Guide to AVO Modeling 1

Guide to AVO Modeling

Introduction

Geoview is the program from Hampson-Russell which you can use to evaluate and model
Amplitude Versus Offset anomalies. For this you will need:

• One or more well logs.

• A pre-stack seismic volume, either 2D or 3D. This volume has usually been
processed to the final CDP gather stage.

AVO analysis can be divided into two parts: synthetic modeling and seismic data analysis. This
tutorial takes you through the synthetic modeling phase of an AVO project. For the seismic data
analysis phase, see the tutorial entitled Guide to AVO Analysis.

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Starting Geoview

Geoview is the starting program for all the applications in the Hampson-Russell suite, including
AVO Modeling.

To start this tutorial, first start the Geoview program. On a Unix workstation, go to a command
window and type:

geoview

On a PC, click the Start button and select the Geoview option on the Programs > HRS
applications menu.

When you launch Geoview, the first window that you see contains a list of any projects
previously opened in Geoview. For example, the figure below shows a single previous project,
which could be opened now. Your list will be blank if this is the first time you are running
Geoview.

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For this tutorial, we will start a new project. Before doing that, it will be helpful to set all the
data paths to point to the location where you have stored the tutorial data. To do that, click the
Settings and Path tabs:

Now you can see a series of default locations for the Data Directory, Project Directory, and
Database Directory. We would like to change all of these to point to the directory where the
tutorial data is stored.

To change all of the directories to the same location, click on the option Set all default
directories and then click the button to the right:

Then, in the File Selection Dialog, select the folder which contains the tutorial data:

After setting all three paths, the Geoview window will now show the selected directories (note
that yours may be different):

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When you have finished setting all the paths, click Apply to store these paths:

Now click the Projects tab and choose the option to create a New Project:

A dialog appears, where we set the project name. We will call it AVO Modeling Guide, as
shown. Enter the project name and click OK on that menu:

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Now a dialog appears, asking you the name of the database to use for this project:

The database is used to store all the wells used in this project. By default, Geoview creates a
new database, with the same name as the project and located in the same directory. For example,
this project is called AVO Modeling Guide.prj, so the default database will be called AVO
Modeling Guide.wdb. This is desirable since we were starting a new project, intending to read in
well logs from external files. Occasionally, we may want to use an existing database, which has
wells already stored. Then we would click on the option Specify database. For this tutorial,
click OK to accept the default database name.

The Geoview Window now looks like this:

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Loading the well log data

One part of the Geoview window (called the Project Manager) shows all the project data so far.
The tabs along the left side select the type of project data. Right now, the Well tab is selected. It
is empty, since we have not yet loaded any data

To load a well, click the button Import Well, as shown below, and select Logs, Check Shots,
Tops, …:

You need to select the file avo_well.las. Highlight the file name in the list of available files on
the left and then click the Select option, as shown below:

Note that Geoview assumes this file has an LAS format because of the name extension:

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If this is incorrect for your Log File, you can choose one of the other options. Now click OK to
load this file in LAS format:

The Geoview window now looks like this:

Thus, by default the program has opened and displayed all of the available log curves and tops in
the avo_well.las file. This includes the P-wave sonic log, density log, gamma ray log, resistivity
log and SP log, as well as the Top_Gas and Base_Gas tops. Note that the default display in the
right part of the window is controlled by the Wells tab at the top of the window, which was
automatically turned on when the logs were read in.

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Displaying the wells

One part of the window (called the Project Manager) shows all the project data so far. The tabs
along the left side select the type of project data. Right now, the Well tab is selected and we can
see the well (AVO_WELL) which has been loaded into the project. Click the “+” sign near the
well name to see a list of curves in that well:

To see more details about the wells, click the Data Explorer tab to the right:

The window now changes as shown:

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Click the arrow next to the well name to get more information about the curves in that well:

Note that all the well logs we saw in the display are listed, as well as the Depth-time_P-wave log,
which was created from the sonic log and will be used for depth-to-time conversion.

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Note that we can edit items in this table. For example, if the Density units were wrong, we could
change them here. Also, we can click the arrow next to any of the curve names to see the
numerical values in that curve:

Click on the arrow that is pointing to the left to go back to the previous menu since we will not
be editing the density values in this tutorial.

To the right of the workspace, we can see a base map, showing the location of the one well:

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Below the base map are a series of tabs. Clicking the Single Well Display tab,

shows the curves for the selected well:

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Finally, to see the most complete view of the log curves within a well, double-click the icon for
that well within the Project Data window, as shown below:

This creates a new tab within the main Geoview window, called the Wells tab, which displays
the selected well curves:

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You can adjust the well plotting parameters by clicking the “eyeball” icon, to bring up a dialog
for that purpose:

You can also apply various log processing options, like Log Editing, by going to the Processes
list:

For this tutorial, we will assume that the logs have been properly edited.

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Loading the Seismic Data

We have now loaded the well which will be used in the AVO Modeling process. The next step is
to load the seismic volume, which we will compare with the calculated synthetic.

On the far left side of the Geoview window, click the Seismic tab:

The window to the right of this tab shows all seismic data loaded so far. This is empty. Go to
the bottom of the window and click the Import Seismic button:

On the pull-down menu, select From SEG-Y File:

On the dialog that appears, select the file gathers.sgy:

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The selected file appears on the right of the menu, as shown. Click Next at the base of the
dialog:

Set the Geometry Type to 2D and click Next:

On the third page, we are telling the program what information it can use from the trace headers.
In fact, in this data set, there are no X and Y coordinates. That is why we answer No to this
question:

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After modifying that item, as shown, click Next to see the SEG-Y Format page:

By default, this page assumes that the seismic data is a SEG-Y file with all header values filled
in as per the standard SEG-Y convention. For example, it expects to find the Inline and Xline
numbers at the byte locations shown above. If you are not sure that is true, you can click Header
Editor to see what is in the trace headers.

In our case, we believe the format information is correct, so click Next to move to the next page.
Now the following warning message appears because the program is about to scan the entire
SEG-Y file:

Click Yes to begin the scanning process. When the scanning has finished, the Geometry Grid
page appears:

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Because we have not read X-Y information from the headers, the program assumes this is a
single straight line, which is correct. Click OK. After building the geometry files, a new
window appears, showing how the well is mapped into this seismic volume:

In this case, the mapping is not correct because we did not supply the X-Y location of the well,
and there were no X-Y coordinates in the seismic trace headers. We can manually locate the

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well at the known CDP location (330). Type that number in the location shown (note that you
may have to double-click in the window to be allowed to edit the value):

Then, click OK to accept the new locations shown on this window.

Now the seismic data appears within the workspace:

Modifying the Seismic Display

The workspace currently shows the single line, positioned at the left, from this dataset. To see
other parts of the line, slide the scroll bar at the base of the display

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To see the display positioned at the well location, go to the Well icon and click the down arrow
as shown below:

The drop-down menu shows the one well in the project. Select the well and the Geoview
window shows the seismic data in the vicinity of that well location:

We can also modify other plotting parameters by using the Seismic View Parameters window.
To make that window appear, click the “eyeball” icon as shown:

The Seismic View Parameters window contains a series of pages which control various aspects
of the plotting. To see the parameters for a specific item, select that item from the list at the left
side. For example, here we have selected the Inserted Wells item:

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Let us (temporarily) insert the density log by selecting that item as shown from the pull-down tab
of the Inserted Curve Log option:

Now click Apply on the Seismic View Parameters window. The display is modified
accordingly:

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We will continue the tutorial with the sonic log inserted. To do this, click Reset Page and OK
on the View Parameters window. This redraws the Geoview window as before:

Using the AVO Modeling workflow

Now that we have read in all the data necessary for the AVO Modeling, we are ready to start the
process.

First, look at the tabs to the left of the Geoview window. You will see that one of those tabs is
called Processes. Click on that tab to see a list of all the operations which are available in
Geoview. Each of the processes can be expanded. For example, if you click on both the Log
Processing and AVO Modeling options, the following expanded list is seen:

As we can see, the list includes Log Processing options, Seismic Processing options, AVO
Modeling and Analysis tools, Inversion options, etc. One way to do the modeling would be to
apply each of the desired options in turn. This would be the traditional approach.

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We will use an alternate procedure in this tutorial. We will use the pre-defined Workflows.
Click the Workflows tab. The window changes like this:

Each of the items on this window contains a complete workflow for the specified process. Click
on the item called AVO Modeling. The window changes like this:

We now see the suggested series of steps to be followed for AVO Modeling. The steps are
colored red to indicate that the parameters have not yet been supplied. These are the “default”
steps, but the list can be edited and customized, as we will see later.

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Double-click on the first item Select Well. An arrow will appear in front of the item, as shown
here:

Now a dialog appears on the right with a list of all wells in the project:

Since we have only loaded one well, that well is selected. Note that at the lower right corner of
the dialog, there is a button for importing more wells:

We do not need to import another well, so click Select on this dialog.

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Now, double-click the second item on the Workflow list, Select Logs:

The dialog on the right shows that for AVO Modeling, we need three log curves:

Two of them, the P-wave velocity (sonic log) and the Density curves are available in the well.
The third, S-wave velocity, is not present in the well and will be computed in the next step. If
we had done log editing, there could be multiple versions of each of these curves. For example,
there could be two P-waves if editing or smoothing had been done. In that case the dialog would
default to select the latest version, but you could select a previous version if you wished.

Click Select on this menu to use the latest curves for the calculation:

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Creating the shear wave velocity log

Now double-click the third step on the workflow, Shear Wave Estimation:

This step is necessary because a shear wave velocity log is required to do AVO offset modeling.
However, like many wells, this well does not include a measured shear wave log. Therefore, we
must compute it now from the existing sonic and density logs. If the well had contained a
measured shear wave log, we could skip this step in the workflow.

The dialog on the right shows a series of tabs, which must be completed in order:

The first tab specifies the location of the Reservoir within the well:

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This page is necessary because there are two types of equations used, depending on whether we
are within the hydrocarbon zone or outside in the wet background. This page specifies the
Reservoir or hydrocarbon zone. The actual equations are described on the next page. A
convenient way of specifying the zone is to use the formation tops, which have been imported
from the LAS file. These tops have been called TOP_GAS and BASE_GAS for this well.
Alternatively, we could specify the depth range directly.

Now click the Velocity tab:

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Here we see that the P-wave velocity is coming from the P-wave log in the well:

As before, the dialog defaults to use the latest P-wave log in the well, but you could choose a
different one, if available.

For the S-wave velocity, two calculations will be used, one for the samples within the reservoir,
and the other for samples outside the reservoir:

These calculations are explained in greater detail in the tabs below:

Now click the Density tab:

This tab appears because the density and porosity of the reservoir are related by the Volume
Average Equation:
ρsat = ρm( 1 − φ) + ρw S wφ + ρhc( 1 − S w )φ .

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By default, with a measured density log, the porosity will be calculated. Alternatively, with a
measured porosity log, the density can be calculated. Finally, the option exists to use both
measured density and porosity logs, and that requires a calculation of the matrix density.

Now click the In-Situ Fluid tab:

On this page, we specify the fluid properties within the reservoir. The first thing we specify is
the relative concentrations of fluid:

In this case, we have told the program that the reservoir is 50% brine and 50% gas. This is
assumed known about the reservoir. Alternatively, we could use a water saturation log, if
available. Change the saturations as shown above.
Lower on the menu page we have the parameters for the density and bulk modulus of the fluids:

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We can also calculate the fluid properties using empirical relationships:

but for this tutorial, we will skip this calculation, so unselect that check box:

Now click the Matrix tab:

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This page specifies the matrix properties within the reservoir. The top part is grayed out – i.e.,
disabled – because we have chosen to use the Greenberg-Castagna equations within the
reservoir. Those equations require a mixture of minerals, which we specify below:

Note that, since we do not have any volumetric logs in the well, our only option is to specify
constant percentages for the whole reservoir zone. By default, the specification is 100% sand for
the reservoir, which we will accept for this tutorial.

Finally, click the Output tab:

Here we specify the name of the output S-Wave velocity curve, we will create. We also can
click the QC Display button to see some of the internal calculations within the reservoir:

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This plot can help show any major problems with the model.

Now click Run to create the S-Wave velocity log:

The Geoview window now includes the calculated shear wave log:

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Selecting the seismic and correlating the well

Now double-click the fourth step on the workflow, Select Seismic:

We need the seismic data for these steps in the AVO Modeling workflow:

(1) To extract a wavelet.

(2) To correlate the well, i.e., to optimize the depth-time relationship between well and
seismic.
(3) To compare with the resulting synthetic.

On the dialog on the right, we see a list of the seismic volumes which have been loaded into the
project. Since there is only one volume, that has been selected:

At the bottom of the dialog we also see a button for importing other seismic volumes, if desired.
Click Select to accept the volume gathers:

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Now the seismic data appears inserted within the Well Display window:

The next step is to apply the process Extract Statistical Wavelet, by double-clicking that
option:

There are two basic methods for extracting the wavelet. One method uses the wells, and can
give a good estimate of both amplitude and phase spectra of the wavelet. However, that method
cannot be used until the well is correlated, i.e., until the proper depth-time relationship has been
determined.

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The second method – called “statistical” – uses the seismic data alone to extract the wavelet.
This method will estimate the amplitude spectrum from the seismic data, but we must make an
assumption about the phase – typically we assume the data are zero phase. In this step, we are
extracting a statistical wavelet. We will refine the wavelet extraction using the wells at a later
stage.

The dialog on the right shows the range of data to analyze:

By default, the program will examine the entire data volume, but this is rarely appropriate. In
particular, we want to set a time window around the zone of interest. Change the dialog to
extract just using the limited time window shown below:

When you have changed the dialog as shown above, click Run to extract the wavelet.

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The extracted wavelet appears in its own pop-up window:

Note that the time domain response is in the upper window, while the amplitude and phase
spectra are in the lower window.

Note also this small button at the lower right of the wavelet window:

If you click that button, the wavelet window will be “docked” within its own Wavelets tab:

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This is a handy way to keep track of any window created within Geoview. To release the
wavelet window from its tab, click on the “airplane” at the lower right of the wavelet window:

All the windows created within Geoview can be docked or floated in this way. Finally, send the
wavelet window back to the wavelets tab by clicking the Wavelets button once again:

The next step in the workflow is to Correlate the Well, so double-click that item:

The process of log correlation examines the current depth-time conversion and optimizes it so
that the derived synthetic matches the seismic optimally. This is necessary because the depth-
time curve derived from the input sonic log is rarely sufficient for that purpose. Of course, if
check shot data are available, that should be applied first. But experience has shown that fine-
tuning of the correlation between the synthetic and seismic is still required.

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A dialog appears to specify which seismic volume will be used for the correlation process, and
how the composite trace will be extracted from that volume:

The composite trace is created by averaging the traces around the borehole location we are using
for the seismic correlation. For a vertical well, such as this one, that means averaging a selected
set of neighboring traces around the borehole. By default this is plus or minus 1 inline or
crossline:

For deviated wells, the process is more complex and involves averaging traces which are a
specified distance from the deviation path.

For this tutorial, we will accept the defaults. Click OK on this dialog.

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The Log Correlation Window now appears:

The blue traces on this display are copies of the synthetic trace. This trace was calculated from
the sonic and density logs in this well, the depth-time curve currently stored in the database, and
the wavelet we have previously extracted:

The red traces are repeated copies of the average (or composite) trace extracted from the seismic
data.

The plot at the upper right shows the cross correlation between the synthetic trace and the
composite trace:

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That correlation result depends on the analysis window. We can improve the calculation by
changing this window. The cross correlation window defaults to be the largest possible window
containing both the synthetic and real trace. We should narrow the analysis to the region where
the log tie is best:

Set the start time to 500, as shown above and click on Apply. The correlation plot now shows a
maximum correlation of 65%.

It also suggests that the synthetic should be shifted down by 50 ms. That information is also
displayed on the menu bar at the base of the window:

Click Apply Shift to apply the suggested 50 ms shift. The correlation plot now looks like this:

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The Cross Correlation window now shows a roughly symmetrical peak at zero Lag Time, with a
maximum correlation of 65%

From this we can conclude that we have a good correlation for this well. Click OK to accept this
correlation.

A dialog pops up suggesting a name for the new sonic log we have created by the log correlation
process. Even though this process, by default, has only changed the depth-time curve and not the
actual sonic log, Geoview calculates a new sonic log (identical to the previous) as a place holder
for identifying the new depth-time curve. Click OK to accept that new name:

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Identifying scenarios and creating synthetics

The next step in the Workflow is Extract wavelet using wells. We very often perform that step
within the Log Correlation Window. In this case, we will assume the zero-phase statistical
wavelet is adequate, so we will skip that step here. Double-click the step after, Identify
Scenarios:

By “scenarios”, we mean the geologic conditions which we wish to model. Each

scenario is a different fluid combination within the target reservoir:

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At least one scenario must be chosen – the in situ scenario which is present in the
logs. In addition, we can model up to 4 other scenarios. In the figure above, we
have chosen Pure Oil and Pure Brine, as well. Note that in addition to specifying
pure hydrocarbons, we can specify any combination of the 3 components using the
Ternary diagram. Set the dialog as shown above, and click Run.

The display is now modified to show the 3 scenarios for each of the P-wave, S-
wave, Density, and Poisson’s Ratio curves:

Now double-click the next step on the workflow, Create Synthetics:

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The dialog on the right shows that, by default, Zoeppritz ray-tracing will be used to
calculate the synthetics:

The range and distribution of offsets has been automatically set to be consistent
with the real data being used:

The wavelet is the most recently extracted:

Also, note at the bottom of the dialog a button for viewing all the Advanced
Parameters:

For this tutorial, click Run to create synthetics using the default parameters:

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The last step of the AVO Modeling Workflow is AVO What Ifs:

This step is used after the synthetics have been created. Here we can interactively
modify various parameters and see their effects on the calculated synthetics.

The dialog on the right contains all the parameters used to generate the in-situ
synthetic.

For example, the in-situ fluid saturation is 50% brine and 50% gas:

That can be modified to contain any combination of the 3 components.

Another interesting change is to modify the thickness of the target layer. The
dialog currently shows the reservoir thickness as 7 meters:

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To see the effect of thickness change, change the thickness to 20 meters, as shown
here:

The display does not immediately change. To produce the new synthetic click the
Preview button:

Now the display is modified to produce new log curves (with a thicker reservoir)
and a new synthetic:

By default, the model changes are not calculated until the Preview button is clicked.
This is because some calculations may take a while. However, by selecting the
Interactive Preview option:

you can force the model to be updated immediately after every change.

Finally, the model changes are normally temporary and disappear as soon as the
dialog is closed. You can save the current model by clicking the Save Results
button:

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For this tutorial, just Close the menu, without saving any results:

Modifying and saving the workflow

We have now completed the AVO Modeling Workflow. The last process we will examine in
this tutorial is customizing and saving a new workflow.

Currently, the AVO Modeling Workflow looks like this:

One of the items, Extract wavelet using wells, is still colored red, because we did not explicitly
perform that step. We might wish to create a new workflow, with that item removed.

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To do that, select the item, Extract wavelet using wells, and right-click:

On the pop-up, select the item Remove process. Click OK on this dialog which appears:

The new workflow now appears under the User tab:

Note that the original workflow is still saved under the Default tab.

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Sometimes we might wish to add a process. For example, select the item Extract statistical
wavelet on the User tab, and right click as shown:

Select Insert New Processes Below and double-click Check Shot Correction.

Now we have added the process of applying a Check Shot Correction before doing Log
Correlation:

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As it stands, the new customized workflow is only available within this project. To make it
available to other projects and other users, we need to export the workflow.

To do that, right click anywhere on the workflow:

On the pull-down menu, select Export Workflow and Parameters. On the dialog which
appears, give the new workflow a name, like AVO Guide, and click OK:

We have now saved the new workflow, and the parameters used in this project, to two separate
files. To import the saved workflow and parameters into a new project, click on the Import
Workflow button at the top of the Workflow menu:

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On the dialog which appears, we see the two files which have been created:

The file with the shorter name, AVOGuide_workflow.xml, is the list of process names in the new
workflow. This is the file we need to import if we wish to use the chosen steps in a new project.

The other file, AVOGuideAVOModelingParameter_parameter.xml, is the complete list of

parameters used in this current project. If we import this second file, as well as the first, the
dialogs which are created will have exactly the same parameters as used previously. Thus, the
combination of both files together will be a reproducible history of the project.

Double-click each of the files named above. The right side of the dialog now changes to this:

If we now click OK, we will import both the list of processes and their parameters. For this
tutorial, click Cancel on this dialog.

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Exiting the project

We have now completed the AVO Modeling Guide. To close the Geoview program, click on
the “x” on the upper right of the Geoview window:

There is no need to explicitly save the project, since it is automatically saved. Click Yes on the
confirmation dialog:

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