Recently, various cameras have been embedded in vehicles for driver safety and convenience. In this context, a backup rear-view camera has attracted increasing attention in helping drivers' parking convenience. Preinstallation of a rear-view camera requires the calibration of a wide-angle lens, such as a fish-eye lens, and the registration of guidelines to the three-dimensional (3D) scene. The proposed method provides a novel simulation method for the optical distortion of a wide-angle lens in a vehicle rear-view camera. The proposed method consists of three steps: (i) generation of the 3D virtual space, (ii) field number-based viewing angle estimation, and (iii) distorted image generation in the 3D space. The major contribution of this work is the lens specification-based simulation of 3D distortion for accurate and efficient preinstallation of vehicle rear-view cameras. The proposed simulation method can also be used to design a general optical imaging system for intelligent surveillance and medical imaging.