Accuracy of inertial motion sensors in static, quasistatic, and complex dynamic motion
Abstract
Inertial motion sensors (IMSs) combine three sensors to produce a reportedly stable and accurate orientation estimate in three dimensions. Although accuracy has been reported within the range of 2 deg of error by manufacturers, the sensors are rarely tested in the challenging motion present in human motion. Their accuracy was tested in static, quasistatic, and dynamic situations against gold-standard Vicon camera data. It was found that static and quasistatic rms error was even less than manufacturers' technical specifications. Quasistatic rms error was minimal at 0.3 deg (+/-0.15 deg SD) on the roll axis, 0.29 deg (+/-0.20 deg SD) on the pitch axis, and 0.73 deg (+/-0.81 deg SD) on the yaw axis. The dynamic rms error was between 1.9 deg and 3.5 deg on the main axes of motion but it increased considerably on off-axis during planar pendulum motion. Complex arm motion in the forward reaching plane proved to be a greater challenge for the sensors to track but results are arguably better than previously reported studies considering the large range of motion used.
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Neck RMSE results varied between less than 1° and 9°, showing good joint measurement validity.
“RMSE results varied between less than 1° and 9°, showing good joint measurement validity [33,34,37,40,41].”
From Validity and Reliability of Wearable Sensors for Joint Angle Estimation: A Systematic Review (2019) · cites this paper as [34]
Trunk validity was similar across all movement planes and axes.
“Validity was similar across all movement planes and axes [34,36,37,38,41,46,47,48,49,50,51].”
From Validity and Reliability of Wearable Sensors for Joint Angle Estimation: A Systematic Review (2019) · cites this paper as [34]
Studies reporting the worst validity assessed sporting tasks or activities of daily living such as sweeping a table.
“For example, studies reporting the worst validity assessed sporting tasks or activities of daily living such as sweeping a table [32,34].”
From Validity and Reliability of Wearable Sensors for Joint Angle Estimation: A Systematic Review (2019) · cites this paper as [34]
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- Authors
- Godwin, A., Agnew, M., & Stevenson, J.
- Affiliations
- Laurentian University (CA)
- Virginia Tech (US)
- Queen's University (CA)
- ORCID
- Godwin, Alison
- Venue
- Journal of Biomechanical Engineering
- Publisher
- ASME International
- Published
- 2009-10-16
- Volume
- 131
- Issue
- 11
- Pages
- 114501-114501
- ISSN
- 0148-0731 (ISSN-L)
- 1528-8951
- OpenAlex
- W1986624256
- Cited by
- 107
- References
- 20
- Citations by year
- 2026: 3 · 2025: 6 · 2024: 3 · 2023: 3 · 2022: 7 · 2021: 8 · 2020: 10 · 2019: 11 · 2018: 8 · 2017: 7 · 2016: 11 · 2015: 6 · 2014: 9 · 2013: 6 · 2012: 6
- FWCI
- 5.82
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Journal of Biomechanical Engineering (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- Workplace Safety and Insurance Board
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Engineering › Aerospace Engineering › Inertial Sensor and Navigation
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition › Context-Aware Activity Recognition Systems
- Physical Sciences › Engineering › Biomedical Engineering › Sports Dynamics and Biomechanics
- Keywords
- inertial motion sensors, orientation accuracy, dynamic motion, human motion tracking
- MeSH terms
- Humans, Motion, Range of Motion, Articular
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