------Using GIS--

Introduction to GIS

Lecture 16: Spatial Sampling and Interpolation

By Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

How are raster surfaces Made?

Raster surfaces are generally either made:

From remote sensing (covered later) which collects reflectance values at every pixel within the geographic extent and can be classified later on or From sample points whose Z values are Interpolated across space to fill in all the blank areas.

2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

What is interpolation?
Process of creating a surface based on values at isolated sample points. Sample points are locations where we collect data on some phenomenon and record the spatial coordinates

We use mathematical estimation to guess at what the values are in between those points
We can create either a raster or vector interpolated surface Interpolation is used because field data are expensive to collect, and cant be collected everywhere
2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

How does it Look

Let say we have our ground water pollution samples

This gives us

2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

How does it work

This can be displayed as a 3D trend surface in 3D analyst

2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

How does it work

We can also use interpolation methods to create contours

2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Sample points
Also known as control points.

These are points where you or someone else has collected data (attributes) for a spatial coordinate (point)
Any number of attributes can be collected at that point E.g.1 weather stations collect data on temperature, rainfall, wind, humidity, etc.

E.g. 2 soil invertebrate samples would record abundance of numerous species at each location
2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

What isnt interpolation?

Interpolation only works where values are spatially dependant, or spatially autocorrelated, that is, where nearby location tend to have similar Z values. Examples of spatially autocorrelated features: elevation, property value, crime levels, precipitation Non-autocorrelated examples: number of drum sets per city block; cheeseburgers consumed per household.

Where values across a landscape are geographically independent, interpolation does not work because value of (x,y) cannot be used to predict value of (x+1, y+1).
2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Interpolation examples
Elevation:

Source: LUBOS MITAS AND HELENA MITASOVA, University of Illinois

2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Interpolation examples
Elevation:

Elevation values tend to be highly spatially autocorrelated because elevation at location (x,y) is generally a function of the surrounding locations Except is areas where terrain is very abrupt and precipitous, such as Patagonia, or Yosemite
In this case, elevation would not be autocorrelated at local (large) scale, but still may be autocorrelated at regional (small scale)
2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Interpolation examples
Imagine this elevation cross section: If each dashed line represented a sample point (in 1-D), this spacing would miss major local sources of variation, like the gorge

2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Interpolation examples
Our interpolated surface (represented in 1-D by the blue line) would look like this

2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Interpolation examples
If we increased the sampling rate, we would pick up that local variation

2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Interpolation examples
Here our interpolated surface is much closer to reality at the local level, but we pay for this in the form of higher data gathering cost

2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Interpolation examples
Weather

Weather tends to be modeled on a regional level (e.g. your local weather report) because, in most places, weather systems and trends happen over a very large area. Hence the need for sample point density is not so great
In other places, local climate variability is very great, such as in the SF Bay Area where temperatures can vary 50 degrees within 10 miles due to ocean effects.
2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Interpolation examples
Weather

Weather is also extremely variable over time, so samples must be continually taken. This is why weather stations are usually permanent

Example: precipitation varying over a season

Source: LUBOS MITAS AND HELENA MITASOVA, University of Illinois

2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Interpolation examples
Groundwater contamination:

The needed density of points will depend on the geology and the type of terrain
Areas where geology allows for free groundwater flows across large areas will have less local variation and need less dense points, while areas with geologic features that inhibit or redirect flow (e.g. karst topography) will need denser points

2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Where interpolation does not work

Cannot use interpolation where values are not spatially autocorrelated Say looking at household incomein an incomesegregated city, you could take a small sample of households for income and probably interpolate However, in a highly income-integrated city, where a given block has rich and poor, this would not work
2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Sampling
As you can see, the density and spacing of samples depends on many things A key component of any study with spatially referenced field data is the sampling strategy

If the values in your interpolation surface (layer A) depend on some factor in layer B, then we can design our sample of A based on layer B We can do this by conducting a stratified random sample
2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Sampling
Example: lets say want to make an average precipitation layer and we find that in our study zone precipitation is highly spatially variable within 10 miles of the ocean Wed a coastline layer to help us sample. Wed have high density of sampling points within 10 miles of the ocean a much lower density in the inland zones

2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Sampling
Say we were looking at an inland area, far from any ocean, and we decided that precipitation varied with elevation. How would we set up our sampling design? In this case, flat areas would need fewer sample points, while areas of rough topography would need more

In our sampling design we would set up zones, or strata, corresponding to different elevation zones and we would make sure that we get a certain minimum number of samples within each of those zones
This ensures we get a representative sample across, in this case, elevation;
2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Sampling
The number of zones we use will determine how representative our sample is; if zones are big and broad, we do not ensure that all elevation ranges are represented

2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Sampling
The number of samples we want within each zone depends on the statistical certainty with which we want to generate our surface Do we want to be 95% certain that a given pixel is classified right, or 90% or 80%? Our desired confidence level will determine the number of samples we need per strata

This is a tradeoff between cost and statistical certainty

Think of other examples where you could stratify.
2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Sampling
A common problem with sampling points for interpolation is what is not being sampled? Very frequently people leave out sample points that are hard to get to or hard to collect data at

This creates sampling biases and regions whose interpolated values are essentially meaningless
So spacing of sample points from interpolation should be based on some meaningful factorif they are dense in a region in sparse in a region, it should be because the values are variable in the first area and homogeneous in the other
2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Sampling and Scale dependency

Sampling strategy for interpolation depends on the scale at which you are working and the scale dependency of the phenomenon you are studying In many cases interpolation will work to pick up regional trends but lose the local variation in the process The density of sample points must be chosen to reflect the scale of the phenomenon you are measuring.

2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Scale dependency
If you have a high density of sample points, you will capture local variation, which is appropriate for large-scale (small-area) studies If you have low density of sample points, you will lose sensitivity of local variation and capture only the regional variation; this is more appropriate for small-scale (large-area) studies

2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

How does interpolation work

In ArcGIS, to interpolate:

Create or add a point shapefile with some attribute that will be used as a Z value
Click Spatial Analyst>>Interpolate to Raster and then choose the method

2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Inverse Distance Weighting

IDW weights the value of each point by its distance to the cell being analyzed and averages the values. IDW assumes that unknown value is influenced more by nearby than far away points, but we can control how rapid that decay is. Influence diminishes with distance.
To predict a value for any unmeasured location, IDW will use the measured values surrounding the prediction location. Those measured values closest to the prediction location will have more influence on the predicted value than those farther away. It weights the points closer to the prediction location greater than those farther away, hence the name inverse distance weighted. From ArcGIS help
2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Spline Method
Another option for interpolation method

This fits a curve through the sample data assign values to other locations based on their location on the curve
Thin plate splines create a surface that passes through sample points with the least possible change in slope at all points, that is with a minimum curvature surface SPLINE has two types: regularized and tension Tension results in a rougher surface that more closely adheres to abrupt changes in sample points Regularized results in a smoother surface that smoothes out abruptly changing values somewhat
2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Kriging Method
Semivariograms measure the strength of statistical correlation as a function of distance; they quantify spatial autocorrelation Because Kriging is based on the semivariogram, it is probabilistic, while IDW and Spline are deterministic Kriging associates some probability with each prediction, hence it provides not just a surface, but some measure of the accuracy of that surface Kriging equations are determined by fitting line through points so as to minimize weighted sum of squares between points and line These equations are weighted based on spatial autocorrelation, which is determined from the semivariograms
2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Example
Here are some sample elevation points from which surfaces were derived using the three methods

2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Example: Spline
Note how smooth the curves of the terrain are; this is because Spline is fitting a simply polynomial equation through the points

2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Example: IDW
Done with P =2. Notice how it is not as smooth as Spline. This is because of the weighting function introduced through P

2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Example: Kriging
This one is kind of in betweenbecause it fits an equation through point, but weights it based on probabilities

2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Other methods of interpolation

Thiessen polygons

This method builds polygons, rather than a raster surface, from control points
grows polygons around sample points that are supposed to represent areas of homogeneity

Source: Jens-Ulrich Nomme http://www.tu-harburg.de/sb3/pssd/GISMethods/thiessen.html

2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Density Functions
We can also use sample points to map out density raster surfaces. This need to require a z value in each, it can simply be based on the abundance and distribution of points.

2005 Austin Troy

Introduction to GIS

Density Functions
These settings would give us a raster density surface, based just on the abundance of points within a kernel or data frame. In this case, a z value for each point is not necessary.

2005 Austin Troy