Fiber-image analysis .1. Fiber-image enhancement

This is the first paper in a series of publications on fiber-image analysis, image-analysis technology provides a new means of automatic measurement of fiber length, diameter, color, and other properties. This paper concerns the adaptation of image-processing techniques for enhancing fiber images, including background-leveling, valley-mapping and watershed segmentation, boundary extraction, and skeletonizatian. Specific attention is given to describing changes in the algorithms made for improving accuracy and efficiency. The implementation of the algorithms is explained with actual fiber images, These image-enhancement techniques are essential for a reliable and accurate fiber-measurement system.