Image analysis - fiber recognition

Question

I am new to image analysis. Do you know how to binarize this image in such a way to get the fibers only?

I have tried different threshold techniques etc, but I was not successful. I do not mind what tool I should use but I prefer .NET or Matlab.

PS: I did not know where to put my answer, so I put it at StackOverflow.

Answer 1

The following may help a bit (Code in Mathematica):

DeleteSmallComponents[
 Binarize[
   LaplacianGaussianFilter[i, 2],
 .6],
 2]

Image composition to show the matching:

ImageCompose[i, {i1, .4}] // ImageAdjust