An optical imaging system and method for use in a degraded visual environment is provided. A wideband modulated laser pulse is transmitted from a first location through a medium toward a target object. An input of the transmitted wideband modulated laser pulse is detected by an optical receiver. A target modulated laser pulse, reflected from the target object is detected by the optical receiver. The transmitted and reflected laser pulses are filtered by a bandpass filter, based on a predetermined modulated frequency range. The filtered transmitted and reflected laser pulses are digitized by an analog-digital converter. The digitized transmitted laser pulse is correlated with digitized reflected laser pulse by a digital matched filter, wherein the matched filter produces a passband matched filter output. A range of the target object is determined based on the matched filter output.