Applications of Historical Optical DISP Images in Antarctica Study

Historical optical photographs acquired by CORONA, ARGON and LANYARD missions, known as Declassified Intelligence Satellite Photography (DISP), date back to the satellite remote sensing in Antarctica in early 1960s. They can provide a broader perspective for studying the early Antarctica by recovering geophysical parameters and products. However, the quality of the early optical satellite images is relatively poor due to the imaging technique used, long-term storage of the film and analogue-to-digital scanning processes. Improvements should be applied to processing methods to make these valuable images suitable for analyzing changes in the Antarctica. In this paper, we introduced our methods of geometric position, hierarchical image matching and parallax decomposing, then demonstrated that these images can be successfully applied to applications, such as DEM reconstruction and ice flow mapping.