Estimating costs and performance of systems for machine processing of remotely sensed data

This paper outlines a method for estimating computer processing times and costs incurred in producing information products from digital remotely sensed data. The method accounts for both computation and overhead, and may be applied to any serial computer. The method is applied to estimate the cost and computer time involved in producing Level II Land Use and Vegetative Cover Maps for a five-state midwestern region. The results show that the amount of data to be processed overloads some example computer systems, but that the processing is feasible on others.