PRO Production

Evaluate SAR scene readiness for downstream analysis, including optional terrain and pairwise coherence-proxy checks.

workflow pro

## Workflow Narrative

SAR Readiness QA

### Problem It Solves

Are SAR scenes normalized enough for robust multi-scene comparison and downstream analytics?

### Who It Is For

- SAR specialists and all-weather monitoring teams.

### Primary User

Disaster/hazard monitoring units, remote sensing service firms, and infrastructure monitoring groups.

### What It Does

- Produces analysis-ready SAR derivatives from SAR + DEM.
- Applies calibration, speckle filtering, and RTC-support factor generation.
- Accepts either direct SAR rasters or supported SAR bundles and records bundle metadata provenance.
- Optionally emits a pair-based coherence proxy and can auto-coregister the pair first when explicit opt-in alignment is requested.

### How It Works

- Converts input SAR intensity to calibrated backscatter-compatible values.
- Applies configurable speckle-window filtering for noise suppression.
- Computes terrain correction factors from DEM geometry, resolves bundle metadata when present, and optionally evaluates a pair coherence proxy.
- Indicative formula: gamma0 ~= sigma0 / cos(local_incidence), then local-window filtering and optional pair coherence estimation.

### Why It Wins

- Couples SAR preprocessing with terrain support, bundle-native provenance, and explicit geometry guardrails, while still allowing an audited auto-coregistration handoff when pair alignment is not pre-established.
- Boundary note:
- `sar_analysis_readiness` is not the dedicated interferogram+coherence production workflow.
- Dedicated companion tool (single combined workflow): `sar_interferogram_coherence`.
- Design spec and scope details: `docs/sar_interferogram_coherence_spec.md`.

### Typical Buying Trigger

An organization needs dependable all-weather monitoring where optical imagery is frequently unavailable.

### Typical Presets

- default with single scene for preprocessing.
- pair mode with either direct raster pairs or bundle-resolved pair inputs for coherence-proxy output.

## Inputs

Parameter | Optional | Description
--- | --- | ---
input_sar or input_sar_bundle, input_dem | no | Primary SAR source plus terrain model used for radiometric terrain correction and readiness metrics.
input_measurement_key | yes | Optional bundle measurement selector when the input SAR bundle contains multiple assets.
optional pair_sar or pair_sar_bundle and look-angle controls | yes | Optional secondary SAR source and geometry controls used for pair-based coherence-proxy diagnostics.
pair_measurement_key | yes | Optional bundle measurement selector when the pair SAR bundle contains multiple assets.
auto_coregister_pair, coreg_max_offset_px, coreg_decimation, coreg_min_overlap_fraction | yes | Optional opt-in handoff to translation-mode pair alignment before coherence-proxy estimation when CRS/grid do not already match.
speckle_window, z_factor | no | Noise-filter window and vertical scaling controls used in SAR preprocessing.

## Outputs

Parameter | Type | Description
--- | --- | ---
sar_backscatter_calibrated | GeoTIFF | Calibrated SAR backscatter raster suitable for quantitative comparison.
speckle_filtered | GeoTIFF | Speckle-reduced SAR raster for improved interpretability and downstream analysis.
rtc_factor | GeoTIFF | Radiometric terrain correction factor raster used to normalize SAR signal.
coherence_proxy | optional GeoTIFF | Optional pair-based amplitude-domain coherence proxy raster when a compatible SAR pair is provided.
summary | JSON | Machine-readable summary report containing run metadata, QA diagnostics, and key metrics.
html_report | HTML | Human-readable customer-facing report generated from the summary contract for stakeholder review and QA traceability.

## Python Example

    import whitebox_workflows as wbw

    wbe = wbw.WbEnvironment(include_pro=True, tier="pro")

    result = wbe.sar_analysis_readiness(
        input_sar_bundle="data/S1_reference.SAFE",
        input_measurement_key="vv",
        input_dem="data/dem.tif",
        pair_sar_bundle="data/S1_pair.SAFE",
        pair_measurement_key="vv",
        auto_coregister_pair=True,
        coreg_max_offset_px=24,
        speckle_window=5,
        output_prefix="output/sar_ready",
    )

    print(result)

## License Notice

Use of this function requires a license for Whitebox Workflows Professional (WbW-Pro). Please visit www.whiteboxgeo.com to purchase a license.

## Project Links

WbW Homepage User Manual Support WbW