Measurement protocol of women's nude breasts using a 3D scanning technique.

It has been difficult to obtain accurate surface data for women's breasts, since the borderline of the breast is ambiguous at the skin surface. In this paper, we scanned 37 women's nude breasts using 3D phase shifting moiré and explored a measurement protocol to get a reliable boundary of the breast and thereby provided new shape parameters for breasts. The folding line method was useful for finding a continuous and natural boundary for the breasts, so that the breasts base and volume could be measured more accurately. The global average radius of the curvature of the bottom breast line was suggested as a useful shape parameter for the design of a comfortable and form-fitting brassiere, especially for those who have a skewed bottom breast curve. It is also expected that data on breast volume based on natural anatomy would be a useful reference for surgical operation on the breast. Copyright 2004 Elsevier Ltd.