Abstract

Over the past 15 years there has been a significant increase in the number of 3D surveys acquired for exploration, development, and production purposes. There has been a corresponding growth in the number of data types such as coherence, acoustic impedance, and AVO volumes being used by interpreters. As our understanding improves, interrelationships between these volumes will become more important in exploration and field development. Furthermore, advancements in seismic processing now provide most interpreters with more opportunities to work in the depth or time domain. This has also played a role in increasing the number of seismic volumes that geophysicists are faced with interpreting.

One solution to help overcome this problem is the adoption of 3D seismic visualization. 3D seismic visualization is based on volume rendering techniques originally developed for medical imaging using three dimensional pixel elements called voxels which can be made transparent or semi-transparent. Volume rendering techniques are now being used quite extensively in the oil and gas industry for display and interpretation of single seismic attribute volumes in various stages of the interpretation cycle.

Multiple volume visualization is a relatively new technology that blends different volumes into the same 3D space. We review several interesting examples on how multiple volume visualization can be used and what the benefits are for oil and gas exploration. The examples include: 1) visualizing post-stack time migration and pre-stack depth migration results to determine effects of different methods of seismic processing, Natuna Sea, 2) visualization of multiple attributes simultaneously to investigate their interrelationships, Gulf of Mexico, and 3) visualizing time lapsed seismic surveys to assess changes in size/shape of reservoir, West Texas.