Bioinspired Bearing Only Motion Camouflage UAV Guidance for Covert Video Surveillance of a Moving Target

The paper focuses on video monitoring of a moving ground target using an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV). The aim is to navigate the UAV so that it is able to monitor the target while concealing its apparent motion in respect to the target’s visual system. A computationally simple sliding mode closed-loop control algorithm mimicking motion camouflage stealth behavior observed in some attacking animals is developed. The proposed guidance law is based on bearing only measurements and does not require any information on the targets’ velocity and the distance to the target. Simulations are conducted to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method.