Abstruct-An automated system for document analysis is extremely desirable. A digitized image consisting of a mixture of text and graphics should be segmented in order to represent more efficiently both the areas of text and graphics. This paper describes the development and implementation of a new algorithm for automated text string separation which is relatively independent of changes in text font style and size, and of string orientation. The algorithm does not explicitly recognize individual characters. The principal components of the algorithm are the generation of connected components and the application of the Hough transform in order to group together components into logical character strings which may then be separated from the graphics. The algorithm outputs two images, one containing text strings, and the other graphics. These images may then be processed by suitable character recognition and graphics recognition systems. The performance of the algorithm, both in terms of its effectiveness and computational efficiency, was evaluated using several test images. The results of the evaluations are described. The superior performance of this algorithm compared to other techniques is clear from the evaluations.