C-3PO: Cyclic-Three-Phase Optimization for Human-Robot Motion Retargeting based on Reinforcement Learning

Abstract

Motion retargeting between heterogeneous polymorphs with different sizes and kinematic configurations requires a comprehensive knowledge of kinematics and inverse kinematics. Moreover, it is non-trivial to provide a kinematic independent general solution. In this study, we developed a cyclic three-phase optimization method based on deep reinforcement learning for human-robot motion retargeting. The motion retargeting and reward calculations were performed using refined data in a latent space by the cyclic and filtering paths of our method. In addition, the human-in-the-loop based threephase approach provides a framework for the improvement of the motion retargeting policy by both quantitative and qualitative manners. Using the proposed C-3PO method, we were successfully able to learn the motion retargeting skill between the human skeleton and the real NAO, Pepper, Baxter and C-3PO robot motions.