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B-Roll: 2025 UAS radiometric calibration and validation research in Golden, Colorado

By Geosciences and Environmental Change Science Center
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Detailed Description

Calibration and validation (cal/val) are essential steps to ensure that remotely sensed data are reliable for scientific use. Radiometric cal/val involves converting digital image pixel values to meaningful units and assessing their accuracy.  

The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) CalVal Center of Excellence (ECCOE) excels in evaluating and improving the quality of remote sensing data. Their standard radiometric data validation protocol requires a handheld spectrometer operator to walk back and forth across the area while collecting measurements. This procedure yields high-confidence measurements but is time- and labor-intensive.  

In collaboration with the USGS National Uncrewed Systems Office (NUSO), ECCOE researchers are exploring uncrewed aircraft system (UAS, also known as drone) remote sensing capabilities and procedures to potentially aid in the validation of satellite data. In June 2025, NUSO collected UAS hyperspectral and multispectral data coordinated with ECCOE field measurements at a vegetated field in Golden, Colorado. This field work was timed to coincide with overpasses by Earth-observing satellites including Landsat and Sentinel, enabling data comparisons and advancements in remote sensing data quality research. 

Timestamps

00:05 Static aerial shot of the study area landscape: an open, vegetated field.

00:20 ECCOE personnel collect handheld spectral measurements on the ground.

00:34 ECCOE personnel measure a white reference panel, which stays covered between measurements to keep it clean.

00:55 Close shot of ECCOE spectrometer operator walking transects across the field while collecting spectral measurements of the vegetation.

01:22 Wide shot of the field showing the scale of the area being measured relative to field personnel. Faint paths have formed across the grass from the consistent, repeated pattern walked by the spectrometer operator multiple times per day for multiple days in a row.

01:43 USGS NUSO remote pilots prepare a drone-based hyperspectral sensor for data collection.

02:11 USGS NUSO remote pilot launches the drone to begin a data collection flight.

02:30 Footage from the perspective of the drone as it flies and collects hyperspectral data. The aircraft turns as it completes one transect and begins the next.

03:05 Top-down aerial shot showing the drone flying transects in the air while the field spectrometer operator walks transects on the ground to capture spatially and temporally coincident data for scientific comparison.

04:14 Footage of the drone flying with downtown Denver in the distance. 

04:38 USGS remote pilot lands the drone after the data collection flight is complete.

Details

Length:
00:04:57

Sources/Usage

Public Domain.

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