The Polarization CrossFire (PCF) suite onboard the Chinese GaoFen-5(02) satellite has been sophisticatedly composed by the Particulate Observing Scanning Polarimeter (POSP) and the Directional Polarimetric Camera (DPC). Among them, DPC is a multi-angle sequential measurement polarization imager, while POSP is a cross-track scanning simultaneous polarimeter with corresponding radiometric and polarimetric calibrators, which can theoretically be used for cross comparison and calibration with DPC. After the data preprocessing of these two sensors, we first select local homogeneous cluster scenes by calculating the local variance-to-mean ratio in DPC’s Level 1 product projection grids to reduce the influence of scale differences and geometry misalignment between DPC and POSP. Then, taking the observation results after POSP data quality assurance as the abscissa and taking the DPC observation results under the same wavelength band and geometric conditions as the same ordinate, a two-dimensional radiation/polarization feature space is established. Results show that the normalized top of the atmosphere (TOA) radiances of DPC and POSP processed data at the nadir are linearly correlated. The normalized TOA radiance root mean square errors (RMSEs) look reasonable in all common bands. The DPC and POSP normalized radiance ratios in different viewing zenith angle ranges at different times reveal the temporal drift of the DPC relative radiation response. The RMSEs, mean absolute errors (MAEs), relative errors (REs), and scatter percentage of DPC degree of linear polarization (DoLP) falling within the expected error (EE = ±0.02) of POSP measured DoLP are better than 0.012, 0.009, 0.066, and 91%, respectively.

The directional polarimetric camera (DPC) is a Chinese satellite sensor with a large field of view (FOV) (±50° both along-track and cross-track) and a high spatial resolution (about 3.3 km at nadir) that operates in a sun-synchronous orbit. It is a difficult task to calibrate the in-flight relative radiometric variation of the sensors with such a wide FOV. In this study, a new method based on Rayleigh scattering over the ocean is developed to estimate the radiometric sensitivity variation over the whole FOV of DPC. Firstly, the theoretical uncertainty of the method is analyzed to calibrate the relative radiometric response. The calibration uncertainties are about 2–6.9% (depending on the wavelength) when the view zenith angle (VZA) is 0° and decrease to about 1–3.8% when VZA increases to 70°. Then, the method is applied to evaluate the long-term radiometric drift of the DPC. It is found that the radiometric response of DPC/GaoFen-5 over the whole FOV is progressively drifting over time. The sensitivity at shorter bands decreases more strongly than longer bands, and at the central part of the optics decreases more strongly than the marginal part. During the 14 months (from March 2019 to April 2020) of operational running in-orbit, the DPC radiometric responses of 443 nm, 490 nm, 565 nm, and 670 nm bands drifted by about 4.44–23.08%, 4.75–16.22%, 3.86–9.81%, and 4.7–16.86%, respectively, from the marginal to the central part of the FOV. The radiometric sensitivity has become more stable since January 2020. The monthly radiometric drift is separated into the relative radiometric part and the absolute radiometric part. The relative radiometric drift of DPC is found to be smoothly varying with VZA, which can be parameterized as a polynomial function via VZA. At last, the temporal radiometric drift of DPC/GaoFen-5 is corrected by combining the relative and absolute radiometric coefficients. The correction is convincing by cross calibration with MODIS/Aqua observation over the desert sites and improving the aerosol retrievals. The Rayleigh method in this study is efficient for the radiometric sensitivity calibration of wide FOV satellite sensors.

The directional polarimetric camera is a polarization sensor that offers an ultrawide angle and low-distortion imaging. Stray light is one of the important factors affecting the accuracy of its polarization measurement. In this paper, the stray light of the directional polarimetric camera is first divided into local stray light and global stray light according to the characteristics of its optical system, and the causes and characteristics of the two kinds of stray light are analyzed. Second, a novel deconvolution method is proposed to correct the local stray light, and the matrix method is extended to a 2D form to correct the global stray light. Finally, image acquisition and stray light correction laboratory experiments of integrating a sphere light source were carried out. The experimental results show that the proposed correction methods can effectively suppress more than 94% of the stray light of the directional polarimetric camera.

The directional polarimetric camera (DPC) is a polarization sensor with ultra-wide-angle and low-distortion imaging characteristics. Geometric calibration is usually the first essential step before remote sensing satellites are launched. In this paper, a geometric calibration method based on a two-dimensional turntable and a rotation matrix with high precision, simple operation, and wide application range is proposed for the directional polarimetric camera. Instead of precisely adjusting the position of the sensor on the turntable, the method effectively eliminates the errors caused by the mechanical axis of the turntable and the optical axis of the sensor not being adjusted to the same direction through the rotation transformation of the coordinate system. The geometric calibration experiments of the directional polarimetric camera were carried out with the method of Chen et al. [ Optik 121, 486 (2010)10.1016/j.ijleo.2008.08.004 OTIKAJ 0030-4026] and the proposed method. The experimental results showed the calibration residual of the proposed method was less than 0.1 pixel while Chen’s method was 0.3 pixel. The mean reprojection error and root mean square error of the proposed method were reduced to 0.06352 pixel and 0.06961 pixel, respectively. The geometric calibration parameters obtained by the proposed method were used for geometric correction of the in-orbit images of the DPC, and the results also prove the effectiveness and superiority of the proposed method.

The Directional Polarimetric Camera (DPC) carried by the Chinese GaoFen-5-02 (GF-5-02) satellite has the ability for multiangle, multispectral, and polarization detection and will play an important role in the inversion of atmospheric aerosol and cloud characteristics. To ensure the validity of the DPC on-orbit multiangle and multispectral polarization data, high-precision image registration and geolocation are vital. High-precision geometric model parameters are a prerequisite for on-orbit image registration and geolocation. Therefore, on the basis of the multiangle imaging characteristics of DPC, an on-orbit autonomous geometric calibration method without ground reference data is proposed. The method includes three steps: (1) preprocessing the original image of the DPC and the satellite attitude and orbit parameters; (2) scale-invariant feature transform (SIFT) algorithm to match homologous points between multiangle images; (3) optimization of geometric model parameters on-orbit using least square theory. To verify the effectiveness of the on-orbit autonomous geometric calibration method, the image registration performance and relative geolocation accuracy before and after DPC on-orbit geometric calibration were evaluated and analyzed using the SIFT algorithm and the coastline crossing method (CCM). The results show that the on-orbit autonomous geometric calibration effectively improves the DPC image registration and relative geolocation accuracy. After on-orbit calibration, the multiangle image registration accuracy is better than 1.530 km, the multispectral image registration accuracy is better than 0.650 km, and the relative geolocation accuracy is better than 1.275 km, all reaching the subpixel level (<1.7 km).

星载多角度偏振成像仪自身的光学系统有一定的偏振效应，会影响非偏通道的辐射测量精度.斜入射到光学元件上的光透射率是偏振敏感的，导致了光学系统的线偏振效应.为精确反演解析出观测目标光的辐射强度，需对成型仪器本身的偏振效应进行准确的测量、定标、校正.通过分析仪器原理和光路结构，详细推导出仪器非偏通道含线偏振效应的辐射测量模型，并根据实际镜头特点合理简化了模型.提出了基于不同偏振角的完全线偏光在仪器全视场内稀疏入射并最小二乘拟合响应值的方法，对非偏通道全视场线偏振效应进行测量和定标，同时对此方法的定标过程进行了仿真.另外，分析了仪器主要物理参数有偏差时对不同偏振态入射光的反演误差，如仪器单像元方位角、显式起偏效应、低频透过率.对仪器开展了实验室定标实验，得到了仪器主要物理参数范围及其拟合偏差量，进一步算出显式起偏效应参数偏差引起的辐射定标强度相对误差最大为0.4%，满足仪器辐射精度5%的要求并留足余量.该研究为仪器非偏通道全视场的高精度辐射测量、定标及后期数据处理提供了理论依据及实验指导.