| 摘要 |
<p>This invention relates to a system and the methods of making custom footwear. A multi-level customization process is employed in the system of the invention. First, shoe last is customized according to the biometric features of the foot. Secondly, the components of the footwear are fine-tuned through a set of interactive measurements for the wearer' needs, while the appearance of the footwear is custom-designed according to the taste of the wearer. Major components of the custom footwear include: a custom upper that best-fits the shape of wearer's foot; a multi-layered custom insole with its surface conforming to the plantar surface of the foot; and a custom sole that sandwiching a heel pad with custom height. The methods for customOmaking of the footwear include: custom last database construction, reverse-engineering for the 3-D foot model, measurement and analysis for foot features, expert system-guided automatic last look-up for the best- fit last, modification and tune-up on the best- fit last, custom- making of shoe upper using the custom last, custom-making of multi-layered insole according to the plantar surface geometry of the foot, making of custom sole, and the integration of custom upper, insole and sole into final custom footwear. In the preferred embodiment, the custom footwear is made through the following process. First, a custom last database is constructed, which stores the geometric features of custom-designed lasts along multiple dimensions. In the last database, one last table corresponds to a footwear style. A reverse- engineering process is used to acquire a 3-D computer model of the foot. The 3- D model of the foot is further measured and analyzed to extract the 3- dimensional features of the foot. In the foot measurement process, not only the foot geometries along last dimensions are measured, but also the 3-D shape and locations of any foot abnormalities are recorded. Automatic last look-up is then carried out according to the extracted foot features, which iterate the last table of the desired style. In this process, fitting indices of all lasts are computed by fitting algorithms derived from a set of rules from an expert system. The fitting indices show the fitting levels between the last features and those of the foot. A best-fit last is chosen from the last database after sorting all the fitting indices of the lasts. The 3-D shape of the best-fit last may further be tuned up and optimized to accommodate any deformities or irregularities of the wearer' s foot. In certain cases, fully customized last would be manufactured if the look-up process is not able to select a best- fit last. Custom upper of the footwear is then made using the finalized custom last. For the insole, a thermal-plastic forming mould is made by Computer Numerical Controlled (CNC) machining process referring to the 3-D shape of the plantar surface of the foot. A multi-layered plate, comprising a layer of shell material, a layer of cushioning material, and a layer of lining material, is then thermal-plastically-formed and trimmed into the custom insole. A custom sole is made by trimming the outlines of the midsole and outsole according to the contour of the bottom of the custom last, and by sandwiching a custom-made heel-pad between the midsole and outsole. Finally, the custom upper, insole, and sole are integrated into the custom footwear, with the colors, materials and other accessories of the footwear customized according to the wearer's preferences.</p> |
