Efficient stitching method of tiled scanned microelectronic images

Abstract

Sparse features and repetitive textures are frequently presented in microelectronic microscopic images. Therefore, it is challenging for image stitching to meet the requirements of high-speed precision manufacturing. A novel image stitching method for tiled images is proposed to generate panoramic images of microelectronics quickly and accurately. According to the preset scan trajectory, grids were established between adjacent images for feature matching. The clustering algorithm was used to screen reasonable and multiple sets of registrations. Then, all registrations were used as connecting edges, and images were used as nodes, to create a multigraph. The unique registration in multigraph was solved by a non-linear minimization problem with linear constraints. Finally, image transformations were computed in global optimization for rendering panoramic images via image warping. The experimental results show that the proposed method improves the stability and efficiency of image stitching, furthermore, it maintains an equivalent level of precision as the Fiji and microscopy image stitching tool methods.