by [TC]²
UK National Sizing Survey using 3D Body Scanning
By Philip Treleaven
University College London
ABSTRACT
3D optical body scanners are transforming our ability to conduct major surveys of people's body size and shape. These scanners capture in 1-10 seconds highly accurate 3D body maps, allowing a computer to automatically extract hundreds of measurements from a scan, so eliminating manual measurement and transcription errors, and greatly reducing the cost of surveys and mass screening.
The UK has recently completed its National Sizing Survey (SizeUK) of 11,000 subjects using 3D whole body scanners to automatically extract 130 body measurements from each subject using two stances; standing and seated. This highly accurate size and shape data, together with each subject's 3D point cloud, is held securely in a UK anthropometrics web-database, available for online data mining. SizeUK is a collaboration of the UK Government, major UK retailers, leading academics and technology companies. The retailers were responsible for recruiting subjects to be measured, with subjects being encouraged to register online. The principal UK clothing colleges managed the data collection process; seen as an educational opportunity. The USA scanner company [TC] The principal UK clothing colleges managed the data collection process; seen as an educational opportunity. The USA scanner company [TC]2 developed special size extraction software to automatically extract 130 'SizeUK' measurements from a body scan, reducing manual measuring to 8 measurements, such as height and weight. The UK company, Bodymetrics is hosting the data on a secure, web-database service accessible through proprietary online data analysis tools.
SizeUK's major contributions are: in attempting to largely automate the conducting of sizing surveys, and in constructing a national anthropometrics database; a major national scientific resource.
The UK National Sizing Survey might be termed 'popular science'; raising huge public interest in the United Kingdom and internationally. SizeUK is seen in Europe as a model for conducting sizing surveys, and the European Commission (CEC) and the European Textile Association (EURATEX) are encouraging all Member States to conduct similar national surveys so that a common European sizing designation standard can be developed. In addition, SizeUK is being used as a model for the United States national sizing survey (www.sizeusa.com).
Reprinted by permission
For a copy of the complete article, contact p.treleaven@cs.ucl.ac.uk