Abstract
Classification of body form is needed to design an industrial product that fits to human body shape. The conventional methods using principal component analysis or cluster analysis do not provide enough information for designing product shape. In the present study, a new method is proposed to analyze human body shape. By the procedure that each point of data of an individual body anatomically corresponds to that of another individual body, a human body shape is automatically deformed to coincide with another body shape using the Free Form Deformation method. The inter-individual distance is defined by using the FFD deformation function. The obtained deformation function can also be applied to a product shape. For example, 3D foot shapes of 17 adult females are analyzed using the present method. The distance matrix is analyzed by multidimensional scaling. The variation of foot shape is well described by the two principal axes contrasting the narrow-wide difference and the flat foot-high arched foot variation. The FFD deformation function from a foot of average width into a very wide foot is applied to a shoe last of average width. The obtained last reflects the differences in proportion between the narrow and wide feet of the same foot length better than the existing wide last.
