CLASSIFICATION OF FOREST AND NON-FOREST AREAS

R.Sathiyavani* Prof V.Srinivasan.

Department of Computer Science, Annamalai University

Abstract
The study investigates the performance of image classifiers for forest and non-forest area classification.
Remote sensing image classification is one of the most significant application worlds for remote sensing. A few
number of image classification algorithms have proved good precision in classifying remote sensing data. We are
experimenting with both supervised and unsupervised classification. Here we compare the different classification
methods and their performances. Specially tested are performances of Maximum Likelihood classifier, Minimum
Distance classifier, Parallelopiped classifier based on Landsat7 ETM+ spectral data and produced high accuracies
of more than 75% with limited input information. Of the classified images, the maximum likelihood method is
found to be more applicable and reliable for the satellite image classification purposes and the Parallelopiped
method is found to give the least reliable results compared to the other methods.
Keywords: Forest classification; Maximum Likelihood Classifier; Minimum Distance; Parallelopiped
Classification accuracy.
1. INTRODUCTION: remotely sensed data, into classes that match the
informational categories of user interest by
Remote sensing, particularly satellites offer
comparing pixels to one another and to those of
an immense source of data for studying spatial and
known identity. This categorized data may then be
temporal variability of the environmental
used to produce thematic maps of the land cover
parameters. Image classification is an important part
present in an image. Studies[3] indicate that spectral
of the remote sensing, image analysis and pattern
information is an effective means of achieving this
recognition. In some instances, the classification
goal. The spectral pattern present within the data for
itself may be the object of the analysis. For example,
each pixel is used as the numerical basis for
classification of land use from remotely sensed data
categorization. . A Multi-spectral image is one that
produces a map like image as the final product of
captures image data at specific frequencies across
the analysis[1]. The image classification therefore
the electromagnetic spectrum. The wavelengths may
forms an important tool for examination of the
be separated by filters or by the use of instruments
digital images.
that are sensitive to particular wavelengths,
Forest classification has evolved from the including light from frequencies beyond the visible
initial identification of forested areas to the light range, such as infrared. Multi-spectral imaging
determination of variation in species diversity. can allow extraction of additional information that
Initially, efforts at classifying forests were the human eye fails to capture with its receptors for
motivated by management objectives, i.e. to red, green and blue. It was originally developed for
safeguard supplies of timber and other forest space-based imaging. Several methods of image
products, and to provide environmental services, classification exist. Two main classification
particularly the protection of fragile mountain methods are Supervised Classification and
catchments areas[2]. Over the years, however, Unsupervised Classification [4]. Unsupervised
nature conservation, recreation, research and classification is a method which examines a large
education have presented additional objectives. number of unknown pixels and divides into a
With the growing interest in developing number of classes based on natural groupings
conservation strategies for species diversity, there is present in the image values. Unsupervised
a need to consider the variation within the classification does not require analyst-specified
vegetation cover (including non-forest training data. This classification is becoming
areas).Deforestation is the major problem existing in increasingly popular in agencies involved in long
the world now. Therefore, classifying the forest and term GIS database maintenance. Supervised
non-forest areas help us to evaluate the areas that classification of remote-sensing images has been
turn to non-forest. widely used as a powerful means to extract various
kinds of information concerning the earth
2. SATELLITE IMAGE CLASSIFICATION
environment. The objective of supervised
Image classification in the field of remote classification in remote sensing is to identify and
sensing, is the process of assigning pixels or the partition the pixels comprising the noisy image of an
basic units of an image to classes. It is likely to area according to its class (e.g. forest and non-
assemble groups of identical pixels found in forest), with the parameters in the model for pixel
values estimated from training samples (ground
truths).Supervised classification is the procedure
most often used for quantitative analysis of remote
sensing image data. It rests upon using suitable
algorithms to label the pixels in an image as
representing particular ground cover types, or
classes. A variety of algorithms is available for this,
ranging from those based upon probability
distribution models for the classes of interest to
those in which the multispectral space is partitioned
into class specific regions using optimally located
surfaces.
For nearly a century, forest and national
park agencies have been engaged in mapping forest
areas in order to provide managers information and
monitor the condition of ecosystems over time.
There have been attempts to improve the accuracy
of the forest maps. But this is an attempt to evaluate
the best of the classifier that suits for forest and non-
forest area classification. In this study three
supervised classification methods were compared
i.e. Maximum Likelihood classifier (MLC),
Minimum Distance classifier, Parallelopiped
classifier. These classification methods were chosen
because MLC has been noted to have a more robust
theoretical basis and higher accuracies[5], whereas
Minimum distance classifier and parallelopided
classifier are found to be very simple to implement
with less complexity.
3. STUDY AREA
Rio de Janeiro lies on a strip of Brazil's
Atlantic coast, close to the Tropic of Capricorn,
where the shoreline is oriented east–west. Facing
largely south, the city was founded on an inlet of
this stretch of the coast, Guanabara Bay and its
entrance is marked by a point of land called Sugar
Loaf– a "calling card" of the city.It lies in the
22°54′30″S 43°11′47″W coordinates[6].
This region retains good quality forest,
including elfin forest, and has the most continuous
well-preserved remnant of Atlantic forest in the
state. Surveys occurred at four locations, each of
which had montane forest, and usually elfin forest.
Araras Biological Reserve is a state conservation
unit located between Serra dos Órgãos National
Park and Serra do Tinguá Biological Reserve
Fazenda Itatiba is within Três Picos State Park. Both
sites are part of the Montane Central Region,
covered mainly by Montane Atlantic Forest. The
Fazenda Boa Esperança site is between Três Picos
and Desengano State Park, but more than 30 km
from both of these protected areas. The Desengano
State Park is located more than 50 km from all other
sites, with the forest being currently isolated due to
deforestation in surrounding areas. All of these sites
are part of a once continuous forest with one of the
highest biodiversity levels in the world including
many threatened species[7].
The Tijuca Forest is a mountainous hand-planted
rainforest in the city of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It is
the world's largest urban forest, covering some
32km² (12.4mi²). The Tijuca Forest is home to
hundreds of species of plants and wildlife, many
threatened by extinction, found only in the Atlantic
Rainforest.
4. DATA PREPARATION
In this research, we have made use of land
cover images obtained from remote sensing for
experimentation. Landsat 7 is equipped with an
enhanced Thematic Mapper (ETM+) as in fig.3 has
been used. Landsat 7’s ETM+ is different from
thematic mappers because it offers following
features.1. A panchromatic band with 15m spatial
resolution. 2. On-board, full aperture, 5% absolute
radiometric calibration. 3. A thermal IR channel
with 60m spatial resolution. 4. An on-board data
recorder.
The data set consists of 800*625 pixels and
covers Rio de Janeiro of Brazil[8] shown in Fig.1.
The advantage of using this dataset is the
availability of the referenced image produced from
field survey, which is used for the accuracy purpose.
The original remote sensing image in false colors
with RGB: 432 with its characteristics Table 1ist
shown in Table.1. A ground truth image (reference
image) is generated by field study campaign as in
Fig. 2. Random sampling is carried out to select the
pixels for training and testing the classifiers.
Table 1.characteristics of Landsat7+ETM
Sensor:L7ETM+
AcquisitionDate:February28,2000
Path/Row:217/76
Lat/Long:-22.904/-43.210
Fig. 1 Map of South America
Fig. 3 Satellite image of Rio de Janeiro
4. METHODOLOGY
The main aim of the study is to evaluate the
performance of the different classification
algorithms for forest and non-forest areas
classification using the multispectral data.
Irrespective of the classifier used there are some
basic steps used in supervised image classification.
1. Decide the set of ground cover types into
which the image is to be segmented. These
are the information classes like forest, non-
forest, water etc.
2. Choose representative or
prototype pixels from each of the desired set
of classes. These pixels are said to form
training data. Training sets for each class can
be established using site visits, maps, air
photographs or even photo interpretation of a
color composite product formed from the
image data. Often the training pixels for a
given class will lie in a common region
enclosed by a border. That region is then
often called a training field.
Fig. 2 Rio de Janeiro
3. Use the training data to estimate
the parameters of the particular classifier
algorithm to be used; these parameters will be
the properties of the probability model used
or will be equations that define partitions in
the multispectral space. The set of parameters
for a given class is sometimes called the
signature of that class.
4. Using the trained classifier, label or
classify every pixel in the image into one of
the desired ground cover types (information
classes). Here the whole image segment of
interest is typically classified. Whereas
training in Step 2 may have required the user
to identify perhaps 1% of the image pixels by
other means, the computer will label the rest
by classification.
5. Produce tabular summaries or
thematic (class) maps which summarize the
results of the classification.
6. Assess the accuracy of the final product
using a labelled testing data set.
4.1 DEFINING THE TRAINING SAMPLES
Supervised classification is much more
accurate for mapping classes, but depends heavily
on the cognition and skills of the image specialist.
The strategy is simple: the specialist must recognize
conventional classes (real and familiar) or
meaningful (but somewhat artificial) classes in a
scene from prior knowledge, such as personal
experience with what's present in the scene, or more
generally, the region it's located in, by experience
with thematic maps, or by on-site visits. This
familiarity allows the individual(s) making the
classification to choose and set up discrete classes
(thus supervising the selection) and then, assign
them category names. As a rule, the classifying
person also locates specific training samples on the
image - either a print or a monitor display - to
identify the classes. The resulting Training samples
are areas representing each known land cover
category that appear fairly homogeneous on the
image (as determined by similarity in tone or color
within shapes delineating the category). In the
computer display one must locate these samples and
circumscribe them with polygonal boundaries drawn
using the computer mouse[9]. More than one
polygon is usually drawn for any class. The quality
of a supervised classification [10] depends on the
quality of the training sites.
4.2 SIGNATURE EXTRACTION
After the training site areas have been
digitized, the next step is to create statistical
characterizations of each information. For each class
thus outlined, mean values ,standard deviation and
covariance of the selected area for each band used to
classify them are calculated from all the pixels
enclosed in each site.
4.2.1. Estimation of MEAN for Classes:
The true values of the mean and
covariance matrix are not known and must be
estimated from training samples. The mean is
typically estimated by the sample mean
where Xi,j the sample j from class i.
Ni the number of training samples from class i
mi the sample mean
4.2.2 Estimation of Covariance Matrix for
Classes:
The covariance matrix is typically estimated by the
sample covariance matrix
Where Σ i the sample covariance matrix
4.3 CLASSIFICATION METHODS
4.3.1 Maximum Likelihood Classifier
Maximum likelihood Classification is a
statistical decision criterion to assist in the
classification of overlapping signatures; pixels are
assigned to the class of highest probability. The
maximum likelihood classifier is considered to give
more accurate results than parallelepiped
classification however it is much slower due to extra
computations. We put the word `accurate' in quotes
because this assumes that classes in the input data
have a Gaussian distribution and that signatures
were well selected; this is not always a safe
assumption.[11] Multivariate normal statistical
theory describes the probability that an observation
X will occur, given that it belongs to a class k, as the
following function
Where µ k Parametric mean vector associated with
the k th class.
X p-dimensional random vector
Σ k covariance matrix associated with the k th class.
Φ k(Xi) Probability density value associated with
observation Xi as
as evaluated for class k..
The quantitative product
can be thought of as a squared distance function
which measures the distance between the
observation and the class mean as scaled and
corrected for mean and covariance of the class. It
can be shown that this expression is an X 2 variate
with p degrees of freedom.
As applied in a maximum likelihood
decision rule, expression (1) allows the calculation
of the probability that an observation is a member of
each of k classes. The individual is then assigned to
the class for which the probability value is greatest.
In an operational context, we substitute observed
means, variances, and covariances and use the log
form of expression (1)
Where Dk p by p dispersion matrix associated with a
sample of observations belonging to the k th class
Since the log of the probability is a
monotonic increasing function of the probability, the
decision can be made by comparing values for each
class as calculated from the right hand side of this
equation
4.3.2 Minimum distance Classification
 Minimum distance classifier classifies
image data on a database file using a set of 256
possible class signature segments as specified by
signature parameter. Each segment specified in
signature, for example, stores signature data
pertaining to a particular class. Only the mean
vector in each class signature segment is used. Other
data, such as standard deviations and covariance
matrices, are ignored (though the maximum
likelihood classifier uses this)[13].
The result of the classification is a theme
map directed to a specified database image channel.
A theme map encodes each class with a unique gray
level. The gray-level value used to encode a class is
specified when the class signature is created. If the
theme map is later transferred to the display, then a
pseudo-color table should be loaded so that each
class is represented by a different color.
The equation used by minimum Euclidian distance
classifier defined by the following equation[12]:
T accuracy requires the collection of some in situ data
Gi(X) = (X-Ui) * (X-Ui)
= SUM [(xj-uj) **2] for j = 1 to d.
Gi(X) is the result for class i on pixel X
T indicates transposition of the elements in brackets
d is the number of pixels in the classification
X=(x1,…, xd) is the (d by 1) pixel vector of grey-
levels
Ui=(u1,...,ud) is the (d by 1) mean vector for class i
J is the subscript of jth element of a vector
SUM[]is the total of elements inside brackets
The distances between the pixel to be
classified and each class centre are compared. The
pixel is assigned to the class whose centre is the
closest to the pixel.
If for all i not equal j, Gj(X) < Gi(X), then X is
classified as j.
Parallelepiped Classification Algorithm
This is a widely used decision rule based
on simple Boolean “and/or” logic.
Training data in n spectral bands are used
in performing the classification.
Brightness values from each pixel of the
multispectral imagery are used to produce an n-
dimensional mean vector, Mc = (μc1, μc2, μc3, ... μcn)
with μck being the mean value of the training data
obtained for class c in band k out of m possible
classes, as previously defined. Sck is the standard
deviation of the training data class c of band k out of
m possible classes.
The decision boundaries form an n-
dimensional parallelepiped in feature space. If the
pixel value lies above the lower threshold and below
the high threshold for all n bands evaluated, it is
assigned to an unclassified category. Although it is
only possible to analyze visually up to three
dimensions, it is possible to create an n-dimensional
parallelepiped for classification purposes. The
parallelepiped algorithm is a computationally
efficient method of classifying remote sensor at a
[14]. Unfortunately, because some parallelepipeds
overlap, it is possible that an unknown candidate
pixel might satisfy the criteria of more than one
class. In such cases it is usually assigned to the first
class for which it meets all criteria. A more elegant
solution is to take this pixel that can be assigned to
more than one class and use a minimum distance to
means decision rule to assign it to just one class.
Classification Accuracy Assessment
Quantitatively assessing classification
or a priori knowledge about some parts of the terrain
which can then be compared with the remote
sensing derived classification map. Thus to assess
classification accuracy it is necessary to compare
two classification maps 1) the remote sensing
derived map, and 2) assumed true map (in fact it
may contain some error). The assumed true map
may be derived from in situ investigation or quite
often from the interpretation of remotely sensed data
obtained at a larger scale or higher resolution.[15]
Classification Error Matrix
One of the most common means of
expressing classification accuracy is the preparation
of classification error matrix sometimes called
confusion or a contingency table. Error matrices
compare on a category by category basis, the
relationship between known reference data (ground
truth) and the corresponding results of an automated
classification. Such matrices are square, with the
number of rows and columns equal to the number of
categories whose classification accuracy is being
assessed. error matrix that an image analyst has
prepared to determine how well a Classification has
categorized a representative subset of pixels used in
the training process of a supervised classification.
This matrix stems from classifying the sampled
training set pixels and listing the known cover types
used for training (columns) versus the Pixels
actually classified into each land cover category by
the classifier (rows). An error matrix expresses
several characteristics about classification
performance. For example, one can study the
various classification errors of omission (exclusion)
and commission (inclusion). Several other measures
for e.g. the overall accuracy of classification can be
computed from the error matrix. It is determined by
dividing the total number correctly classified pixels
 (sum of elements along the major diagonal) by the
Table 3 Maximum likelihood Classification Error
total number of reference pixels. Likewise, the
matrix (Percentage)
accuracies of individual categories can be calculated
by dividing the number of correctly classified pixels CLASS CLASS1 CLASS2 CLASS3 TOTAL
in each category by either the total number of pixels
in the corresponding rows or column. Producers Unclassified 0.21 0.33 0.2 0.21
accuracy which indicates how well the training sets Class1[Red] 99.79 0.07 0 96.06
pixels of a given cover type are classified can be
determined by dividing the number of correctly Class2[Blue] 0 99.61 0 2.22
classified pixels in each category by number of Class3[Green] 0 0 99.8 1.5
training sets used for that category (column total).
Total 100 100.01 100 100
Users accuracy is computed by dividing the number
of correctly classified pixels in each category by the Producer’s Accuracy and Users Accuracy
total number of pixels that were classified in that
category (row total). Red(non-forest)= 65367/65503 = 99.8%
Red= 65367/65368 = 99.9%
Kappa coefficient
Green(forest) = 1514/1520 = 99.6%
Kappa analysis is a discrete multivariate technique Green= 1514/1514 = 100%
for accuracy assessment
Blue (water) = 1022/1024 = 99.8%
Kappa analysis yields a Khat statistic that is the water = 1022/1022 = 100%
measure of agreement of accuracy. The Khat
statistic is computed as Overall accuracy = (65367+ 1514 + 1022)/68047=
99.7%
Kappa Coefficient =0.9716.
The error matrix shows the accuracy of
Maximum Likelihood classification method using
Where r is the number of rows in the matrix xii is the image provided. Similarly the error matrices for
the number of observations in row i and column i, other classification were found out. The minimum
and xi+ and x+i are the marginal totals for the row i distance classifier is found to be the least accurate
and column i respectively and N is the total number with the lowest accuracies. The output of the
of observations. classification is shown in figure [Fig. 4-6]. Overall,
A study of the performance of various the Maximum Likelihood classifier shows the
classifiers based on the overall accuracy, kappa highest accuracy assessment for this particular area.
coefficient, and confusion matrix and it is shown in 6. Conclusion
table 2 and 3 is made. It is observed that Maximum
Likelihood classification method is determined to be In this paper we have compared the
the most accurate. One of the reasons is it filters out performance of various classifiers and found that the
shadows and also it classifies the highly varied Maximum Likelihood classifier outperforms other
clusters. classifiers. This accurate but simple classifier shows
the importance of considering the data set -
classifier relationship for successful image
classification. Further studies are required to
improve the use of classifiers to increase the
Table.2 Maximum Classification Error matrix applicability of such methods. There is a need to
(Pixels) develop new work to compare the supervised
classifiers with unsupervised classifiers and identify
CLASS CLASS1 CLASS2 CLASS3 TOTAL
the pros and cons of among them.
Unclassified 136 5 2 143
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Fig-4 Parallelopiped classification

Fig-5 maximum Likelihood classification

Fig-6 Minimum distance classification