Classifying images
Automated remote sensing (ARS) is rarely ever done in the visible spectrum. ARS processes images without any human input. The most commonly available wavelengths outside of the visible spectrum are infrared and near-infrared.
The following figure shows a thermal image (band 10) from a fairly recent Landsat 8 flyover of the US Gulf Coast from New Orleans, Louisiana, to Mobile, Alabama. The major natural features in the image have been labeled so that you can orient yourself:
Figure 7.9 – Key features in a thermal satellite image
Because every pixel in that image has a reflectance value, it is information as opposed to just color. The type of reflectance can tell us definitively what a feature is, as opposed to us guessing by looking at it. Python can see those values and pick out features the same way we intuitively do by grouping related pixel values. We can colorize pixels based on their relation to each other to simplify...
