1. An automated method of separating an object from a background in an image comprising pixels, the method comprising the steps of: selecting a set of weights in a digital filter, wherein at least a portion of the weights is selected to enhance at least a portion of the object, said object portion characterized by a predetermined multispectral pattern comprising a plurality of spectral bands; transforming the image with the digital filter to enhance pixels associated with the predetermined multispectral pattern of the object not contained in the background so as to produce a transformed image, wherein the multispectral pattern comprises a plurality of edge gradients and non-edge gradients, wherein at least a portion of non-edge gradient values falls within the range of the edge gradient values, and wherein the weights are selected so as to enhance both the edge and non-edge gradients which are included in the multispectral pattern, thereby allowing object identification with the use of said digital filter; and thresholding the transformed image, wherein the thresholding step includes extracting object features from the transformed image and sorting the extracted object features so as to separate the object from the background.