A cinematic study of the distribution of pressure in the human foot

The divergence of opinion among anatomists and clinicians concerning the functional significance of the various structural elements of the human foot suggests the desirability of more accurate knowledge concerning the method by which the foot functions. Various attempts have been made at studying the distribution of pressure in the foot. The first recorded attempt is that of Beely, in 1882. Beely had his subjects step on a thin sack filled with plaster of Paris. He thought that those portions of the foot carrying the greatest weight would make the deepest impressions. Variations of this method were employed at the turn of the century by Griitzner, Seitz and Muskat. Momburg, in 1908, simplified the technique by spading a portion of his garden, pulverizing the soil and then moistening it. The difficulty with this type of method is that it measures chiefly the shape of the foot, not the pressure. More accurate methods have been devised recently. Abramson, in 1926, spread steel shot over a hard surface, placed a lead plate over the shot, and invited his subjects to stand on the lead plate. The depth to which the shot penetrated the plate was a measure of the weight carried by the parts of the foot. Forstell, in 1925, suspended a wire net over an ink pad. The subject stood on a paper placed on the wire net; the elasticity of the net allowed the parts of the foot bearing the greatest weight to bear more largely on the ink pad. Basler ( '26) built an ingenious harp-like machine, in which the ten-