ABSTRACT
A thorough understanding of the human gait cycle is a fundamental prerequisite for anyone intending to undertake forensic gait analysis, and useful knowledge for those involved in its commissioning and application. Human locomotion is usually based on walking, which is a process involving two legs alternately providing support and propulsion of the body in space, with at least one lower limb remaining in contact with the ground at all times. The gait cycle is defined as the time between two successive occurrences of one of the repetitive events involved in walking. It is usually determined as the period from initial contact of the foot with the ground to the next initial contact of the same foot. Speed of gait can be measured by timing a person when walking a defined or known distance between landmarks. Observational gait analysis is the acquisition of kinematic information about the gait of a person from visual observations.
