An image forming apparatus that includes an image forming unit that forms an image on a transfer medium, a conveying unit that conveys the transfer medium, a first image detection unit that detects the image formed by the image forming unit on the transfer medium; and a control unit that controls the forming of the image and the conveying of the transfer medium, and receives detection results from the first image detection unit and a second image detection unit, wherein the control unit determines whether the image detected by the first image detection unit has image quality higher than or equal to predetermined quality and calibrates the first image detection unit based on the detection result from the first image detection unit and the detection result from the second image detection unit for the image having the image quality higher than or equal to predetermined quality.