Gait Capture Systems

Abstract

Motion analysis systems are widely used around the world for many purposes ranging from modeling, sport performance analysis, simulation, gait analysis and more, therefore, it is conceivable to imagine a wide arrange of systems designed for the sole purpose of studying motion. In this article we evaluate the state of the art of 5 different companies (Vicon, MotionAnalysis, Optitrack, Qualisys, Codamotion) that offer very robust and costly motion systems for the aforementioned use modalities making a comparison between, we also recommend a more cost-efficient system built with wearable devices such as portable Inertial Measurement Units (IMU) which are sensors created by The Witmotion company, this system was specifically thought to be used in gait analysis. We also present the implementation of the previously mentioned sensors within our motion capture system that was programmed using the visual programming platform for multimedia interactive applications Max 7. The system was tested by obtaining data from subjects with normal gait being compared to the profiles of subjects with normal gait found in the literature validating our system as a low cost gait analysis alternative.