Object segmentation within microscope images of palynofacies

Identification of fossil material under a microscope is the basis of micropalentology. Our task is to locate and count the pieces of inertinite and vitrinite in images of sieve sampled rock. The classical watershed algorithm oversegments the objects because of their irregular shapes. In this paper we propose a method for locating multiple objects in a black and white image while accounting for possible overlapping or touching. The method, called Centre Supported Segmentation (CSS), eliminates oversegmentation and is robust against differences in size and shape of the objects. Crown Copyright (c) 2008 Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.