* Band Number 1,2,3 designations were for an entirely different instrument: the RBV (Return Beam Vidicon).
** Water penetration depends on many factors such as water clarity, atmospheric conditions, sun angle, nature of the water bottom. This table shows rough guidelines for excellent penetration conditions in typical Canadian waters.

With increased sediment load in marine waters, the brightness of the satellite pixels increases and the colouring changes too - the peak brightness shifts slightly to longer wavelengths. This and other changes among water features are subtle, making analysts stretch the limits of remote sensing analysis methods. One of the main issues in dealing with quantitative water quality analysis is atmospheric conditions. Even without cloud cover, the changes in general atmospheric haze is strong enough to influence the very low reflectivity measurements over water. Thus, direct water sampling, in order to 'calibrate' the measurements made on an image must be done in synchrony with the satellite image acquisition, and are only valid for that one image, since the atmospheric conditions will likely be different for another image. In fact, extrapolating from one part of an image to another part is also highly prone to error due to haze variability within any one image.