On the Processing of Aerial LiDAR Data for Supporting Enhancement, Interpretation and Mapping of Archaeological Features

Rosa Lasaponara1 and Nicola Masini2

1

CNR-IMAA (Institute of Methodologies For Environmental Analysis), Potenza, Italy lasaponara@imaa.cnr.it 2 CNR-IBAM (Institute of Archaeological and Architectural Heritage), Potenza, Italy n.masini@ibam.cnr.it

Abstract. Airborne Laser Scanning (ALS) technology, also referred to as LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging), represents the most relevant advancement of Earth Observation (EO) techniques for obtaining highprecision information about the Earths surface. This includes basic terrain mapping (Digital terrain model, bathymetry, corridor mapping), vegetation cover (forest assessment and inventory), coastal and urban areas, etc.. Recent studies examined the possibility of using ALS in archaeological investigations to identify earthworks, although the ability of ALS measurements in this context has not yet been studied in detail. It is widely recognized that there are numerous open issues that must be addressed. The most important of these limitations are: (i) data processing, (ii) interpretation and (iii) reliable mapping of archaeological features. In particular, there is a pressing need to generate very detailed maps of subtle archaeological remains as required for planning field survey, excavations etc. Up to now, the visualisation has been approached using hill-shaded LiDAR DTMs, namely different DTMs are produced by different illuminations from arbitrary azimuths and elevations using GIS hill-shading techniques. But numerous limitations characterize this approach, mainly linked to the following aspects: (i) the use of numerous hill-shaded LiDAR DTMs is time consuming, (ii) the same features may be replicated from several angles, (iii) the interpretation is strongly subjective (depending on the interpreter), and (iv) this implies the impossibility to have reliable maps. In this paper, these critical issues have been addressed using: 1) slope and convexity algorithms; 2) Principal Component Analysis (PCA) of hill-shaded LiDAR DTMs. The investigations were carried out near Monte Irsi, a significant archaeological area in the Basilicata Region (Southern Italy) characterized by complex topographical and morphological features. Keywords: LiDAR, archaeology, full-waveform, hill shading, PCA, slope, convexity.
B. Murgante et al. (Eds.): ICCSA 2011, Part II, LNCS 6783, pp. 392406, 2011. Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2011

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1 Introduction
The advent of LiDAR technologies (Light Detection And Ranging), generally known as Airborne Laser Scanner (ALS), has completely revolutionized the area of topographic surveying. ALS is an active remote sensing technology, based on laser pulses, which measures properties of scattered light to find range and/or other information of a distant target. The range to an object is determined by measuring the time delay between transmission of a pulse and detection of the reflected signal. ALS can be mounted onboard on airplane or helicopter. The acquisition system consists of the following individual components: (i) laser ranging device, (ii) Inertial Measuring Unit (IMU), (iii) onboard Global Positioning System (GPS) device, (iv) ground GPS data acquisition at the same time as the LiDAR survey (mandatory for an accurate georeferecing process, (v) Digital Camera (Optional). While each of these components are operating independently, integration of all of them allows us to obtain measurements with a high level of accuracy. Currently, two different types of ALS sensor systems are available: (i) conventional scanners (or discrete echo scanners) and (ii) full-waveform (FW) scanners. The conventional scanners only record some representative signals (generally the first and last pulse) from the echo waveform, thus losing many other reflections. The fullwaveform (FW) scanners are able to detect the entire echo waveform for each emitted laser beam, thus offering improved capabilities especially in areas with complex morphology and/or dense vegetation cover. The LiDAR technology exceeds other methods, such as stereo-photogrammetry or interferometric SAR, particularly in vegetated areas due to its ability to see through gaps in canopy forming trees. ALS provides a detailed digital surface model which can efficiently enable the identification of archaeological sites and features, which leave traces in relief, but can not detect buried structures without (micro-) relief. The high resolution of LiDAR-based DTM allowed us to identify and record small differences in height on the ground produced by surface and shallow archaeological remains (the so-called shadow marks) which can not be seen from other data sets, such as satellite optical images and air photographs. Nowadays, the majority of archaeological investigations have been carried out using data collected by conventional ALS, for the management of archaeological monuments [3], for landscape studies [4] and archaeological investigations to depict microtopographic earthworks in bare ground sites [5] and in forested areas [6,7] Up to now, the potential of FW LiDAR for archaeological purposes has been assessed in a few studies by Doneus et al [8] who investigated an Iron Age hill fort covered by dense vegetation and by the authors [9,10] who performed investigations on two medieval settlements, located on ground hilly places with low dense vegetation cover. Despite the high capability of ALS in archaeological investigations, for both conventional scanners and full-waveform scanners, there are a number of open issues that must be addressed. Among these limitations, the most important are: (i) the data processing chain, (ii) interpretation and (iii) accurate mapping of subtle archaeological features. In particular, there is a pressing need to generate very accurate maps of subtle archaeological remains.

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These limitations are particularly relevant for archaeological investigations being that the structures under investigation are usually characterized by very low relief which exhibit subtle features (i.e. small elevation range compared to the surrounding landscape). Moreover, the visibility and, therefore, the detectability of these archaeological features strongly vary according to the direction of the illumination. For example, linear features are not visible if they are aligned with the direction of the illumination. To reduce this drawback, some authors suggested the use of numerous hill-shaded LiDAR DTMs, in order to consider several different illumination angles for the interpretation process. Nevertheless, the analysis of diverse combinations of illumination directions has several limitations, above all (i) it is time consuming, (ii) it may be inconsistent being linked to a subjective evaluation, (iii) using diverse hillshaded LiDAR DTMs the same features may be replicated from several angles and thus implying a low accuracy level. Image analysis may cope with these drawbacks, offering techniques to quantitatively reduce the redundancy of hill-shaded LiDAR DTMs, and, at the same time, capturing the most significant information. In this paper, we will present and discuss the data processing approach we adopted to support the enhancement, interpretation and detailed mapping of subtle features linked to archaeological micro-relief. The proposed approach has been applied to the medieval village of Monte Irsi, located in Basilicata on a hilly plateau characterized by the significant presence of low vegetation. The data processing chain includes: 1) slope and convexity extraction from DTM; 2) hill-shaded DTMs and 3) Principal Component Analysis (PCA) of the hill-shaded DTMs. The reconnaissance of archaeological features has been carried out by convexity, whereas hill-shaded DTMs were used to extract them with the highest spatial accuracy. Moreover, hill-shaded representations of a LiDAR DTM have been further elaborated using PCA to effectively reduce the multiple images to a single product for interpretation and mapping. This data processing chain enable us to (i) reduce the multiple images to a single product for interpretation and mapping, (ii) to capture all the possible archaeological features and (iii) to extract them with the highest spatial accuracy. This approach greatly sharpens the visibility of small-scale and shallow topographic features and synthesizes the most relevant information in a single product evaluated by using convexity. The text is organized as follows: in Section 2 we describe the study area and the previous investigations; in Section 3, we focus on data processing issues; in Sections 4 the results are discussed; conclusions follow in section 5.

2 Study Area and Previous Analyses

Monte Irsi is a hilly plateau, near the confluence of the Bradano and Basentello rivers, in the Northeast of Basilicata (Southern Italy). From the geological point of view, it is localised in the Bradanic Foredeep (or Bradanic Trough), a wide depression located between the southern Apennines to the west and the Apulian foreland to the east. From a geodynamic point of view, the origin of Bradanic Trough is to be found in the deformation sustained from Apulia caused by the elastic bending of the lithosphere.

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The hill of Irsi is a strategic place where it is possible to observe two rivers, Basentello and Bradano, three roads: 1) one followed the Bradano river and it ended at the Ionian coast; 2) the second crossed the valleys and the hilly slopes of the Lucanian Apennines (Northwestern direction); 3) the third road axis connected Monte Irsi to Venosa, an important town during the Roman age. This strategic location of Monte Irsi favored a long human frequentation, as testified by the archaeological findings unearthed during the excavation campaigns and field works carried out by Cherry and Whitehouse [11] and Alaistair Small [12] since 1970. In particular, the archaeological records put in evidence an important human activity in the Late Iron age (6th-4th century B.C.), when probably the hill was settled [12], in the late Hellenistic period and in the imperial roman age [13]. The latter is testified by a villa unearthed by Small, near a Church (of S. Maria dIrsi) which is the only preserved architectural evidence. As regards to the historical studies, the tradition supposes a Byzantine settlement which was destroyed by the Saracens in 988. The first documentary source available dates back to the 12th century. It is a papal bull, issued in 1123, which refers a settlement, named castrum Ursum belonging to the diocese of Montepeloso (today Irsina). In 1133, Castrum Ursum (named also Yrsum in other documents), was given to the Benedectine Priorate of S. Maria dello Juso [14].

Fig. 1. Location of Yrsum

The first information on the demographic consistency dates back to the 13th century. The census of the year 1277 did record 114 families, corresponding to a population ranging from 700-to 900 inhabitants, quite significant compared to the surrounding villages. In that time, Yrsum was in decline, as testified by the Prior of S. Maria dello Juso, who described the state of poverty of the people living in the village in a letter to the King dated 1272. The only information on the medieval urban fabric dates back to 1288. A deed of sale of a house in Yrsum refers to the presence of a church, two houses and a platea puplica (public square) [15]. Unfortunately, no documented information about the presence of a monastery is available. It may be in the structures of the baroque church, located at 200 m on the southeast side of the urban perimeter. At the end of the 13th century, the decline of Yrsum was increasing so that, in 1294, it obtained exemption from the tax payment by the King [16]. The tax exemp-

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tion did not free the village from poverty, as testified by the 1320 census which recorded a decrease in population [15]. Between 1370 and 1376, the people of Montepeloso with the moral support of the Duke of Andria, Francesco del Balzo, first looted the monastery, then they devastated all its properties, among which the village of Yrsum [14]. Such devastations marked the end of Yrsum, which is thought to be abandoned not long after. Starting from the archaeological record and the historical data described in the previous section, integrated investigations based on the use of remote sensing have been performed, since 2005. By means of the integration of VHR satellite imagery and field survey it was possible to identify the main anthropic witnesses referable to the medieval age. In particular, the ditch of a castle, some crop marks and microrelief related to the urban fabric of the medieval village [2, 15, 17]. The optical dataset showed significant limits in detecting all the archaeological microrelief, thus preventing the reconstruction of the urban shape. To overcome such limits and to survey the underwood, a LiDAR survey has been carried out on September 2008. The DTM derived by the point clouds taken from a fullwaveform laser scanner mounted on an helicopter allowed us to detect a greater number of archaeological microrelief very useful to us for studying the urban morphology. In particular, three urban sectors (see B, C and D in figure 2) have been identified [9], among which one interested by a landslide [10] which could be probably one of the factors which caused the abandonment of the medieval village. The analysis of DTM under vegetation and wood revealed traces of small potential ancient field divisions which suggest intensive farming in this area, likely related to vineyard, vegetable gardens and fruit trees which supplied the people living in Yrsum [18].

Fig. 2. 3d DTM of the medieval village of Yrsum in Monte Irsi

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The above described information provided by the remotely sensed data (satellite imagery and DTM LiDAR) greatly improved the knowledge of the medieval urban fabric of Yrsum. Nevertheless, in order to use such data for future archaeological excavation campaigns, a map of microrelief with the location of possible buried or shallow walls needs to be done. To this aim, a post processing approach by using shaded DTMs and other topographical modeling has been adopted, as shown in section 3.3.

Fig. 3. Subset of Yrsum: detail of microrelief

3 Airborne Laser Scanning in Archaeology: Data Processing Methodology

3.1 Data Filtering The identification of archaeological features, from earthworks to surface structures in both bare and densely vegetated areas, needs a DTM with a high accuracy. To this aim, it is crucial to carry out the classification of terrain and off terrain points by applying adequate procedures. Several filtering methods are available and used for this task. In the current study, both Digital Surface Model (DSMs) and Digital Terrain Model (DTMs) are obtained from the classification performed using a strategy based on a set of filtrations of the filtrate. The workflow can be summarized as follows: i) Low point Classification; ii) Isolated points Classification; iii) Air points; iv) Ground Classification; v) Classification of points below surface; vi) Classification of points by class; vii) Classification of points by height from ground for different heights.

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The data classification process starts by including all of the point cloud into a single class, called the default class, which becomes the reference for the next processing. The elimination of outliers is performed through classification of : (i) "low points", (ii) isolated points, and (iii) air points. The first finds single points or groups of points with an height lower than 0.5 m compared to the other points within a ray of 5 m. The second routine identifies isolated points such as points present in the air (for example birds, etc..). The third one finds points present in the air not classified as isolated points. The next processing step is based on the Axelsson TIN model [19] in an attempt to define a "ground" surface. To accept or reject points as being representative of the "ground" is necessary to define some geometric threshold values which prescribe possible deviations from the average topographic surface. For example, the maximum building size of the largest buildings. The algorithm looks for the so-called "key points", i.e. the lowest point that will define a first ground surface made up of very large triangles. A triangle of the primary mesh is progressively densified by adding a new vertex to a point inside it. The Classification of points below surface allows the identification of points under the surface level, such as wells or similar. Such classification was performed setting the standard deviation value at 8 (with 0.01 m tolerance value). The next two classifications (vi and vii) identify and classify points according to a given class or heights, respectively. All points left into the default class are now considered as vegetation. Finally, using Classification of points by height from ground for different heights three classes are considered: low (< 0.25), medium (0.25 to 2 m) and height ( > 2m). A further classification enables the discriminations of cars, walls, buildings, vegetation types, etc. The DTM was created using a commercial software TerraModeler on the basis of the classification of terrain and off terrain objects performed using the whole processing chain from (i) to (vii) step. 3.2 Post Processing Approach 3.2.1 Topographical Modelling In order to extract and classify different geomorphological features from DTMs topographical modelling has been applied. There are several ways to model the topographical surface among which the most employed are the slope and the convexity ( profile, plan, longitudinal and cross section convexity). The slope is a different way to measure elevation changes. It is the rate of rise or fall of elevation against horizontal distance, this measures how a surface is inclined. Computation of slope is also used for LiDAR point classification that evaluates sudden changes in the terrain surface [20]. Convexity represents the first derivative of slope. For archaeological applications, both slope and convexity maps could be used in order to better interpret micro-relief referable to buried or shallow structures or earthworks of cultural interest. Both slope and convexity can facilitate the extraction of the geometrical patterns referable to buried architecture elements or settlements. To explain the potential of using slope and convexity to identify micro-relief, it is necessary to resume the diverse phenomena which generates the microrelief. They are

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generally caused by structures collapsed and generally hidden by building material and terrain which are exposed to erosion rate varying according to the pendency (slope) and landscape characteristics. The results are generally alternations of convexity and concavity features. Convexity patterns are caused by the presence of buried walls and/or foundations, whereas the concavity patterns could reveal the presence of floor and/or road paving (see figure 3). For our study case, slope and convexity routines of ENVI have been used. 3.2.2 DTM Shading In order to emphasize archaeological features with particular reference to micro-relief a further crucial step is given by shading procedures. Several routines embedded in commercial software allow different solutions, such as the visualization of the elevations by using colour graduations and the slope of the terrain, in order to identify the portions of the terrain that are relatively flat versus those that are relatively steep. For the visualization of elevations it is useful to enable Hill Shading option to view elevation data as shaded relief. With this option shadows are generated using the loaded elevation. To do it, it is necessary to light the DTM by an hypothetical light source. The selection of the direction parameters (zenith angle z and azimuth angle ) depends on the difference in height and orientation of the micro-relief of possible archaeological interest. Single shading is not the most effective method to visualize and detect micro-relief. If features and/or objects are parallel to the azimuth angle, will not rise a shade. As a result, it would not be possible to distinguish them. The problem could be solved by observing and comparing DTM scenes shaded by using different angles of lighting. In addition the different shaded DTMs could processed by using the Principal Components Analysis (PCA) [21]. 3.2.3 Principal Component Analysis The PCA is a linear transformation which decorrelates multivariate data by translating and/ or rotating the axes of the original feature space, so that the data can be represented without correlation in a new component space. In order to do this, the process firstly computes the covariance matrix (S) among all the shaded DTMs, then eigenvalues and eigenvectors of S are calculated in order to obtain the new feature components.
covk1, k 2 =

nm SBI , J ,K1 K 2 SBi, j,k 2 k 2 i=1j =1

)(

(1)

where k1, k2 are two input shaded DTM (SDTM), SB i,j, is the digital number (DN) value of the SDTM in row i and column j, n number of row, m number of columns, mean of all pixel SB values in the subscripted input SDTM. The percent of total dataset variance explained by each component is obtained by formula 2.

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% i = 100 *

i
i i =1
(2)

where i are eigenvalues of S. Finally, a series of new image layers (called eigen-channels or components) are computed (formula 3) by multiplying, for each pixel, the eigenvector of S for the original value of a given pixel in the input shaded DTMs.

Pi = Pk u k ,i
i =1

(3)

where Pi indicates a SDTM in component i, u k,i eigenvector element for component i in input SDTM k, Pk DN. for SDTM k, number of input SDTM. A loading, or correlation R, of each component i with each input shaded DTMs k can be calculated by using formula 4.

Rk , i = u k ,i (i ) 2 (vark ) 2
1 1

(4)

where var k is the variance of input shaded DTMs k (obtained by reading the kth diagonal of the covariance matrix). The PCA transforms the input shaded DTMs in new components that should be able to make the identification of distinct features and surface types easier. The major portion of the variance is associated with homogeneous areas, whereas localized surface anomalies will be enhanced in later components, which contain less of the total dataset variance. This is the reason why they may represent information variance for a small area or essentially noise and, in this case, it must be disregarded. Some problems can arise from the fact that eigenvectors can not have general and universal meaning since they are extracted from the series.

4 Discussion of Results
For Irsi case study, the first step has been the computation of slope and profile convexity. The maps obtained (fig. 4) put in evidence microrelief characterized by a significant elevation change, thus disregarding the subtle microrelief. Anyway, the maps obtained allow us to extract and analyze both the geomorphological (we refer to a landslide which affects the south-eastern slope of the hill) and archaeological features: the latter, from the urban morphology point of view. In particular, we observe in a more emphasized way respect to the DTM (fig. 4), two different patterns of urban fabric: i) one, close to the castle, is characterized by a more regular and square grid; ii) the second pattern is given by curvilinear features due to the fact that the settlement adapted to the morphology of the hill. Such patterns are likely referable to two different historical building phases. Figure 5 shows on the left the convexity map, in the middle the slope map of a subset and its interpretation, on the right: linear segments likely referable to the axis of buried structures are plotted. Such marks have been assumed as reference for the interpretation of the maps obtained by shading procedure.

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Fig. 4. On the left: map derived from the computation of the slope; on the right: map obtained by computing the profile convexity. Both of them put clearly in evidence the microrelief referable to the layout of buried buildings of Irsi medieval village.

Fig. 5. On the left: the convexity map; in the middle: slope map; on the right: the interpretation of the two maps (superimposed on the slope map)

Fig. 6. On the left: shaded DTM lighted by light source from East, with z=60 and =0; in the middle: the same DTM with the interpretation; on the right: the interpretations performed on the convexity map (see figure 5, right) superimposed on to the image of middle

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The second step consisted just of the shading procedures (following section 3.2.2) of the DTM. The latter has been lighted by four hypothetical light sources with the following values of zenith (z) and azimuth angles (): 1) z=60; =0; 2) z=60; =90; 3) z=60; =180; 4) z=60; =270. The comparative observation of the shaded DTMs put clearly in evidence how dramatically changes the visibility of microrelief, varying the light source direction. Moreover, the visual interpretation of the single shaded DTM (fig. 6-9) highlights several differences in the visualization of microrelief respect to the interpretation performed on the slope map. In particular, the marks surveyed using the shaded DTMs fit the marks detected from the slope and convexity maps according to the following percentage: 55%, 48%, 41%, 44%. Then, the PCA has been calculated, in order to quantitatively reduce the redundancy of hill-shaded LiDAR DTMs and capture the most significant information.

Fig. 7. On the left: shaded DTM lighted by light sources from East, with z=60 and =90; in the middle: the same DTM with the interpretation; on the right: the interpretations performed on the convexity map (see figure 5, right) superimposed on to the image of middle

The interpretation of the four components of the PCA allowed us to increase the number of marks detected compared to those obtained from the single shaded DTM. Moreover, the marks surveyed fit the marks detected from the slope and convexity maps with higher percentages compared to the single shaded DTMs. In particular, the best results were obtained from PC3 and PC4, where the rate of superimposition ranging between 65% and 70 %.

Fig. 8. On the left: shaded DTM lighted by light sources from East, with z=60 and =180; in the middle: the same DTM with the interpretation; on the right: the interpretations performed on the convexity map (see figure 5, right) superimposed on to the image of middle

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Fig. 9. On the left: shaded DTM lighted by light sources from East, with z=60 and =270; in the middle: the same DTM with the interpretation; on the right: the interpretations performed on the convexity map superimposed on to the image of middle

The results obtained on the test area of figures 5-12 pointed out the effectiveness of slope and convexity maps, as well as the usefulness of PC3 and PC4 obtained from shaded DTMs to help the mapping of the archaeological features of Yrsum (see figure 13).

Fig. 10. On the left: PC1; middle: interpretation (with yellow segments), on the right: blue line interpretation from convexity map superimposed on to the yellow line related to PC1 interpretation.

Fig. 11. On the left: PC3; middle: interpretation (with green segments), on the right: blue line interpretation from convexity map superimposed on to the green line related to PC3 interpretation.

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Fig. 12. On the left: PC4; middle: interpretation (with red segments), on the right: blue line interpretation from convexity map superimposed on to the red line related to PC4 interpretation

Fig. 13. Map of Yrsum: mapping of archaeological features with contour lines

5 Conclusions
In this paper, we focus on the approach we adopted to support the data processing of aerial LiDAR survey for archaeological investigations. The processing chain has been devised in order to facilitate the interpretation and mapping of micro-relief linked to archaeological features. Analyses were carried out for the medieval village of Monte Irsi, located on a hilly plateau in the Basilicata Region.

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The procedure included the extraction and interpretation of slope and convexity maps, to extract the microrelief using an automatic approach, which provides the most likely pattern features. The advantage of obtaining automatic and objective archaeological features is coupled with a loss of spatial accuracy due to the computation. To reduce this effect we used the hill-shading of DTMs. Shadow and saturation of the hill-shading technique are reduced via PCA. In order to assess the most significant image in term of information content, we carried out a comparison of the all DTMs and PC with the slope and convexity maps over a subset. This comparison pointed out that PC3 and PC4 seem to provide the most satisfactory results, being that features recognized from PC3 and PC4 fit well with marks obtained from convexity. Finally, convexity along with PC3 and PC4 were assumed as a basis for mapping archaeological features for the whole study area. This approach greatly sharpens the visibility of small-scale and shallow topographic features and synthesize the most relevant information in a single product evaluated by using convexity.

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