AbstractCharacterization of the roughness of surfaces of individual features present inSEMimages is obtained from the slope and intercept of a plot of the brightness difference between pixels as a function of their separation distance, in directions parallel and perpendicular to the scan lines within the outlines of the feature. The descriptive namescontrastandtextureare given to the intercept and slope of this plot, respectively. These parameters can be used to classify features, just as measures of size, shape, etc. are used for selection, distribution plots and statistical comparison. Evidence is also shown for a correlation between thetextureand the fractal dimension of the feature profile, and consequently with the surface fractal dimension of the feature.