Distributed Calibration of a Camera Sensor Network

Abstract

The thesis proposes algorithms to perform distributed calibration of a camera sensor network. Unlike other calibration techniques which involve non-linear computations, we propose simple techniques which can be implemented on low power processors. The concept of pin-hole camera model and generation of a reference coordinate system that are used in this thesis, were inspired from some existing work. A cooperative friendly target equipped with a dead reckoning position sensor, moves around in the environment and communicates its coordinate information at three distinct locations in the field of view of a camera sensor node. The sensor node uses the concept of slope angle of a straight line to solve for its location and orientation. This method does not require any initial guesses to calculate the external parameters of a camera. The correctness of the method was verified experimentally and its scalability for a large scale sensor network was validated through simulation.