On the Issue of Camera Calibration with Narrow Angular Field of View

This paper considers the issue of calibrating a camera with narrow angular field of view using standard, perspective methods in computer vision. In doing so, the significance of perspective distortion both for camera calibration and for pose estimation is revealed. Since narrow angular field of view cameras make it difficult to obtain rich images in terms of perspectivity, the accuracy of the calibration results is expectedly low. From this, we propose an alternative method that compensates for this loss by utilizing the pose readings of a robotic manipulator. It facilitates accurate pose estimation by nonlinear optimization, minimizing reprojection errors and errors in the manipulator transformations at the same time. Accurate pose estimation in turn enables accurate parametrization of a perspective camera.