Comparative analysis of x-band SAR polarizations for VHR SAR to optical image translation using conditional BBDM

SAR image interpretation requires expertise. A lot of SAR to optical research studies have been conducted to assist SAR image interpretation. However, existing studies have arbitrarily selected the polarizations of SAR data to be translated. This study explores SAR polarization combinations for Very-High-Resolution (VHR) SAR to optical conversion. Through comprehensive quantitative and qualitative analysis of experiments and results, we find the optimal SAR polarization combination for each SAR configuration. We used multiple image quality metrics including PSNR, SSIM, LPIPS, and FID for thorough quantitative analysis. We also propose a modified conditional Brownian Bridge Diffusion Model (BBDM) that can leverage all four polarizations of Quad polarization configured SAR. This study provides evidence for which polarization combinations should be selected in future SAR to optical research according to the polarization configuration of the SAR system.