Coastline Detection Method in SAR Images Based on anImproved Level Set Algorithm

Abstract

Coastline detection in Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) images plays a significant role in marine applications, such as autonomous navigation, geographic mapping, etc. Level set algorithm is an edge detection method, based on visual characteristic of human being. Level set algorithm has been attracting much attention of research and application in coastline detection due to its detection effectiveness and quality of anti-noise. However, when applied to high resolution image, the level set algorithm will cost a lot of time to detect the contour because of its complicated iterative manner. In this paper, we present an improved method based on level set algorithm used especially in SAR images. Firstly, the coarse detection procedure is processed using level set algorithm in a low resolution image to obtain the contours closing to the real coastline of the image. Then, the coarse contour in the low resolution image is projected to the high resolution image and the coastline detection continued by level set algorithm in a finely way to obtain the final fined results. Experimental result using Radarsat ScanSAR image indicates that this novel improved method based on level set algorithm can enhance the detection speed, compared with the original level set algorithm, without the loss of detection effectiveness.