Loading ERS-SAR PRI Data into an image processing system

Using for example an ERDAS image processing system, SAR PRI data may be loaded by taking the following major points into account:

1. use the BSQ or BIL option,

2. skip two files,

3. there is an additional line on the top of the file, but you can remove it later-on (see point i),

4. the number of columns is 8 006 (the first six bytes are zeros).The image record length is 16 004 (the double of the column number),

5. blocking factor is 1,

6. data are packed into 16 bits,

7. if you have a workstation or PC do not reverse bytes; this is only necessary when a mainframe is used,

8. there is only one band in the data set,

9. start loading data from input with co-ordinates 7, 2,

10. the maximum number of lines is 8 200,

11. do not forget to check your available disk space (min. 135 megabytes) before loading an ERS-SAR image.

A smaller subset of the data set can easily be loaded. When choosing the right portion within a map, you have to take the necessary reflection around an axis into account, which means that the original image is always wrong-sided (more details in Reflection around horizontal or vertical axis)