A comparison of synthetic thermal imagery created using MuSES and thermal imagery captured in the field

Abstract

The ability to model and simulate target signatures in a range of backgrounds under a range of environmental conditions are highly desirable as it allows for better understanding and assessment of the vulnerability of our soldiers in the battlefield. One main limitation of using game engine simulation is that they have limited capabilities and fidelity in simulating thermal signatures of targets and background. Physics based simulation software program on the other hand is more capable of simulating thermal properties of the scene and rendering a more physically realistic sensor image. In this study, we used MuSES (ThermoAnalytics), a physics based EO/IR signature simulation software to model and simulate the thermal properties and predicated thermal imagery of a real world scene with moving human targets. We used FLIR thermal IR cameras to capture the scene and the same scene was simulated in MuSES. A comparison of the synthetic and real thermal IR imagery was conducted and the progress made towards creating realistic thermal imagery in the land domain discussed