In-field absolute calibration of ground and airborne VIS-NIR-SWIR hyperspectral point spectrometers

Spectrometer calibration and measurements of spectral radiance are often required when performing ground, aerial, and space measurements. While calibrating a spectrometer in the field using an integrating sphere is practically unachievable, calibration against a quartz halogen (QH) lamp is a quite easy and feasible option. We describe a calibration protocol whereby a professional QH lamp, operating with a stabilized current source, is first calibrated in the laboratory against a US National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) traceable integrating sphere and, then, used for the field calibration of a spectrometer before a ground or airborne campaign. Another advantage of the lamp over the integrating sphere is its ability to create a continuous calibration curve at the spectrometer resolution, while the integrating sphere is calibrated only for a few discrete wavelengths. A calibrated lamp could also be used for a secondary continuous calibration of an un-calibrated integrating sphere.