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Laboratory calibration of star sensor with installation error using a nonlinear distortion model

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Abstract

The high-precise star sensor calibration method requires high-accurate turntable, collimator, star point plate or other high-precision devices that are very expensive. We present a simple and available method to calibrate the principal point, focal length, radial distortion, tangential distortion and installation error of star sensor in laboratory, and without having high accurate or expensive devices. The calibration model takes the ordinary camera calibration methods and installation error into account. The installation error is modeled by combination of three typical effects: the installation of pan-tilt-zoom (PTZ) initial status, PTZ and charge-coupled device, which result in six parameters. The proposed procedure consists of a closed-form solution, followed by a nonlinear refining based on maximum likelihood criterion. Our calibration method is validated through simulation and real data that shows the superiority with respect to the traditional methods and has the same level as the state-of-the-art methods. The accuracy of our calibration method is 0.015° in the root of mean square distances between testing points and projected ones.

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Acknowledgments

The author wishes to express her appreciation to the reviewers for their suggestion on improving this paper. This work is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant Nos. 61273279.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute for Pattern Recognition and Artificial Intelligence, Huazhong University of Science and Technology (HUST), Wuhan, 430074, Hubei, People’s Republic of China

    Yunting Li, Jun Zhang, Wenwen Hu & Jinwen Tian

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  1. Yunting Li
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  2. Jun Zhang
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  3. Wenwen Hu
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Correspondence to Jun Zhang.

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Li, Y., Zhang, J., Hu, W. et al. Laboratory calibration of star sensor with installation error using a nonlinear distortion model. Appl. Phys. B 115, 561–570 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00340-013-5637-5

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