Abstract: An apparatus and method for uniquely detecting pits on a smooth surface by irradiating an area of the surface; separately sensing radiation scattered from the surface in the near-specular region indicative of a pit and in the far-specular region indicative of a flaw and producing signals representative thereof; normalizing the near-specular signal with respect to the far-specular signal to indicate a pit; and discriminating the near-specular components of the normalized signal representative of surface pits.

Abstract: A surface inspection defect detection and confirmation technique in which a beam of radiation is directed at the surface to be inspected; the radiation scattered from the surface is separately sensed in the near-specular region indicative of a pit and in the far-specular region indicative of a flaw, the near-specular region signal and far-specular region signal are normalized, the near-specular component is discriminated, and the flaw signal is indicated as being a defect and not contamination when there is coincidence between the pit signal and flaw signal.