Variation of soil surface image brightness in the function of the solar zenith angle and the atmosphere state, described by its optical thickness for chosen wavelength of 850 nm, is examined in this paper. The issue is discussed on examples of four surfaces: two uncultivated desert, the relatively smooth silty and the very rough rocky, as well as the two cultivated, with randomly dispersed soil aggregates and their directional distribution with the furrow microrelief. Data generated by the model predicting the hemispherical-directional reflectance from the surfaces mentioned above were used in this paper. The data for the surfaces in the given illumination conditions are presented in the form of this reflectance distributions for all the possible directions, normalised to the nadir. Discussion about practical applications of the non-Lambertian behaviour of soil surfaces to obtain more detailed and reliable information of the surface properties using remote sensing finalizes the paper.

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