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Last Post 20 Jan 2013 03:32 AM by  anon
Negative NDVI over algal blooms
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anon



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20 Jan 2013 03:32 AM
    Hi everyone, I'm relatively new to envi, so I know, perhaps, the barest minimum of how to make it work, I'm looking at MODIS L1b 500m data of the Baltic sea and Barents sea in order to attempt to crudely quantify algal blooms. I have an issue with NDVI (and every other vegetation index there is) where green algal blooms report back negative values much greater than the surrounding water and and clouds that escaped masking (e.g. water= -0.3, thick algae = -0.6). I understand that algal blooms will be slightly negative anyway in a best case scenario. I've tried masking out land and cloud, using the images raw and georeferenced, converting the images using the MODIS toolkit. I've also attempted Dark Object Subtraction as a way to crudely apply an atmospheric correction and the results are the same. I'm completely out of ideas here! Any help is greatly appreciated Thanks, Nic

    MariM



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    21 Jan 2013 02:47 PM
    NDVI is a simple equation and you can look at the pixels in your red and nir band and perform a hand calculation to see the resulting NDVI for a specific pixel. If the values are higher in the red than in the nir, the resulting NDVI will be negative. Did you calibrate your data to reflectance?

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    22 Jan 2013 08:00 AM
    Hi there, I used the calibrated radiances and reflectances directly from the l1b data file. I've read about other calibrations being performed, but have no idea how to carry them out in ENVI or whether or not they are necessary. Looking at the data being given in using Cursor/Location Value I think my NDVI should be positive.... I also forgot to mention; when i have my full unmasked scene, NDVI gives the expected values for land and clouds.

    MariM



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    22 Jan 2013 08:07 AM
    Did you hand calculate the NDVI from a pixel and compare it to the NDVI produced in ENVI? You can also use Band Math to calculate NDVI for the dataset to see how it compares.

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    22 Jan 2013 08:35 AM
    A few hand calculations performed now confirm the results I'm receiving in ENVI, even over areas of clear water. The results over the bloom give more negative values than water by itself. I'm beginning to think that the area of the bloom I'm looking at has died and sunk into the water. Such an occurence could account for the increased absorbance in the NIR band right?

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    08 Mar 2013 01:22 PM
    Have you looked up papers by Anatoly Gitelson? He's done a lot of work on remote sensing of algae.
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