Flying device, method of controlling flying device, and storage medium

A method to be performed by a processor in a flying device for controlling the flying device, the flying device further including a propulsion unit and a sensor unit that detects at least a current position and a current velocity of the flying device, the processor in the flying device being configured to:

• receive a target position and calculate or receive a target velocity corresponding to the target position:
• perform a velocity feedback control in which the current velocity is taken as a process variable and the target velocity is taken as a setpoint so as to generate a velocity-feedback manipulated variable for controlling the propulsion unit, and
• perform a position feedback control in which the current position is taken as a process variable and the target position is taken as a setpoint so as to generate a position-feedback manipulated variable for controlling the propulsion unit,
• the method comprising:
• in at least a prescribed distance range of the flying device with respect to the target position, causing the processor to calculate a weighted average of the velocity-feedback manipulated variable and the position-feedback manipulated variable;
• and
• controlling the proposition unit in accordance with the weighted averaged manipulated variable, thereby performing velocity-position hybrid feedback control, and
• wherein in said at least the prescribed distance range, the larger a current distance of the current position of the flying device from the target position is, the more weight the processor assigns to the velocity-feedback manipulated variable in the weighted average, and the smaller the current distance becomes, the more weight the processor assigns to the position-feedback manipulated variable in the weighted average, so that as the flying device approaches the target position, the position feedback control becomes more dominant relative to the velocity feedback control.

A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium having stored thereon a program executable by a processor in a flying device that further includes a propulsion unit and sensor unit that detects at least a current position and a current velocity of the flying device, the program configuring the processor to:

• receive a target position and calculate or receive a target velocity corresponding to the target position,
• perform a velocity feedback control in which the current velocity is taken as a process variable and the target velocity is taken as a setpoint so as to generate a velocity-feedback manipulated variable for controlling the propulsion unit, and
• perform a position feedback control in which the current position is taken as a process variable and the target position is taken as a setpoint so as to generate a position-feedback manipulated variable for controlling the propulsion unit,
• wherein in at least a prescribed distance range of the flying device with respect to the target position, the program causes the processor to calculate a weighted average of the velocity-feedback manipulated variable and the position-feedback manipulated variable and control the proposition unit in accordance with the weighted averaged manipulated variable, thereby performing velocity-position hybrid feedback control, and
• wherein in said at least the prescribed distance range, the larger a current distance of the current position of the flying device from the target position is, the more weight the processor assigns to the velocity-feedback manipulated variable in the weighted average, and the smaller the current distance becomes, the more weight the processor assigns to the position-feedback manipulated variable in the weighted average, so that as the flying device approaches the target position, the position feedback control becomes more dominant relative to the velocity feedback control.