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False Color Composite (FCC)

A false color satellite image is one in which the Red(R), Green(G), and Blue(B) values do not correspond to the true colors of red, green and blue. A standard False Colour Composite (FCC) blue is assigned to green radiatons (0.5 to 0.6 μm), green is assigned to red radiatons (0.6 to 0.7 μm and red is assigned to Near Infrared radiaton (0.7 to 0.8 μm).

In other words, a false color composite is a multispectral image interpretation using the standard visual RGB band range. FCC imagery can be produced using different color combinations. The choice of a color scheme depends on the type of objects that need to be emphasized in the image.

False Color Composite Vegetation

This false colour composite scheme allows vegetaton to be detected readily in the image. vegetaton appears in diferent shades of red depending on the types and conditons of the vegetaton, since it has a high refectance in the NIR band

False Color Composite Band Combination

FCC Band Combination (RGB)Description
4,3,2Standard “false-colour” combinaton. Vegetaton shows in red.
3,2,1The “nature colour” combinaton. It provides the most water penetraton.
False Color Composite Band Combination

Four most common false-color band combinatons are:

  1. Near infrared (red), green (blue), red (green). This is a traditonal and polular band combinaton useful in seeing changes in plant health.
  2. Shortwave infrared (red), near infrared (green), and green (blue), often used to show foods or newly burned land.
  3. Blue (red), two diferent shortwave infrared bands (green and blue). We use this to diferentate between snow, ice, and clouds.
  4. Thermal infrared, usually shown in tones of gray to illustrate temperature.

Colour Signatures on Standard False Colour Composite of Surface Features

1. Healthy Vegetaton and Cultiated Areas:

FeaturesColour In Standard FCC
EvergreenRed to magenta
DeciduousBrown to red
ScrubsLight brown with red patches
Cropped landPink to Bright red
Fallow landLight blue to white
Wetland vegetatonBlue to grey

2. Waterbody:

FeaturesColour In Standard FCC
Clear waterDark blue to black
Turbidity waterbodyLight blue

3. Built up Area:

FeaturesColour In Standard FCC
High densityDark blue to bluish green
Low densityLight blue

4. Waste lands/Rock outcrops:

FeaturesColour In Standard FCC
Rock outcropsLight brown
Sandy deserts/River sand/Light blue to white
Salt afected Deep ravinesDark green
Shallow ravinesLight green
Water logged/Wet landsMotelled black

False Natural Color Composite

Some of the Sensors (SPOT, LISS-III, LISS-IV) do not capture blue band, because of higher scattering problem. That means it’s not possible to generate true color composites.

Perform FNCC

  1. Select Raster tab Resolution group choose Spectral click Natural Color.
  2. The Natural Color dialog opens, select your Indut data file (e.g- kolkata_2010_liss3).
  3. Choose your Output destination, and enter file name.
  4. Define the band spectral range, Near infrared-3, Red-2, Green-1.
  5. Check on the Ignore Zero in Stats chackbox.
  6. Finally click OK button to start this process.
Perform FNCC
False Natural Color Composite

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