UAV Mapping of an Archaeological Site Using RGB and NIR High-Resolution Data

During the last decade, remote sensing methods have developed significantly. The technological progress in development of new sensors and techniques opened up a large scope of new applications including near-field data collecting using Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs). State-of-the-art UAV technologies provide advantages including cost-effectiveness and temporal flexibility. For our case study, we acquired the high-resolution UAV data over the archaeological site near Černouček, the Czech Republic. This site was discovered at the beginning of 1990s as a result of low altitude aerial reconnaissance carried out by the Institute of Archaeology, Czech Academy of Sciences. Two ditched enclosures were identified due to vegetation marks in late spring and early summer, as higher moisture and presence of some chemical constituents in the secondary infill of the ditches give better conditions for plants above them. In 2017, new UAV data (Red, Green and Blue: RGB and Red and Near-infrared data: Red + NIR) were acquired over the Černouček site in June to find out whether there are some other objects hidden under ground. Using the RGB data digital elevation models were derived while the Red + NIR data were used to compute vegetation indices (VI), further spatial filtering allowing enhancing the local anomalies in the VI values was employed. As a result, several small objects were detected and suggested for the further investigations