Multispectral (MS) imagery provides information about the reflective properties of features in various wavelengths. In an MS image, more than one band or channel contains information about a specific wavelength range. Therefore, the image data can provide details about the reflectance of a particular feature in each band, at any given pixel. MS imagery is useful because of its high spectral resolution.
Panchromatic (PAN) imagery is a single-band image that represents one large band of wavelengths in a single channel. PAN imagery is often very useful because of its high spatial resolution.
While both data sets offer valuable information on their own, an optimal approach is to have a data set with a high spectral resolution (multiple bands) and high spatial resolution (high-resolution imagery); this is known as pansharpening. Pansharpening combines the benefits of both types of imagery to produce a single output image characterized by the high spectral resolution of the MS image and the high spatial resolution of the PAN imagery .
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