What is camera calibration?

Camera calibration is the process of estimating the intrinsic parameters (e.g., focal length, principal point, lens distortion coefficients) and/or extrinsic parameters (position and orientation) of a camera. It's essential for accurate 3D reconstruction, augmented reality, robotics, and computer vision applications where precise spatial measurements or alignment between the camera image and the real world are required. It's commonly used to correct for lens distortions, determine the camera's field of view, and relate pixel coordinates to real-world coordinates.