TH-1) satellite

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