Child body shape measurement using depth cameras and a statistical body shape model

• Published in: Ergonomics Vol. 58; no. 2; pp. 301 - 309
• Main Authors: Park, Byoung-Keon, Lumeng, Julie C., Lumeng, Carey N., Ebert, Sheila M., Reed, Matthew P.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: England Taylor & Francis 01.02.2015; Taylor & Francis LLC
• Subjects: Anthropometry; Anthropometry - instrumentation; Anthropometry - methods; Avatars; Body Size; Cameras; Child; child body shape measurement; Child, Preschool; Children & youth; depth camera; Dimensional measurements; Ergonomics; Female; Fittings; Human body; Humans; Imaging, Three-Dimensional - instrumentation; Imaging, Three-Dimensional - methods; Lasers; Male; Mathematical models; Measurement; Models, Statistical; Photography - instrumentation; Photography - methods; Principal Component Analysis; Principal components analysis; statistical body shape model; surface fitting; Torso; statistical body shape model; depth camera; anthropometry; child body shape measurement; surface fitting
• ISSN: 0014-0139; 1366-5847; 1366-5847
• DOI: 10.1080/00140139.2014.965754

We present a new method for rapidly measuring child body shapes from noisy, incomplete data captured from low-cost depth cameras. This method fits the data using a statistical body shape model (SBSM) to find a complete avatar in the realistic body shape space. The method also predicts a set of standard anthropometric data for a specific subject without measuring dimensions directly from the fitted model. Since the SBSM was developed using principal component (PC) analysis, we formulate an optimisation problem to fit the model in which the degrees of freedom are defined in PC-score space. The mean unsigned distance between the fitted-model based on depth-camera data and the high-resolution laser scan data was 9.4 mm with a standard deviation (SD) of 5.1 mm. For the torso, the mean distance was 2.9 mm (SD 1.4 mm). The correlations between standard anthropometric dimensions predicted by the SBSM and manually measured dimensions exceeded 0.9. Practitioner Summary: Rapid and robust body shape measurement is beneficial for tracking child body shapes and anthropometric changes. A custom avatar generated by rapidly fitting a statistical body shape model to noisy scan data showed the potential for good accuracy in measuring child body shape.