In this paper, a new calibration method for mechano-luminescence (ML) thin film sensors was proposed to enable quantitative full-field strain measurements in pixel-level resolution for the first time along with two standard reference test methods. The proposed method has a distinct advantage of its facet-free full-field strain sensing capability with pixel-level resolution. For the ML sensor, standard reference test methods were proposed for developing calibrated relationships between ML light intensity and effective strains: (1) uniaxial tensile reference test and (2) non-uniform strain reference test. From the reference tests, two different calibration models were developed in a recurrence equation form and validated measuring general strain distributions on different experimental specimens. Verified finite element (FE) simulation results were compared with ML effective strains to confirm its accuracy. The comparisons of the ML effective strains with FE simulation results showed that the calibration models can acceptably measure full-field strains. Limitations, sources of errors, suggestions for improving accuracy and practical considerations were also discussed. A conclusion of this research is that the proposed method enables ML sensing films to measure quantitative full-field strain distributions.