The Comparison of the SIFT Image Descriptor by Contrast Enhancement Algorithms with Various Types of High-resolution Satellite Imagery

Image registration involves overlapping images of an identical region and assigning the data into one coordinate system. Image registration has proved important in remote sensing, enabling registered satellite imagery to be used in various applications such as image fusion, change detection and the generation of digital maps. The image descriptor, which extracts matching points from each image, is necessary for automatic registration of remotely sensed data. Using contrast enhancement algorithms such as histogram equalization and image stretching, the normalized data are applied to the image descriptor. Drawing on the different spectral characteristics of high resolution satellite imagery based on sensor type and acquisition date, the applied normalization method can be used to change the results of matching interest point descriptors. In this paper, the matching points by scale invariant feature transformation (SIFT) are extracted using various contrast enhancement algorithms and injection of Gaussian noise. The results of the extracted matching points are compared with the number of correct matching points and matching rates for each point.