The water colour simulator WASI: A software tool for forward and inverse modeling of optical in-situ spectra

Abstract

Optical data collected from ships serve as reference measurements for remote sensing of oceans, coastal waters, lakes and rivers. They are usually a set of different types of spectra. A comfortable WINDOWS based software tool has been developed for forward and inverse calculations of major types, namely, upwelling radiance above the surface, downwelling irradiance above the surface, remote sensing reflectance above the surface, specular reflectances at the surface, irradiance reflectance below the surface, and bulk absorption of the water body. The calculations are easily adaptable to regional specifics, because all input data are taken from files in ASCII format. Main applications of the tool are data analysis of optical in-situspectra from different sources, data generation for remote sensing simulations and sensitivity studies in different types ofwaters, and visualisation of spectral changes upon altered parameters.