Patent ID: 8299431

Claim:
A method for examining a sample with scanning charged particle beam imaging apparatus, comprising: specifying an image area and a scan area, wherein said image area is a portion of a surface of said sample and said scan area is an area to be scanned, wherein said image area is entirely covered with said scan area, wherein an orientation of said scan area is at a tilted angle neither parallel nor perpendicular to an orientation of said image area; and scanning said scan area, wherein said charged particle beam is moved in parallel to said orientation of said scan area, wherein a portion of said scan area outside said image area is essentially not exposed to said charge particle beam, wherein when said scan area is a quadrangle with a edge along a first direction and a edge along a second direction and said image area is a quadrangle located inside said scan area and with its two opposite vertexes located on said edge and an edge opposite to said edge, said scan area is scanned according to the following process steps: (A1) blanking said charged particle beam when scanning along said first direction from a proximal end of said edge to a predetermined point on said edge, said proximal end being on an intersection of said first and edges, said predetermined point being on a proximal vertex of said image area; (A2) projecting said charged particle beam on said image area when scanning through said proximal vertex of said image area; (A3) blanking said charged particle beam when scanning along said first direction from said certain point of said edge to a distal end of said edge, said distal end being on an intersection of said edge and an edge opposite to said edge; (A4) scanning back to a first point of said edge, said first point being a first distance away from said proximal end; (A5) blanking said charged particle beam when scanning along said first direction until scanning to an edge or a vertex of said image area; (A6) projecting said charged particle beam on said image area when scanning along said first direction within said image area until scanning to an another edge or another vertex of said image area; (A7) blanking said charged particle beam when scanning along said first direction from said another edge or said another vertex of said image area to said edge of said scan area opposite to said edge; (A8) scanning back to a second point of said edge, said second point being a second distances away from said first point: and (A9) repeating said steps (A5) to (A8) until said charged particle beam completely scan said scan area along said second direction.