Does anyone know of an affordable COTS drone one could try this out with? I’m very interested in the intersection of machine learning and control theory.
For anyone who might want to buy that - it’s a horrible craft to use for anything but in a lab environment set up with a motion tracking system (you won’t be able to do indoor navigation using just the IMU and barometer) - using PCB as frame is not good for flight performance or durability. Any whoop would fly much better.
Author of the referenced work here. I have to disagree with this, at least with the motion tracking system part. The optical flow deck [1] works like magic and can maintain low drift positioning even when doing relatively fast and agile maneuvres.
For an example you can have a look at our video [2] (e.g. the disturbance rejection tests at 3:00 and after are solely using the optical flow deck)
Awesome work! Can you share the titles of some of your favorite books or courses in controls and RL (for controls) that helped you in doing this project?