DSMs GENERATION FROM TERRASAR-X HIGH RESOLUTION SPOTLIGHT IMAGERY: EVALUATION OF RADARGRAMMETRIC APPROACHES IMPLEMENTED IN THE SCIENTIFIC SOFTWARE SISAR

One relevant application of SAR remote sensing is the generation of Digital Surface Models (DSMs) of the Earth's surface, thanks to the SAR independence from logistic constraints on the ground, illumination and weather conditions. Starting from SAR imagery two different approaches can be used to generate DSMs: the well known interferometric and the promising radargrammetric one. The goal of this work was to evaluate the radargrammetric mapping potential of high resolution TerraSAR-X SpotLight imagery using the StereoSAR processing chain developed at the Geodesy and Geomatics Division of University of Rome “La Sapienza” during the ISPRS Project Evaluation of DEM derived from TerraSAR-X data. In particular, the images acquired in High Resolution SpotLight mode over the Beauport (Canada – flat forest with small build up zones), Hannover (Germany – flat urban area) and Trento (Northern Italy – valley with an urban area) areas, where accurate ground references represented by LIDAR DSMs are available, were considered in this work. For the sake of brevity, only the results regarding Trento data set are here presented and discussed; anyway in all cases, the overall results in terms of accuracy range between 3 meters (flat forest) and 6-7 meters (urban areas).