Trend analysis is a technique used to distinguish between trends, such as regional dip or thickening, which may influence a whole region that is the object of study, and small-scale effects (anomalies) which are influential locally. Because oil and gas fields are in almost every place associated with anomalies or departures from the regional trend, whether governed by structural, thickness, or lithologic factors, trend analysis should prove to be an important prospecting tool.

The electronic computer has permitted the application of trend analysis and numerous other techniques to large areas by the oil industry. A procedure involving the computer has obvious advantages in that it provides a degree of rigor that more elementary methods lack, and reduces considerably the amount of time involved in computation.

Application of the technique to the pre-Morrow surface in the southeastern part of the Hugoton embayment, using few control wells, reveals objectively the combine topographic and structural relief that existed before Pennsylvanian deposition. With few exceptions, Morrow sandstones, and hence production, are found to be related empirically to the flanks of structures or in depressions.

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