The thumb carpometacarpal (CMC) joint is one of the most likely joints to develop osteoarthritis (OA). If conservative treatments fail to alleviate symptoms, surgery may be pursued. Kinematic outcomes of CMC surgery have been described, but current tools have limitations in capturing motion abilities. The goals of this study were to develop a new and robust set of kinematic outcome measures, apply them to a cohort of younger and older control individuals without CMC OA to determine age and sex related changes, and a cohort of participants with CMC OA before, 3 and 6-months after undergoing thumb ligament reconstruction with tendon interposition surgery. 52 control and 18 surgical participants were tested. Kinematics were investigated using motion capture by mapping the 3-dimensional motion space of the whole thumb, and 2-dimensional motion boundaries of the metacarpal and proximal phalange. Visual analog pain score was recorded. Older control participants had shifted regions of motion compared to younger participants (p=0.027), suggesting asymptomatic CMC wear. Control females had 31% more metacarpophalangeal motion than control males (p=0.013), which could alter loading paths through the CMC joint and increase OA risk. Pain at 6-months post-surgery was 72% less than pre-surgery (p<0.001), but motion abilities were 20-28% less than pre-surgery (p=0.074) and 24-40% less than control participants (p=0.066). These techniques have the possibility of identifying pre-symptomatic motion changes, including those at the metacarpophalangeal joint in CMC OA progression.