February 19, 1996

Clothes That Are Cut to Fit

Shoppers who are in between sizes or find that their clothes never fit them might have an easier time with a new system that attempts to measure precise body dimensions to produce custom clothes.

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Scanning

Wearing a body suit or underwear, a person is scanned using ordinary light.

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Generating a profile

The person stands in front of a banded light source. There are six cameras which read the alternating bands of light and dark from four different angles. The curves provide data on height and width, but not on depth.

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Estimating depth

Using software, computers can extrapolate the person's depth, or thickness, using data from the different views.

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Making clothes

The three-dimensional information is mapped directly onto a cutting pattern that customizes standard patterns for the individual.

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