The replacement of the rational function model (RFM) by the rigorous sensor model (RSM) has been studied extensively and verified with many types of sensors and remote-sensing applications. However, relatively less research has been conducted on recovering RSM from RFM, and the few relating techniques can only be applied in specific circumstances. This paper proposes a novel linear method to obtain the position, attitude, and interior orientation (IO) elements of satellites based on the orientation information of the rays implied by the RFM. Instead of resection, forward intersection is used to solve for position, and an equivalent body coordinate system is introduced to overcome the strong correlation between the attitude and IO. The orientation information of the rays implied by the RFM is used to calculate the IO pixel by pixel. Experiments using the Ziyuan 3 panchromatic nadir sensor show that this method can recover the exterior orientation and IO elements effectively.