Introduction
The purpose of this product documentation help article is to provide current status of data support for Capella's SAR imagery products in a variety of geospatial desktop software applications. The compatibility information provided herein is based primarily on feedback provided to Capella Space by the company or organization who develops and distributes any given software package.
Capella does not explicitly endorse any specific software application for working with our SAR imagery products and the extent of our own in-house software compatibility testing is quite limited. The geospatial software applications described in this help article are listed in top-down alphabetical order based on name of the company/organization that develops and distributes the software package.
Technical Support Assistance
The Capella Space customer success team can only provide limited guidance to users in relation to effective utilization of our SAR imagery products in these geospatial software applications. Consequently, if users have more detailed advanced questions related to working with Capella data in any of these software applications they must contact the appropriate software provider's technical support directly for further assistance.
Comments & Resources
BAE Systems - SOCET GXP
Capella SLC+GEC+GEO image data support with full sensor model functionality requires installation of two plugins developed by BAE Systems contractor for SOCET GXP v4.4 software:
To install these plugins simply download the ZIP file, unpack the archive, and move the two DLL files to the following SOCET GXP software installation subfolder:
- ... SOCET GXP 4.4.0\bin\smplugins\csmplugins\3.0.3\
Once the plugins are installed restart the SOCET GXP software then open Capella datasets accordingly.
Catalyst.Earth - Catalyst Professional
Initial Capella SLC+GEC+GEO image data support introduced in Catalyst Professional v2222.0.2 software (formerly known as PCI Geomatica) released in May 2021. At this time data for the Spot (spotlight) and Strip (stripmap) imaging modes are supported, Catalyst reports that support for Site (sliding spotlight) imaging mode will be added to a future software release. The GEC+GEO imagery data will be successfully loaded into the software with associated UTM (most latitudes) or UPS (polar regions) coordinate system for visualization, analysis and processing in combination with other geospatial data sources.
ESA (SkyWatch) - SNAP / Sentinel-1 Toolbox
Initial Capella SLC+GEC+GEO image data support introduced in SNAP v8.0 software release but for best possible compatibility several enhancements were added to the recent 's1tbx-8.0.3' patch which should be installed using the "Check for Updates" tool within the SNAP software. To successfully open a Capella SAR imagery product into the SNAP software utilize the "File > Import > SAR Sensors > CAPELLA" menu item then select the *_extended.json metadata file. For more information please refer to the SNAP open source project backlog:
Esri - ArcGIS Pro
Capella GEC+GEO image data supported only via generic GeoTIFF format raster ingest. The GEC+GEO imagery data will be successfully loaded into the software with associated UTM (most latitudes) or UPS (polar regions) coordinate system for visualization, analysis and processing in combination with other geospatial data sources. No testing has been performed with the older ArcMap desktop software application so compatibility has not been characterized.
GAMMA RS-AG - GAMMA
Capella SLC, SICD, GEC, & GEO formats are all fully supported by GAMMA. Additional background information on the current version of the GAMMA software is available in the following document:
Hexagon Geospatial - ERDAS IMAGINE
Initial Capella SLC+GEC+GEO image data support introduced in ERDAS IMAGINE 2020 Update 3 software release. The GEC+GEO imagery data will be successfully loaded into the software with associated UTM (most latitudes) or UPS (polar regions) coordinate system for visualization, analysis and processing in combination with other geospatial data sources. Capella's SLC image in SICD v1.2.1 format will open via generic NITF ingest with no SAR-specific data support. To open GeoTIFF format datasets as Capella SAR imagery products make sure to select the appropriate 'Files of type' raster ingest filter:
JSC Racurs - PHOTOMOD Radar
Initial Capella SLC+GEC+GEO image data support introduced in PHOTOMOD Radar v2.0.1 software release. The GEC+GEO imagery data will be successfully loaded into the software with associated UTM (most latitudes) or UPS (polar regions) coordinate system for visualization, analysis and processing in combination with other geospatial data sources. JSC Racurs also distributes a "PHOTOMOD Radar Viewer" application with support for Capella datasets.
L3Harris Geospatial (HGSI) – ENVI
Initial Capella GEC+GEO image data support introduced in ENVI v5.6 software release. The ENVI software will open GEC & GEO image product type GeoTIFF files, assign acquisition time metadata and apply Gaussian quick-stretch suitable for Capella SAR imagery display. The GEC+GEO imagery data will be successfully loaded into the software with associated UTM (most latitudes) or UPS (polar regions) coordinate system for visualization, analysis and processing in combination with other geospatial data sources. Capella's SLC image in SICD v1.2.1 format will open via generic NITF ingest with no SAR-specific data support.
QGIS Community - QGIS
Capella GEC+GEO image data supported only via generic GeoTIFF format raster ingest. The GEC+GEO imagery data will be successfully loaded into the software with associated UTM (most latitudes) or UPS (polar regions) coordinate system for visualization, analysis and processing in combination with other geospatial data sources.
Sarmap SA - SARscape
Initial Capella SLC+GEC+GEO image data support introduced in SARscape v5.6 release (which runs as a module within the ENVI v5.6 software). Capella's SAR imagery products from all imaging modes (Spot & Site & Strip) are supported in SARscape Basic module functions supported along with speckle filters in the Gamma and Gaussian Filtering module. Support for Capella's SLC image in SICD v1.2.1 format currently requires installation of additional SARscape v5.6 software patch available by contacting Sarmap directly. Sarmap has also provided the following getting started tutorial slide presentation:
To successfully open a Capella SAR imagery product into the SARscape software make sure to utilize the "CAPELLA" data ingest utility within the ENVI toolbox panel:
Textron Systems - RemoteView Pro
Capella GEC+GEO image data supported only via generic GeoTIFF format raster ingest. The GEC+GEO imagery data will be successfully loaded into the software with associated UTM (most latitudes) or UPS (polar regions) coordinate system for visualization, analysis and processing in combination with other geospatial data sources. Capella's SLC image in SICD v1.2.1 format will open via generic NITF ingest with no SAR-specific data support. Textron reports that a RemoteView v4.7 software patch will be released in 2021 that will add full SICD v1.2 support in the future.
Appendix – Libraries & Scripting Toolkits
While the focus of this help article is data support within geospatial desktop software applications Capella has also performed limited testing of our SAR imagery products in GeoTIFF and SICD format in the following scripting languages + toolkits and have confirmed at least a basic level of compatibility:
- GDAL (v2.4.2)
- Matlab + SAR Toolbox (R2020b)
- NGA SIX Library (v3.1.4)
- Python (v3.9) + SarPy (v1.2) + Rasterio (v1.0.28)