Patent ID: 7417719

Claim:
A method for optical inspection of a surface of a semiconductor ( 21 ) in which method an image is captured of the surface of the semiconductor substrate ( 21 ) that comprises a plurality of pixels having at least three associated intensities of varying wavelengths that are designated as color values; a first frequency distribution ( 12 ) is calculated from the color values by transformation in a color range that is spanned by one intensity and by color coordinates (U, V), and whose pixels have the same color coordinate values (u, v); and the first frequency distribution ( 12 ) calculated in this manner is used for comparison with a second correspondingly calculated frequency distribution or a variable derived therefrom, wherein a center of gravity is calculated from the first calculated frequency distribution ( 12 ), and a position of the center of gravity of the first calculated frequency distribution ( 12 ) is compared with a position of a center of gravity of the second frequency distribution to detect a color shift for the semiconductor substrate ( 21 ).