Accurate Scene Generation Including Atmospheric Effects

Accurate synthetic scene generation is a critical capability required to support sensor development, software and hardware in-the-loop testing and pre-flight test analysis. Current \acIR scene generation codes such as \acFLITES and its predecessor \acCHAMP are excellent tools for creating radiometrically accurate IR scenes including targets of various types. These tools, however, do not currently include the degrading effects of the atmosphere which will be inherent in any sensor based on an airborne platform. Such effects include near-field aero-optical disturbances, free-stream atmospheric turbulence, aerosol absorption and scattering (in terms of both a radiometric loss and reduction in image quality), scattering due to various forms of clouds in the line of sight, and refractive effects due to the earth's limb. Each of these effects is dynamically changing with engagement time and may vary spatially across an extended scene at a fixed point in time. For instance, one can easily envision an engagement for which only a portion of the scene is affected by clouds. MZA proposes a Phase I effort that will demonstrate the feasibility of implementing comprehensive atmospheric models to capture the effects that degrade airborne sensor performance.