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Bull. Soc. Photogr. Imag. Japan. (2015) Vol. 25 No. 2: 31–37

Original paper

Appropriate Luminance for Estimating Vegetation Index from Digital Camera
ImagesKeiji Osaki

Abstract:I t was revealed that estimated vegetation indices with a commercial digital camera have shown anomalously high values over 0.9 in
NDVI (Normalized Difference Vegetation Index) for a shady area of the camera images. It was manifested that an exclusion of pixels of the camera image with luminance below a threshold is a key method to remove the shady area and to acquire much better estimation of vegetation index. Appropriate luminance for the purpose requires us to exclude pixels of the image with luminance below
about 70 out of 255. Successful removal of shady/anomalous NDVI areas and excellent estimation of vegetation index from the images of the specific digital camera were obtained.

Key words:

Digital camera images, Estimated NDVI, Light exposure, Luminance, Spectral photometer

1. Introduction
Spectral vegetation indices are derived from quantities in different
spectral bands, mostly in visible and near-infrared regions of thespectrum1). A relationship of visible red and near-infrared reflected
light energy is related to the amount of vegetation present on the
ground2). The healthy plant absorbs most of the visible light and reflects a large portion of the near-infrared light. On the other hand,unhealthy or sparse plant reflects more visible light and less near-infrared light3). Vegetation indices have been used over a wide range ofapplications: such as vegetation monitoring, climate and hydrologic
modelling, agricultural activities, drought studies and health issues.
Among many proposed vegetation indices, the most widely use
vegetation index is the NDVI (Normalized Difference Vegetation
Index) which consists of a normalized ratio of near-infrared andvisible red reflectance due to NDVI's simplicity and ease of application.
The general usefulness of NDVI is easily found on enormous Web
sites in the world. In Australia, "Monthly NDVI Average for Australia" has been publicized to everyone as one of climate maps by an
official bureau of meteorology4).
In India, land use classes of study area are available for better crop
efficiency using NDVI derived from Indian Remote Sensing Satellite and other earth observation satellites5).
To date, NDVI has been widely employed in the estimation of
biomass for more than 30 years. This may then provide information
on a variety of key terrestrial variables for global environmental issues6). Recently proximal remote sensing technologies have come todraw particular attention with the advent of smaller equipment like'drone camera'7).
Received: 6th, September 2015; Accepted: 15st, December 2015

*International Christian University**Osawa 3-10-2, Mitaka-shi, Tokyo, 181-8585, Japan

It is highly expected that a vast potential for practical use of commercial digital cameras as a sort of sensor will increase according as
an advancement of mobile technologies' performance. Practical useof digital cameras as one of the tools for a monitoring vegetation
property of plants is now prevailing and has been actively investigated8,9).
It has been called people's attention that two images in near-infrared and visible red bands can produce an estimation of vegetationindex with the digital cameras10). However, it was revealed that theestimated vegetation index with the specific digital cameras show
anomalously high values over 0.9 in NDVI for shady areas of thecaptured images11). To achieve higher accuracy of the estimated vegetation index from the camera images, it is unavoidable to deal withthe shady areas of the images in an appropriate way.
A necessary evaluation of the accuracy of estimated NDVI has
been done by comparing with calculated NDVI from measured reflectance by using a spectral-radiometer.
Primary goals of this research are to clarify the cause of anomalously high values in NDVI estimated from the camera images andto aim at a more accurate estimation of NDVI.

2. Anomalously High Vegetation Index
Vegetation shows a unique signature in its reflectance spectrum asshown in Fig. 1. Its reflectance spectrum marks transition zone fromabsorption by chlorophyll in the visible red region to scatter due to aleaf 's internal structure in the Nir (near-infrared) region. From thefeature of transition, the most widely used NDVI (Normalized Difference Vegetation Index) is defined by the following Eq. (1).

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Bull. Soc. Photogr. Imag. Japan. Vol. 25 No. 2 (2015)

Fig. 1 Spectral reflectance for green leaves: Legend shows three directions ofmeasurement under sunlight by spectral photometer, the three directions will appear in the following Fig. 8. ρNir and ρred are reflectancein near-infrared and visible red bands, respectively. Measured reflectance of gray standard card by spectral photometer under sunlight isshown by dotted line.

NDVI = (ρNir-ρred )/(ρNir+ρred )(1), where ρNir and ρred are reflectance of objects for near-infraredand visible red band, respectively.
Usually, other quantities closely related to the reflectance are often
adopted to derive NDVI such as radiance, irradiance, luminance, illuminance, etc. because of a difficulty of direct measurement of reflectance. Mathematically values of NDVI calculated by Eq. (1) result in a number that ranges from -1 to +1. For objects on the surfaceof the land, the NDVI ranges from values close to 0 for arid or barren
areas to about 1 for densely vegetated areas. For water surfaces, the
NDVI approaches -1 due to their very low reflectance in the Nirband.
Most of the researchers in the remote sensing field have quoted
an article by J. Weier and D. Herring about a range of NDVI values12). It says that an NDVI close to 0 corresponds to no vegetation,
while NDVI close to +1 (0.8 - 0.9) indicates the highest possible
density of green leaves. Though one of those researchers concluded
that essentially vegetation values have a range from 0.1 to 0.713), it
seems to be necessary for further investigation.
From various papers and publicized materials on Web sites, it isreasonable that values of NDVI for vegetation lie below 0.8. However, the author has noticed that NDVI estimated from the images ofthe specific camera in near-infrared and visible red bands sometimes
show anomalously high values of NDVI under a particular conditionof light exposure11). Anomalously high values of NDVI (>0.9) haveappeared in shady or darkest areas of visible photo images.
Here, we need to draw careful attention to the expression, 'anomalous or anomaly' regarding NDVI. Because the phrase 'NDVI
anomalies' have been frequently used in lots of research articles asdeviations of NDVI values from a long-term average of NDVI. For
example, NDVI anomalies that were more than one standard deviation below 21-year average conditions, and in 2002, fully 95% ofNorth America exhibited below-average NDVI 14).
The term 'anomalous or anomaly' used in this paper signifies that

Fig. 2 Histogram of anomalously high values of estimated NDVI. Anomalous values signify that NDVI values are more than 0.9.

the values of NDVI are over 0.9. Distribution of anomalous NDVI
estimated from captured images is clearly manifested in a histogram
as in Fig. 2. It was speculated that the anomalous situation would becaused by insufficient light exposure just like 'under-exposure' inphotography.

3. Method for Estimating Vegetation Index from Images
One of the most used vegetation indices is NDVI just mentioned
in the previous chapter. Two types of images acquired by digital
cameras are necessary for estimation of vegetation index from camera images: one is visible band photo, and the other is near-infrared
band photo captured with an infrared lens filter. A flow of estimation of vegetation index is shown in Fig. 3. And also to evaluate an
accuracy of the estimated NDVI from the images, quantity concerning reflectance measured by a spectral photometer is needed as acriterion for the evaluation of the estimated NDVI.
It is important to understand a relationship between reflectanceof objects and output of the digital camera. Acquiring various spectral/colorimetric quantities is very complicated. However, it is beneficial to review travel of light from incident light to an image sensor
of the digital camera as a flow diagram in Fig. 4.
With a spectral photometer, NDVI can be directly calculated froma measured reflectance or certain quantity closely related to the reflection unlike the estimation of NDVI from captured images.
In remote sensing with a multispectral sensor on platforms ofearth observation satellites, the spectral radiance at the top of theatmosphere is acquired at the altitude from the ground surface ranging from 700 km to 450 km. Regarding long-distance view, technologies of proximal remote sensing have emerged to offer enoughground-truth for calibrating data from satellite sensors. We havedeveloped an in-situ measurement of vegetation at a closer distancethan proximal remote sensing by the spectral photometer, agricultural digital cameras and commercial digital cameras. In Table 1, alist of items is shown for measurement of radiance and capturingKeiji Osaki

Appropriate Luminance for Estimating Vegetation Index from Digital Camera Images

33

Fig. 3 Flow of estimating vegetation index from captured images by digital camera.

Fig. 4 Traveling of light from light source to image sensor of digital camera

Table 1 Specification of items for measurement of irradiance/radiance andcapturing images
Item

For useInfrared lens fil- Blocking visible lightter
Artificial sunlight Emitting sunlightlamp

Specification

Kenko Tokina PRO1D R7219)
SERIC SOLAX XC-100AF21)

Portable spectral Measuring radiance/ir- FieldSpec HH20)
radiance
EIKO MS-720
photometers
Color chart

LCD display

Calibration of radi- gmb ColorChecker
ance

Displaying digital im- EIZO FlexScan L887
ages

Plants (Outdoor Target objects for im- Hedera,turf,field weeds (Tokyo)
place)
ages under sunlight
Wild buckweat (Akita)
Shrubs (Tokyo,Kushiro)
Weeds (Nagasaki)
Plants (Indoor)

Target objects for im- Potted Hedera Pittsburgh
ages under the artificial sunlightA g r i c u l t u r a l Comparison of vege- Tetracam ADC-3
digital cameras tation indices
BIZWORKS Yubaflex

Commercial dig- Capturing digital im- CANON Powershot 710IS
ital cameras
ages Recording geolo- CANON S110
cation data
OLYMPUS C-5060
CASIO EX-H20G

camera images.
The table also indicates several target plants in various places forobservation. To clarify the optical properties of the visible light
blocking filter 'R72', the spectral transmittance curves of the 'R72'

Fig. 5 Spectral quantum efficiency of an image color sensor and measured
spectral reflectance of standard white plate and transmittance of visible light blocking filter, ‘R72’ by the spectral photometer, ‘FieldSpec
HH’ under the artificial sunlight, ‘SOLAX XC-100AF’. Spectral
characteristics curves of the image color sensor, ‘KAI-0340’22) as a
typical example of CCD sensor are shown in quantum efficiency (%)
of right axis.

and the spectral characteristics curves of the CCD camera sensor are
shown in Fig. 5.
The primary purpose of our research is to develop the method for

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Bull. Soc. Photogr. Imag. Japan. Vol. 25 No. 2 (2015)

Table 2 Reflectance of gray scale patches from “ColorCheckerClassic” 17)18) andmeasured irradiance by the portable spectral photometer (MS-720).
ColorChecker
Classic

Munsell Value% Reflect.

Black

2.00

3.10

N5

5.00

19.77

8.00

59.10

N3.5

N6.5
N8

White

3.50

6.50
9.50

9.00

36.20
90.01

Measured Irradiance(W/m*m)
0.047

0.154
0.316
0.617
0.983

1.640

Fig. 6 Spectral photometer (MS-720), white reference card, gray standard
card and color-rendition card (ColorChecker Classic)17,18): Various
gray-level patches are for irradiance calibration of the photometer.

higher accurate estimation of NDVI from the images by the commercial digital camera. To achieve it, we have selected 'CANON
710IS' as the choice digital camera and 'Potted Hedera Pittsburgh'
as the plant with high NDVI value among many cases. Since the sizeand shape of leaves of 'Wild buckwheat' are similar to those of the'Potted Hedera', we compared the difference of vegetation map between outdoor and indoor measurements with the images of 'Wildbuckwheat'23).
Regarding two agricultural digital cameras, they have marked
poorer results of evaluation of estimated vegetation map from theircamera images than the results from the 'CANON 710IS'.
A portable spectral photometer 'MS-720' seen in Fig. 6 has beenused to calculate NDVI from its measured output.
Though the output of MS-720 is irradiance (W/m2) of target objects, the output can be approximately transformed to radiance (W/m2/sr) because FOV (Field of View) of the photometer is 10 degrees
and sufficiently small. Then, a ratio of the irradiances is closely related to the reflectance of the target objects.
We approximate spectral sensor output of the digital camera by
the following equations as DN (Digital Number):(DN)Nir = KNirΣ[IL(λ)·ρNir(λ) ·τNir(λ) ·TNir·SNir(λ)]λ(DN)red = KredΣ [IL(λ) ·ρred(λ) ·Tred·Sred(λ)] 
λ(2), where K is a ratio of camera output to light exposure, IL is anincident light illuminance[lx], ρis a reflectance of a target object, τis a transmittance of a lens filter, T is a shutter speed, S is a sensor
sensitivity, respectively.
Since the ratio of irradiance is proportional to that of reflectanceof objects, measured irradiance by spectral photometer with small
FOV can be used for calculation of NDVI.

4. Appropriate Light Exposure for Estimating NDVI
and Results
According to famous paper "A Color-Rendition Chart"18), eachpatch is characterized by spectral reflectance factor; assigned name;
CIE (1931) x, y, and Y; Munsell notation; and ISCC-NBS name.
Recently, various charts for color calibration and other purposes areissued in addition to the classical color chart17). Measured irradiance

Fig. 7 Digital camera's output against measured irradiance by the spectral
photometer.

by MS-720 is precisely proportional to the luminous reflectance factor (% Reflect.) as seen in Table 2. Thus, the linearity of the MS720's output to input light is considered to be guaranteed.
Based on the linearity of the MS-720, the spectral reflectance ofthe standard gray card was measured and is plotted by the dottedline in Fig. 1. The reflectance of the standard gray card shows nearly
20% of the visible light wavelength.
On the other hand, DN values of patch images captured by adigital camera (e.g. CANON S110) show a power-law to the measured irradiance by the photometer as in Fig. 7. By fitting a curve to
DN adjusted to gray card, its exponent of the power-law was foundto be 1.82 (=1/0.5498).
Among two captured images by the digital camera, the visible
light image is displayed with three directions for spectral measurement by the MS-720 in Fig. 8. The ellipse in orange color indicatestarget areas used for estimating NDVI from the images. . The image
also shows a white reference card and a standard gray card. It is apparent that shady or darkest areas are seen in various regions in Fig.
8. It was revealed that these shady areas and areas that showedanomalously high values of NDVI almost overlapped.
Since luminance of the captured image is closely related to light
exposure onto the image capture sensor in Fig. 3, it might be expected that a specific feature of anomalous NDVI will appear in a scatterplot between a luminance of the image and estimated NDVI fromthe images. As the characteristics of the scatterplots are indicated inFig. 9, a distinct region showing anomalously high values of NDVI(>0.9) appears bottom right in the figure. This area is abnormal forKeiji Osaki

Appropriate Luminance for Estimating Vegetation Index from Digital Camera Images

Fig. 8 V isible light image captured by a digital camera under sunlight. Target areas of the image for estimating NDVI are shown by orange ellipse with its height of 1.5cm and width of 3 cm.

35

Fig. 10 Converted output of the digital camera image against light exposureof the camera image sensor. Threshold value of the output DN of 72
for exclusion of the pixels exposure is indicated by a red arrow. Graystandard is also indicated as ‘18% neutral gray’ corresponding to the
exposure of 0.100(lx·s)15,16).

Fig. 9 Scatterplots between luminance of the camera image and estimated
NDVI from the camera images. Number of plotted pixels are randomly sampled from 512x512 to 24,000. Contour lines in the figure
show high density of aggregated pixels and threshold luminance of 72
and NDVI of 0.9 are indicated in red letters.

the estimated NDVI; therefore it has to be excluded for an accurate
estimation.
Then, it was discovered that a threshold of light exposure E (lx·s)
gave a threshold value of luminance for anomalous NDVI. It corresponds to a threshold value of DN (=72) in luminance calculated
from the camera image. Thus, the luminance threshold value of thevisible color image is utilized for removal of the shady area from theestimation process of NDVI.
Fig. 10 indicates us an appropriate light exposure for estimation
of NDVI from digital camera images. It signifies that E (lx·s) > 0.033
or DN >72 for gamma of 2.2, where (DN) converted is defined by-log10(DN/255)gamma.
Appropriate light exposure for capture of photo images can give
more precise estimation of NDVI from near-infrared and visible red
images. The following equation gives luminance Y' from R', G ', andB' of camera images:
Y' = 0.2999R' + 0.567G' + 0.114B’ (NTSC-TV),
where prime indicates gamma-corrected R, G, B.

(3)

Fig. 11 D istribution map of anomalous NDVI region shown in red area. It
is shown that variation of area of pixels with anomalous NDVI(>0.9) depends on gamma values. Upper three colored maps are derived by no exclusion of pixels with luminance below threshold.
Lower three colored maps are derived by excluding pixels whose
luminance lies below 72.

While the NDVI calculated from measured quantity by spectral
photometer has a limited scope, the NDVI estimated from the images can cover a spacious sphere and it is one of the surpassing advantages. In Fig. 11, a distribution map of the estimated NDVI isdisplayed as level-sliced color images. It is shown that area withanomalous NDVI changes depending on gamma values.
When anomaly of NDVI is defined by the ratio of pixels withNDVI >0.9 to total pixels of the estimated NDVI map image, it ismanifested that anomaly ratio of the estimated NDVI changes in analmost linear way to gamma values.
As seen in Fig. 12, anomaly ratio of the NDVI remains 7.0% for
gamma=2.2 even in the case of excluding pixels with luminance be-36Bull. Soc. Photogr. Imag. Japan. Vol. 25 No. 2 (2015)

estimation of NDVI from the digital camera images.

5. Conclusion

Fig. 12 Dependence of anomaly ratio of the NDVI on the gamma values

Current research showed excellent features by the method of excluding pixels with luminance below the threshold from estimating
NDVI from the specific camera images.
Proposed criterion of the appropriate light exposure for the NDVI
estimation is that light exposure lies more than 0.033 (lx·s). It corresponds to that the luminance of the image should be more than 72
out of 255 for the gamma of 2.2.
The ratio of a difference between the estimated NDVI from thecamera images and calculated one by the measured reflectance stays
within about 3%.
For the purpose of utilizing digital cameras like some photometer,
it might be recommended to set gamma to 1.8 rather than 2.2
during the image processing for NDVI estimation.
Acknowledgement
This work was supported by JSPS KAKENHI Grant Number
26450367. Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)Fig. 13 Comparison of the estimated NDVI from the camera images withmeasured NDVI derived from the irradiance acquired by the spectral
photometer: Dependence of estimated NDVI on the gamma values
is shown.

low the threshold. For gamma=1.8 anomalous area of NDVI shrinks
to 1.33. It is a drastic improvement for estimating NDVI from thecamera images. As previously mentioned in the paragraph referring
to Fig. 7, the exponent of the power-law for the curve was 1.82. It is
manifested that the proper value of gamma for the output of thedigital camera might be 1.8 when we use the camera as a certain
kind of a photometer.
For evaluation of the accuracy of the estimated NDVI from thecamera images, it is important to compare the estimated NDVI with
the NDVI calculated from measured reflectance by the spectral photometer. In Fig. 13, the comparison is shown by using an absolutevalue of difference ratio between the estimated and the calculated
NDVI.
To evaluate an accuracy of the estimation of NDVI from camera
images, target area where the photometer points from a distant of
about 20 cm or so was selected on the surface of a leaf as indicatedby an orange ellipse in Fig. 8. Taking the corresponding target areaof the photo image, the estimated NDVI was obtained by averaging
the NDVI values within the target area.
The result is given for comparison in Fig. 13 and explained indetail as follows.
A difference of NDVI between estimated NDVI from images andaverage of measured NDVIs (M-4, M-5 and M-6 in Fig. 8) varies
depending on the gamma values. The absolute value of difference
ratio (%) lies from 2 to 3% for gamma near 1.8. It can be said thatthe proposed pixel exclusion method results in better and excellent

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