High resolution DSM generation from ALOS PRISM — Status updates on over three year operations

Panchromatic Remote-sensing Instrument for Stereo Mapping (PRISM) carried by Advanced Land Observing Satellite (ALOS) was designed to generate worldwide topographic data in respects of its high resolution and stereoscopic observation. Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's (JAXA's) Earth Observation Research Center (EORC) has widely assessed the on-orbit geometric performance of PRISM sensors since the launch in January 2006. This ongoing activity has generated various geometric performance data over three year on-orbit period of operations. EORC also performed the data analysis of digital surface model (DSM) derived from these geometric performance data. The detailed characteristics of triangulations for PRISM stereo-geometry were evaluated by ground control points (GCPs) and height accuracies of the DSM were also evaluated from the comparison with reference DSM data sets. DSMs are being routinely processed on a scene basis at EORC and mosaicked for global standardized datasets. The preliminary result of the mosaicking process was given with their accuracy analysis.