Properties of central catadioptric circle images and camera calibration

Abstract

Camera calibration based on circle images has unparalleled advantages in many fields. However, due to the large distortion, catadioptric camera calibration from circles remains a challenging and open problem. Under central catadioptric camera, circles in a scene are projected to quartic curves on the image plane. Except for the sufficient and necessary conditions that must be satisfied by paracatadioptric circle image, the properties of the antipodal image points and the absolute conic are both very important for catadioptric camera calibration. In this paper, we study the properties of the antipodal image points on paracatadioptric circle image, that is the criterion conditions for the antipodal image points on circle image. What’s more, we show the image of the absolute conic, and derive the constraint equations about the intrinsic parameters of central catadioptric camera. Finally, we discuss on the central catadioptric camera calibration using circle images.