Measuring cross-sectional area

RD
Posted By
Ryan_Dilger
Jun 8, 2004
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558
Replies
5
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Closed
Is there an EASY way to measure cross-sectional area in Photoshop Elements? I am working with irregularly shaped objects but want to use the lasso tool to outline the object and determine the area. Any suggestions?

Ryan
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Dick_Smith
Jun 8, 2004
Ryan,

If the object is on its own layer against a transparent background, you can simply ctrl/click on the image thumbnail in the layers palette and then open the "info" pallette from Windows. That will at least give you the largest horizontal and vertical dimension of the object.

Dick
RD
Ryan_Dilger
Jun 8, 2004
Dick,

Thanks for the reply. Currently, the horizontal and vertical dimensions are the only info that I have. Unfortunately, I believe this is another function that was not carried over into Elements from Photoshop. Also, I will be unable to get the image on its own layer because the pictures I will be taking are of muscle fibers (taken with an electron microscope and special camera). Thanks for the advice.

Ryan
EW
Ed_Wurster
Jun 8, 2004
Ryan_Dilger wrote…
Thanks for the reply. Currently, the horizontal and vertical dimensions
are the only info that I have. Unfortunately, I believe this is another function that was not carried over into Elements from Photoshop. Also, I will be unable to get the image on its own layer because the pictures I will be taking are of muscle fibers (taken with an electron microscope and special camera). Thanks for the advice.

You can use the line tool to measure. You’ll see a "D" readout on the info palette as you draw.

Scion Image will complement PSE for this, and do much more in the way of analysis.

—
Ed Wurster
http://www.ewurster.com/blog/
RD
Ryan_Dilger
Jun 8, 2004
Ed,

That was a good suggestion, but because of the irregularity of the object, cross-sectional area changes according to your line positioning. I have found an answer on my own. As we put a micrometer under the microscope when looking at slides, I have a scale to use. Then, by selecting the edges of the object, I can go to histogram and get a total number of pixels inside that selection and using the scale, I can determine cross-sectional area. Thanks for all the assistance. Hope this can help others!

Ryan
KW
Kyle_White
Jun 8, 2004
Ryan,

Have you had a look at ImageJ? It is a Java app from the National Institutes of Health in the U.S. and has just this sort of stuff available. Even some of their demos are MRI slices and stacks.

It can be had at:

<http://rsb.info.nih.gov/ij/>

I’ve run it on OS/2, Solaris, Win98/XP and, of course, MacOS X. Seems to work quite well and is still being developed.

Kyle

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