632 KB0 KB200020242009Courtois, FrancisFaessel, Matthieuletnik:28številka:39 stranistr. 195-203ISSN:1580-3139COBISSID:26424793URN:URN:NBN:SI:doc-NWPN7RZ8enDruštvo za stereologijo in kvantitativno analizo slike, Medicinska fakultetaImage analysis and stereologyločljivostmatematična morfologijarižsegmentacijavelikost delcevTouching grain kernels separation by gap-filling|Separation of touching grain kernels is a recurring problem in image analysis.Morphological methods to separate merged objects in binary images aregenerally based on the watershed transform applied to the inverse of the distance function. This method is efficient with roughly circular objects, butcannot separate objects beyond a certain elliptic shape nor when the contact zones are too numerous or too large. This paper presents a gap-fillingmethod applied to the skeleton of the image background as an alternative technique to go further in the fused objects separation process. Open lines resulting from skeletonization are prolonged according to their direction from corresponding end points. If the distance between two lines is smaller than a certain value, their respective end points are connected. Results of combined use of watershed and gap-filling based methods are presented on sample binary images. An example of its use on an particularly complex image containing rice grains shows that it allows to segment up to 90%of the grains when classical watershed methods allow only to segment 25% ofthe grains. An application to breakage and cracks assessing of parboiled rice kernels is presentedTEXTznanstveno časopisjejournalsSlovenian National E-content AggregatorNational and University Library of SloveniaDruštvo za stereologijo in kvantitativno analizo slike