Remote Sensing Band

Remote
Sensing
Band

This is an old version of the RSB webpage. Please go to http://www.fs.fed.us/ne/rsb/ for the new version that is being revised (December 2005). nbsp; :-))

This www page is a dynamic, working document. We're trying to keep it updated with:

the latest descriptions of RSB work, recommendations, study plans, meeting notes, .ppt summaries
on-line copies of papers
links to valuable spatial data

Official Stuff

members, email addresses and phone numbers...
RSB Charter (... lastest draft-April 2000...)
RSB status reports -- presented to FIA PM's meeting June 18, 2001

Glossaries and Acronyms...

Link to NASA GSFC remote sensing glossary and some of the acronyms

also, some shorter but also useful remote sensing glossaries compiled by the UnivMelb and UCSB

Links to useful GIS glossaries:

a GIS Jargon list...
ESRI's site -- for arc terms
a good Canadian list...
and one that's very complete, but a little harder to use...

Recent activity

All FIA proposals funded by RSSC-- see project list... (need links)
Papers presented at FIA Techniques Symposium in Traverse City (October 2001)
Joint Band meeting in Tuscon -- RSB's summary (Wednesday morning's) and final MT notes
Pictures from Tucson, RSB in Sabino Canyon
Latest RSB conference call -- 2/7/02
Band Leader conference call notes -- 1/30/02

Current RSB Tasks

provide metadata fields for P1 (for IM)
put together change proposal for ground photography -- to standardize the collection of this type of photography where it is collected, and perhaps propose the collection of more complete ground photography on P3 plots (Winterberger's heading up this)
put together strategic plan
keep tabs on available water datasets and when one of sufficient quality becomes available, give SB some sample data to run some test calculations with. Lister is currently looking at the most recent TIGER 2000 shape files indicating detailed land and water boundaries received from the Census Bureau (~1:100,000).

Current projects (let's get this list complete...)

P1 investigations

brief summary of pilot studies on alternative strategies (.rtf)

Fragmentation

CEMRI study description...
.ppt,paper and poster of results so far (Oct 2001), and .ppt and paper of technical considerations

Canopy modeling

paragraph description?

spatial modeling to provide continuous maps of forest (FIA) variables

links to results so far (papers, posters, .ppt, web pages)
species distribution maps (species importance) -- poster, web, paper

Identifying forest variables from high resolution imagery

Megown/RSAC's work... -- .ppt
Winterberger's work... --

Other projects

LANDFIRE fact sheet

360^o "immersive" photography -- IPIX -- Panoscan

GeoTools (.doc)

FIA & NASA possible proposal -- and Cohen's intro comments

[Pilot inventory of Nonforest areas -- poster]

NLCD 2000 Discussions

Management Team Decision regarding partnership with EDC (.doc)
The FIA RSB's Summary of Issues and Comments on an FIA Partnership with the NLCD Consortium (.doc or .html)
Background citations for FIA-NLCD2000 project (.doc)
Preliminary results from mapping zone 60 (8/17/01)
Preliminary results from mapping zone 60 (7/6/01)
Forest/nonforest evaluation discussion (June 2001)
Blacksburg meeting (Jan 10-12, 2001) issues and actions, and Befort's additional thoughts and Czaplewski's thoughts
Zhu's .ppt presentation
MRLC2000 consortium partner's meeting summary1, summary2, and minutes --Nov 7-8, 2000, Sioux Falls, SD
Las Vegas meeting minutes, and white paper (April 10-11, 2000)
Colin Homer's .ppt presentation describing MRLC2000
FIA requirements from MRLC .ppt presentation (Czaplewski)
Warbington's analyses using CALVEG maps re: sparse forest estimates (.xls file); and info from the Sagebrush mapping meeting (1/25/01) -- concepts_of_scale_classif_and_inventory, standards_for_plot_data_for_plant_community_classif_INT, meeting_notes, framework
Field manuals

FIA field manual --version 1.5
NRI field manual (NRI national website)

The Big Picture -- shared data and cross-program consistency..., brief summary and FGDC .ppt presentation

Meeting Notes and Agendas

GSTC Steering committee meeting (Tymcio and Caylor will attend) -- (March 12-13, 2002?)
All Bands meeting issues, agenda, RSB meeting notes (Wed. morning summary) and pictures(Jan 6-11, 2002)
FIA techniques meeting in Traverse City (program), and some papers (Oct, 2001)
Report presented to June 2001 FIA PM's meeting
Sioux Falls meeting with EDC -- agenda(May 1-3, 2001)
All Bands meeting issues and agenda and meeting notes (April 2-6, 2001)
Blacksburg meeting agenda and issues and actions (Jan 10-12, 2001)
MRLC 2000 consortium partner's meeting(Nov 7-8, 2000)
FIA-FHM joint mgmt team meeting notes (October 2000)
RSB technical workshop in SLC (October 2000)
St. Paul meeting agenda and meeting notes (May 22-25, 2000)
SLC meeting notes(March 27-31, 2000)
Remote Sensing Band Status Report (Based on Beth Collins' notes from Kansas City meeting 3/17/99)
Kansas City agenda and meeting notes (March 1999)
Report presented to Jan. 1998 FIA PL's meeting

Current notes for the Management Team

Recommendations -- May 2000
Recommendations for EDC-FIA cooperation -- March 2001
Final note from the RSB re: EDC-FIA cooperation -- Jan 2002 and Mgmt Team's decision -- Jan 2002

Current FIA business requirements from RS data

field navigation
to improve phase II estimates (via a good forest/nonforest stratification layer)
to provide more spatially continuous information -- better maps more efficiently
to provide more accurate small area estimates (e.g. counties) and estimates of removals/regen
to provide fragmentation and context information not available (or available as easily) from the ground
for historical estimates of trend (since we can't go back in time to measure on the ground)
to provide more temporally accurate information (e.g. by identifying change...)
measures of variance and uncertainty are one of the standpoints of FIA. Need to continue explicitly including measures of variance and uncertainty in everything we do, particularly those measures of uncertainty that can be used in subsequent modeling efforts.

additional note: RSB = RS and GIS and spatial modeling (GIS also comes into the IMC and Analysis Band). GIS and RS are intimately related and should be closely linked groups in the FIA units.

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Related Papers (and project summaries):

Accuracy:

AVHRR:

Comparison of AVHRR classification and aerial photography interpretation for estimation of forest area.
Forest cover from Landsat Thematic Mapper data for use in the Catahoula Ranger District geographic information system.
Forest density mapping in the lower 48 States: a regression procedure.
AVHRR data to update forest area change for midsouth states...

Digitizing:

MDSD (Mono-Digitizing Stereo Digitizing)

Fragmentation:

Fragmentation statistics for FIA: designing an approach -- .ppt, paper and poster
Techniques and consideration for FIA forest fragmentation analysis -- .ppt and paper

Geostatistics:

Modeling:

Merging Regional Forest Inventory Data with Satellite-Based Information Through Nonlinear Regression Methods

Phase 1

Quick summary of pilot studies on alternative strategies (.rtf)

RS'98:

Bringing together remote sensing application and research within the Forest Inventory and Analysis program

RS2000:

Hoppus, Riemann and Lister
Weyermann
Frescino
Guldin

St. Paul meeting

Agenda
Meeting Notes
Landsat TM issues for FIA Phase 1 Inventory
Rack -- Registration of TM data
Warbington -- Forest/nonforest for NFS in California
Cooke -- AVHRR/TM
Hoppus -- Forest/nonforest in NERS
Moisen -- Forest/nonforest in RMRS
Befort/Rack -- Single vs. multiple date annual imagery
Lannom -- Forest/nonforest from RSAC
Burk/Bolstad -- Automated classification at the U of MN
Scrivani and Wynne -- Landsat TM-based forest area estimation using iterative guided spectral class rejection (IGSCR). Abstract.
Zhu -- MRLC2000 (.ppt)

FIA Techniques Symposium - Traverse City, MI - Oct 16-19, 2001:

Kaartinen, Fried and Dunham -- Evaluating precision gain for timber and non-timber attributes via Landsat-based stratification on California's North Coast -- .ppt and .doc
Hoppus and Lister -- A statistically valid method for using FIA plots to guide spectral class rejection in producing stratification maps -- .ppt and .doc
Lister, Lister, Riemann and Hoppus -- Techniques and considerations for FIA fragmentation analysis -- .ppt and .doc
Riemann, Lister, Hoppus and Lister -- Fragmentation statistics for FIA: designing an approach -- .ppt and .doc
Czaplewski -- Opportunities to develop a 30-meter spatial database for the USA-- .ppt and .doc
McRoberts -- .ppt and .doc

Other:

Reprint of Remote Sensing of Wildland Resources: A State-of-the-Art Review, General Technical Report RM-71, by Robert Aldrich (1979)

Examples of spatial analysis products from FIA data with respect to the NFS

Visualization to address management concerns, by Vic Rudis
Providing context around the Allegheny NF using information derived from FIA (Rachel Riemann)

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Comments/Discussion

Befort 2/10/98 re: cost estimates of national projects and potential FIA use of GAP
Evans 2/12/98 re: response
Befort 2/12/98 re: aerial photographic projects
Minutes from conference call 2/12/98
Minutes from conference call 3/31/98
Minutes from conference call 4/27/98
Minutes from conference call 2/9/99
Minutes from conference call 7/8/99
Minutes from conference call 8/12/99
Minutes from conference call 2/15/00
Powerpoint Presentation about MRLC, as discussed 2/15/00 (self-extracting zip--double click to unzip after downloading)
Minutes from conference call 5/15/00
Minutes from conference call 1/30/01 (first draft)
Minutes from conference call 3/14/01
Minutes from conference call 4/19/01
Minutes from conference call 7/18/01
Minutes from conference call 9/24/01
Agenda/issues from conference call 11/19/01
Minutes from conference dall 2/7/02

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Related WWW Pages

Sources for acquisition of spatial data (imagery and GIS)
AFIS ImageView (a really interesting way to access satellite imagery)
Current FGDC Vegetation Classification
EarthCam (Live images)
Geostatistics and Geomathematics Links
The Ai-geostats homepage (superb page for anyone who conducts spatial data analysis; highly recommended!)
TerraServer (Images of various parts of the world
Forest Inventory and Monitoring Environmetrics (who develops, validates, and transfers scientifically credible methods of mathematical statistics for the FIA data to improve inventory methods)
National Cartography and Geospatial Center's Natural Resources Inventory Data Collection Guidelines (The National Resource Inventory (NRI) is the major data collection effort coducted by NRCS. The NRI is a statistically based inventory of natural resources on private lands in the United States.)
Subject list for geospatial data (great list of links to data, information, etc.)
Examples of some applications of spatial modeling by Robin Reich at Colorado State U.
Subject list for geospatial data (great list of links to data, information, etc.)

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Sources for spatial data

county boundaries
streams, water bodies
watersheds
coastline
soils
DEM
DLG
deposition
?'s -- common projection?, consistent nationwide unless otherwise noted, best available, accuracy noted, make use of NE-FIA's web page...(?)

Sources for acquisition of existing imagery

MRLC (now NLCD--national land cover data) procurement -- link to www page (for info and status) and regional contacts for getting copies. Also, link to the Land Cover Characterization Program (LCCP) behind it...
GAP projects -- national status map and links to state efforts...
FAS procurement -- link to Chuck Dull's email address... (Is Bill Belton now handling this??)
NALC triplicates
USGS data products (imagery and other Geospatial data); also see the Webglis homepage; for free DEM's, DLG's and land use maps, see USGS's downloadable data page)
GSTC Clearinghouse -- (areas in and around National Forests only)

TIGER data -- ArcView shapefile format, decimal degrees, NAD83
CFF
30 meter DEM
10 meter DEM
DOQ (anticipated in late 2000)
PBS softcopy

MODIS -- Finco's .ppt presentation, Andy's .ppt presentation

UMD's Global Landcover Facility (GOFC)
NASA's MODIS webpage

Link to NASA GSFC remote sensing glossary and some of the acronyms

Other links

GAC - Geospatial Advisory Committee
GSTC - Geospatial Service and Technology Center
RSSC -- Remote Sensing Steering Committee
Table of membership (7/19/01) of the Geospatial Executive Board (GEB), Geospatial Advisory Committee (GAC), Geospatial Service and

Maintained by:
Rachel Riemann
and
Andy Lister

Northeastern Research Station

11 Campus Blvd.
Newtown Square, PA 19073
URL:http://www.fs.fed.us/ne/rsb/

Revised Feb 13, 2002