Foot Anthropometry by Digital Photography and the importance of its application in Boot Design

Introduction. The first anthropometric studies have been performed on militaries in the world. These days, different kinds of foot anthropometric studies are done for the purpose of medical goals and design of boots. But there is not any background of foot anthropometry in Iran as widespread and specially. Determination of the foot anthropometric data's for a sample of Iranian men and detection the importance of applying these studies in design of boots. Materials and Methods. In this study, the foot images of 160 Iranian men, with ages ranging from 18 to 25 years old were taken by a digital camera and the values of 8 dimensions of the foot were extracted with Photo Anthropometry software. Finally the results were analyzed by SPSS.Results. The average values, standard deviation, the smallest and largest values, the5th, 50th and 95th percentiles of the 8 dimensions were calculated. For example M± SD for length, width and Biomlleolar Breadth of the foot were obtained 264.66±13.10, 106.84±5.64 and 74.47±4.11 millimeter. The correlation coefficients were found between different dimensions. It was determined that there is significant correlation between 85% of foot dimensions (p<0.05). Conclusion. In this study, the values of important foot dimensions for a sample of Iranian men were obtained that would be useful for design and sizing of the boots in the future. It is recommended that similar studies to be done with considering race, life style and job for the purpose of medical goals and ergonomic designs for militaries.