Automatic Lighthouse Calibration Using Conics for Indoor Robot Localization
Said Alvarado-Marin, Alexander Abadie, Martina Balbi, Thomas Watteyne, Filip Maksimovic
Abstract: In this letter, we propose a technique for calibrat-
ing Lighthouse localization systems using a single view of two or
more coplanar circles traced by a moving robot. The calibration
method leverages conic algebra to compute the homography
between the Lighthouse view and the world plane, up to
similarity. This approach requires minimal user intervention
and is particularly suited for automatically calibrating large-
scale deployments involving hundreds of mobile robots.
We validate our method using a centimeter-scale differential-
drive robot, utilizing 5 cm circles to calibrate a 2×2m2
area.
The proposed technique achieved a mean positional accuracy
of 7.77 mm, compared to the 5.37 mm accuracy of a previous
calibration method based on manual measurements and known
correspondences. We demonstrate that the conics traced by the
robot are accurate enough for reliable homography estimation,
even under varying conditions of tire material and surface
type. A camera-based motion capture system served as the
ground truth for all experiments. This work represents a
step toward scalable and decentralized lighthouse calibration,
enabling efficient 2D localization in large-scale robotic systems.