This thesis focuses on advanced methods of detecting contours of the cardiac cells and measuring their contraction. The theoretical section describes the types of confocal microscopes, which are used for capturing biological samples. The following chapter is devoted to the methods of cardiac cells segmentation, where we are introduced to the generally applied approaches. The most widely spread methods of segmentation are active contours and mathematical morphology, which are the crucial topics of this thesis. Thanks to the those methods we are able in the visual data to accurately detect required elements and measure their surface chnage in time. Acquired theoretical knowledge leads us to the practical realization of the methods in MATLAB.