gdal_translate GeoTIFF to KMZ results in transparent image

Question

I know this has been asked before but I have tried just about every post I've found and nothing seems to work. I have a GeoTIFF where areas outside the dataset have been set to nodata

When I open the GeoTIFF in QGIS the nodata areas are transparent

I tried:

gdal_translate -of KMLSUPEROVERLAY LVIS2_ABoVE2017_0706_R1803_075811.tif  alpha.kml

But that resulted in all my NoData areas showing up black

Then I tried:

gdal_translate -of KMLSUPEROVERLAY -a_nodata 0 alpha.tif alpha.kml -co format=png

As I understand JPEG does not support transparent background so I should use PNG. But that resulted in no image at all (still zooms to the correct location)

The closest I could get was:

gdalwarp -srcnodata 0 -dstalpha LVIS2_ABoVE2017_0706_R1803_075811.tif LVIS_alpha.tif

Which did eliminate the black background in when I opened in ArcMap but resulted in a blank KMZ again when I tried gdal_translate

I also tried the -ot Byte thinking maybe its due to being Float32 but that didn't seem to work either

gdalinfo output:

Size is 2488, 2488
Coordinate System is:
GEOGCS["WGS 84",
    DATUM["WGS_1984",
        SPHEROID["WGS 84",6378137,298.257223563,
            AUTHORITY["EPSG","7030"]],
        AUTHORITY["EPSG","6326"]],
    PRIMEM["Greenwich",0],
    UNIT["degree",0.0174532925199433],
    AUTHORITY["EPSG","4326"]]
Origin = (211.588427999999965,64.714126000000007)
Pixel Size = (0.000100000000000,-0.000100000000000)
Metadata:
  AREA_OR_POINT=Area
Image Structure Metadata:
  INTERLEAVE=BAND
Corner Coordinates:
Upper Left  (     211.588,      64.714) (211d35'18.34"E, 64d42'50.85"N)
Lower Left  (     211.588,      64.465) (211d35'18.34"E, 64d27'55.17"N)
Upper Right (     211.837,      64.714) (211d50'14.02"E, 64d42'50.85"N)
Lower Right (     211.837,      64.465) (211d50'14.02"E, 64d27'55.17"N)
Center      (     211.713,      64.590) (211d42'46.18"E, 64d35'23.01"N)
Band 1 Block=2488x1 Type=Float32, ColorInterp=Gray
  Min=130.450 Max=313.650
  Minimum=130.450, Maximum=313.650, Mean=162.552, StdDev=50.426
  Overviews: 1244x1244, 622x622, 311x311, 156x156
  Metadata:
    STATISTICS_MAXIMUM=313.64999389648
    STATISTICS_MEAN=162.55166902341
    STATISTICS_MINIMUM=130.44999694824
    STATISTICS_STDDEV=50.425973702069

What could the problem be?

UPDATE: I tried setting the NoData value as I read on some posts:

  Min=130.450 Max=313.650 
  Minimum=130.450, Maximum=313.650, Mean=162.552, StdDev=50.426
  NoData Value=0
  Metadata:
    STATISTICS_MAXIMUM=313.64999389648
    STATISTICS_MEAN=162.55166902341
    STATISTICS_MINIMUM=130.44999694824
    STATISTICS_STDDEV=50.425973702069

Also tried:

gdalbuildvrt $VRT $inFile -addalpha  
gdal_translate -scale -ot Byte -mask 2 $VRT $outTIFF

and I found that when I opened the bands individually in ArcMap, -addalpha is masking the entire image. If I just open band 1 then everything views fine and it scaled properly to 0-255.

EDIT2:

I tried:

gdal_translate $inFile $out -a_nodata 0
gdalbuildvrt $VRT $inFile -srcnodata 0
gdal_translate -scale -ot Byte $VRT $TIFF

and this appears to work. I opened the resulting tiff in ArcMap and it looked like this.

However when I do:

gdal_translate -of KMLSUPEROVERLAY $TIFF $KML

the resulting KML is blank. It has an extent but nothing else and the file size is only 1KB.

What could be causing this?

Answer 1

With some help from user2856s answer I figured it out. Like he said first I needed to scale down to 0-255 before converting to Byte.

Then the issue was I was not exporting the KML along with the tiles... silly mistake. I just put the kml in a folder with all the tiles.

Hopefully this answer helps someone else.