Parallax can significantly affect the apparent location of clouds in satellite imagery, which presents problems for rainfall estimation and other cloud-related applications. As the spatial fields of view of satellite instruments continue to become finer, the parallax errors relative to pixel size will continue to grow.

A basic parallax correction scheme described in Vicente et al. (2001) is part of the routine production of satellite rainfall estimates at the NOAA/NESDIS Center for Satellite Applications and Research and corrects a substantial portion of the parallax errors. However, it assumes a standard vertical profile of temperature and thus is subject to errors as a result of incorrectly assigned cloud-top heights. The parallax correction scheme has been modified to use temperature profiles from a numerical weather model in place of the standard profiles. The performance of both the original and new schemes will be compared.