A laser beam system for measuring an aspect of a surface wherein a laser
beam is reshaped into a corrected shaped laser beam having a corrected
energy profile and subsequently reshaped into a measurement shaped laser
beam having an measurement energy profile shaped to be effected by the at
least one aspect of the surface. The measurement shaped laser beam is
reflected from the surface, being modified by the aspect of interest of
the surface, and to a sensor array wherein the sensors measure the
reflected laser beam to determine the aspect of interest of the surface.