Frequency Space Representation and Transitions of Quadruped Robot Gaits

The locomotion of a quadruped robot was examined with the emphasis on the creation, optimization and merging of motions and gaits. A Fourier Series Expansion was performed on the controller commands used in the robot gait. It was found that omitting higher order terms has very little, at times even positive effect on the robot’s performance yet yields a greatly reduced parameter set describing the motion. The parameter reduction is desirable for creating, optimizing and adapting motions. Furthermore, the acquired frequency space representation allows for simple creation of new motions by merging of existing ones and also for creating transitions from one type of motion to another.