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Abstract

A metrology system having an optical measurement system serves to simulate illumination and imaging properties of an optical production system when an object is illuminated and imaged. The optical measurement system has an illumination optical unit serving to illuminate the object and having a pupil stop in the region of an illumination pupil in a pupil plane, and an imaging optical unit for imaging the object in an image plane. At least one pupil stop for specifying a plurality of measurement illumination settings created by displacing the pupil stop in the pupil plane is provided within the scope of the simulation method. Measurement aerial images are recorded in the image plane for various displacement positions of the object perpendicular to the object plane with the various measurement illumination settings. The various measurement illumination settings are specified by displacing the pupil stop. A complex mask transfer function is reconstructed from the recorded measurement aerial images. A 3-D aerial image of the optical production system is determined from the reconstructed mask transfer function and a given illumination setting of the optical production system as the result of the simulation method. The reconstruction includes the fact that profiles of stop edges of the at least one pupil stop which effectively act to specify the respective measurement illumination setting are changed in a manner going beyond a pure displacement of the stop edge when the respective measurement illumination setting is specified on the basis of the displacement position of the pupil stop. This results in an improvement of the simulation method.

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