Distinctive Order Based Self-Similarity descriptor for multi-sensor remote sensing image matching

Robust, well-distributed and accurate feature matching in multi-sensor remote sensing image is a difficult task duo to significant geometric and illumination differences. In this paper, a robust and effective image matching approach is presented for multi-sensor remote sensing images. The proposed approach consists of three main steps. In the first step, UR-SIFT (Uniform robust scale invariant feature transform) algorithm is applied for uniform and dense local feature extraction. In the second step, a novel descriptor namely Distinctive Order Based Self Similarity descriptor, DOBSS descriptor, is computed for each extracted feature. Finally, a cross matching process followed by a consistency check in the projective transformation model is performed for feature correspondence and mismatch elimination. The proposed method was successfully applied for matching various multi-sensor satellite images as: ETM+, SPOT 4, SPOT 5, ASTER, IRS, SPOT 6, QuickBird, GeoEye and Worldview sensors, and the results demonstrate its robustness and capability compared to common image matching techniques such as SIFT, PIIFD, GLOH, LIOP and LSS.