STACK: Stacking

Topics
2 STACK Overview
3 STACK General Use
7 STACK Technical Description
10 STACK Requirements and Restrictions
11 STACK Parameter Description Table
12 STACK Parameter Table
13 STACK General Execution Parameters - Required
15 STACK OPTICAL - Optional
16 STACK ATRIM - Optional
17 STACK ITER - Optional
19 STACK COH - Optional
21 STACK HDRSAVE - Optional
22 STACK Examples

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 STACK: Stacking

STACK Overview
STACK sums seismic traces, algebraically. It outputs a single trace for each input ensemble of
traces.

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 STACK: Stacking

STACK General Use

The STACK module can stack seismic data sorted in any order. The program also includes
options for alpha-trimmed, iterative and coherency-weighted stacking.
Data may be sorted by using SORT or directly reading data in the appropriate order using DSIN.
STACK outputs a single trace for each ensemble. If all traces in an ensemble are dead, a dead
trace is output in sequence.
STACK may be run without any parameters. In this case the SCALING normalization is used with
a default scalar of 0.2. The options for scaling are SCALE, NORM, or AVERAGE.
The options supplied are:

SCALE option SCALE produces a scalar that is different from the NORM scalar. The value
supplied for parameter SCALRAT is used in the calculation. It defaults to 0.2
if not supplied.
NORM option NORM simply scales the stacked trace by the number of non-zero samples
that contributed to the stacked sample.
AVERAGE AVERAGE scales the stacked trace by the number of traces in the ensemble.
option
POWER option POWER determines the scaler for fold compensation.
NOSCALE NOSCALE adds traces together with no scaling.
option

Optical Stacking Process - OPTICAL

OPTICAL list is an optical stacking process. OPTICAL is used for a quick look at the data, because
it does not require a stacking velocity function.

Alpha-trimmed Mean Stack - ATRIM

The ATRIM list performs an alpha-trimmed mean stack. There are three ATRIM parameters, all of
which are optional. The user can supply any or all of three parameters to control the number of
samples used to calculate the mean. They are RATE, MIN and MAX.
Parameter RATE determines the total percentage of amplitude samples to be dropped before
the stack. Half of RATE is applied to the highest and half to the lowest amplitudes. The default is
30.0, which is equal to 30%. If RATE is defaulted, STACK trims 15% of the high samples and 15%
of the low samples.
MIN controls the minimum number of samples used to calculate the mean. It overrides RATE, if
the RATE value results in fewer than MIN samples. Low and high amplitude samples are added
so that the total equals MIN. The default is 1.

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 STACK: Stacking

MAX controls the maximum number of samples used to calculate the mean. It overrides RATE,
if the RATE value results in more than MAX samples. Low and high amplitude samples are
dropped so that the total equals MAX. MAX defaults to the total number of traces per
ensemble.

Iterative Stack - ITER

The ITER list performs mean iterative stacking. Up to ten iterations can be requested. There are
three optional parameters - RATE, ITER and THRESH. ITER and THRESH must be supplied at least
once if multiple iterations are to be performed.
RATE determines the percentage of samples that must be retained for each iteration. The
default is .5. If the user does not supply a value for RATE, at least 50% of the remaining samples
are preserved in each iteration. RATE overrides parameter THRESH, described below, when the
application of THRESH causes fewer than RATE samples to be included in calculation of the
mean.
ITER and THRESH control the iterations. They must be supplied to obtain multiple iterations.
ITER has two functions: 1) It designates the iteration to which the accompanying value of
parameter THRESH applies. 2) It determines the total number of iterations. The number of
iterations is equal to the last value supplied for ITER. The default for ITER is 1.
THRESH establishes the trim threshold for excluding samples from each iteration. Samples that
are larger or smaller than plus or minus THRESH times the standard deviation from the mean
are dropped for the iteration specified with ITER. Each iteration drops additional samples,
which are never included again. The default is 20.
ITER and THRESH need not be supplied for every iteration. STACK interpolates linearly to
establish the threshold values for iterations between those specified with the parameters.

Coherency-weighted Stack - COH

The COH list performs coherency-weighted stacking. It is useful for improving the signal-to-
noise ratio of the stacked trace. COH has three optional parameters - WINDOW, STABL and
METHOD.
COH forms an initial mean or median stacked trace that is crosscorrelated with each unstacked
trace. It uses the crosscorrelation coefficients to weight the unstacked traces. Parameter
WINDOW determines the length of the crosscorrelation window. The default is 1000
milliseconds. The window is moved down each trace, sample by sample.
STABL is a stabilizing exponent that is applied to the correlation values before an unstacked
trace is scaled. It may not always be desirable to apply the full correlation weights. The default
is 1.0, which is equivalent to scaling the trace with the crosscorrelation coefficient. A STABL
value of .5 causes the square root of the correlation weight to be applied. Low values of STABL
produce mild coherency weighting. It is recommended that values greater than 1.0 not be
supplied.

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 STACK: Stacking

Parameter METHOD determines the type of stacking applied to the input traces to form the
crosscorrelation trace. The choices are MEAN and MEDIAN. MEAN is the default.

Trace Header Entries

Some conditions are applied to trace header values when STACK is run:
• STACK requires certain header values to be defined in the input trace headers.
• STACK creates some header entries, if they don’t already exist.
• STACK preserves all header entries by default. The user can supply HDRSAVE parameters to
determine how the value is selected for these header entries.

Required Header Values

STACK requires the following values to be in the input trace headers:

lasttr Last trace flag

type Data or auxiliary trace flag
seqno Trace sequence number within the ensemble
pkeynam and pkey Data sort order (usually CDP and CDP number)

Header Entries Created by STACK

STACK defines the following trace header values if they do not already exist:

nlive Number of live traces in the ensemble prior to stacking

fold Total number of traces in the ensemble prior to stacking

Header Entries Preserved by Default

STACK preserves all trace header entries in the output traces. By default, the value saved for the
header is the value of the header for the trace with the minimum offset in the input ensemble.
The minimum offset can be obtained from the headers offset or soffset, or can be calculated
from shot and receiver positions. If the minimum offset cannot obtained from trace headers in
the input ensemble, the value saved for the header is the value of the header for the first trace
in the input ensemble.
If the user wishes to preserve a different value for the header (AVERAGE, MIN, MAX, or MINOFF)
the HDRSAVE parameter should be used. The value of the header for the STACK trace will be
that which is specified by the METHOD parameter. All other trace headers will be set to the
value of the trace with the minimum offset or the first trace of the ensemble.

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 STACK: Stacking

Other Header Entries

The user must supply HDRSAVE parameters to preserve input header entries other than those
preserved by default. Parameter METHOD determines the method by which the user’s
designated header values are calculated.

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 STACK: Stacking

STACK Technical Description

STACK sums, sample by sample, the amplitude of a specified number of traces in each
ensemble. The user may restrict the number of traces in the stack by use of the MAXFOLD
option. The summed trace amplitude is modified in one of three ways. The user may select
from three normalization algorithms.
Amplitude weighting for each of the options is calculated as follows:
• Scaling Option - SCALE
This is the default normalization process used. The scaling option, like the NORM option,
may be used to compensate for the muting of the early data or for uneven fold coverage.
This option is useful when noise is present as is the case for most seismic data. Each sample
of the summed trace is multiplied by a scalar calculated as follows:

1 1
Equation 1  1 – S   -------- + S  ----
N N

where:
S = SCALRAT
N = Number of live samples
• Normalizing Option - NORM
NORM is a balancing option that helps compensate for muting of the early data. It can also
be used to compensate for uneven fold coverage.
When NORM is specified, the trace samples in each ensemble are divided by NLIVE where
NLIVE is the number of live sample values in the summed sample.
• Averaging Option - AVERAGE
AVERAGE scales the stacked trace by the number of traces in the ensemble.

OPTICAL Option
The OPTICAL list is based on the work of Eric de Bazelaire, 1988, described in “Normal Moveout
Revisited: Inhomogeneous Media and Curved Interfaces,” Geophysics, 53:143-157. In particular,
see page 149 for the formula applied.

2
TP +  ----------- – TP
2 X
Equation 2 DT =
 VEL

where:
DT = the moveout
TP = the focusing time parameter
X = the offset
VEL = the velocity

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 STACK: Stacking

The input data to OPTICAL should be deconvolved, properly muted, common depth point
gathers, with no normal moveout applied. The output traces can be processed further, such as
with a normal stack.
OPTICAL sweeps through a series of values for the parameter TP, ranging from the time
supplied by the user to several times the trace length. For each value of TP, OPTICAL generates
a summed trace by applying a static time shift of DT to the cdp prestack traces and summing
them. OPTICAL is designed so that 24 of the summed traces are produced for each cdp. The
stacked output trace is formed from the 24 summed traces by moving through them one
sample at a time. OPTICAL picks the largest amplitude for each sample to be the output trace
element.
Note that data will only be properly imaged below the time parameter supplied by the user;
the shallower data will not be properly stacked. To get a proper image, the velocity supplied to
the program should be accurate to within 25 percent of the actual velocity.
Note also that OPTICAL cannot distinguish multiples from primaries. In the case of strong
multiples, OPTICAL may stack the data based on multiple velocities. To offset this possibility,
ZMULT may be used to remove strong multiples before using OPTICAL.

ATRIM Option
The ATRIM list uses a mixed mean/median technique. It is sometimes called an alpha-trimmed
mean, hence the name. The user specifies some number of high and low amplitude samples to
drop before a mean of the remaining samples is calculated. There are various methods of
determining the number of samples to exclude.
The SCALING parameter with option POWER, the amplitude of the output stacked trace can be
controlled. At each sample time, the number of nonzero samples (NLIVES) contributing to the
mean is calculated. The stacked sample is then scaled down by NLIVES to the POWER as shown:

Equation 3
 Samples
Stacked Sample = ----------------------------------------
POWER
NLIVES

ITER Option
The iterative stack does not use median values. It excludes high and low amplitudes by
calculating a mean and standard deviation. Program flow for the iterative stack is as follows for
each time sample. First, the mean and the standard deviation are computed. A threshold is
calculated by scaling the standard deviation with a user-supplied value. Amplitudes greater
and lesser than the threshold are dropped and a new mean is calculated. This process
continues for a user-specified number of iterations.
The SCALING parameter with option POWER controls the amplitude of the output stacked
trace. After the last iteration, the number of nonzero samples (NLIVES) is calculated. The
stacked sample is then scaled down by NLIVES to the POWER according to the following
formula:

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 STACK: Stacking

Equation 4
 Samples
Stacked Sample = ----------------------------------------
POWER
NLIVES

COH Option
The COH list calculates a time-variant scaler for each input trace on the basis of its
crosscorrelation with a stack of the input traces. This is useful for improving the signal-to-noise
ratio of the output stacked traces.
First, a preliminary stacked trace is formed using either the mean or median of the input traces,
as determined by the user. Each unstacked trace is then crosscorrelated with the preliminary
stacked trace within a window. The user can control the length of the window. The
crosscorrelation window is moved down the trace sample by sample to form a continuous
WINDOW
crosscorrelation coefficient trace. The crosscorrelation values above -------------------------- and below
2
WINDOW
TRACE LENGTH – -------------------------- are held constant.
2
Each input trace is then weighted by the crosscorrelation coefficient and summed with the
other weighted traces to form the final stacked trace. The stacked trace is scaled by the inverse
of the sum of the weights raised to the power specified with the SCALING parameter with
POWER selected.
The parameter STABL can be used to stabilize the correlation weights. The correlation
coefficient is raised to the power of STABL before the weight is applied to the unstacked trace.
A STABL value of 1.0 corresponds to full application of the correlation weight. A value of .5
causes the square root of the correlation weight to be applied.
The SCALING parameter with option POWER chosen controls the amplitude of the output
stacked trace. With the COH list, however, the sum of the computed weights is used in the
calculation rather than the number of live samples. The stacked sample is scaled down by the
sum of the coherency weights to the POWER as follows:

 Weights  Sample
Stacked Sample = ------------------------------------------------------
Equation 5 POWER
 Weights

References
Robinson, J.C., 1970. Statistical optimal stacking of seismic data. Geophysics 35:436-446.

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 STACK: Stacking

STACK Requirements and Restrictions

Input data must be sorted in the correct order for stacking before STACK is run. The program
SORT can be run to sort the data.
STACK changes certain system variables internally. Therefore, the IF, RESET directives should
not be used with STACK to process a subset of data. HOLDIF, RECALL should be used instead.
Only one of the stacking options may be specified in a call to the program.

STACK Output
Stacked traces are passed on for further processing. STACK will delete any presence of auxiliary
traces. An auxiliary trace is defined as one with a header of type = 1.

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 STACK: Stacking

STACK Parameter Description Table

Req General Execution Parameters

METHOD Stacking algorithm (NORMAL/ATRIM/COH/ITER/MEDIAN/OPTICAL)
SCALING Scaling method (SCALE/AVERAGE/NORM/NOSCALE/POWER)
SCALER Scaler used with SCALING (used only with SCALE or POWER)
MAXTR Limit stacking to first MAXTR traces

Opt OPTICAL Optical Stacking

TIME Starting time (ms)
VEL Velocity associated with starting time

Opt ATRIM Alpha-trim Stacking

RATE Trim rate (%)
MIN Minimum number of samples for averaging
MAX Maximum number of samples for averaging

Opt ITER Iterative Stacking

RATE Percentage of preserved samples after each iteration
Rep ITER Iteration number
THRESH Threshold for sample amplitude exclusion

Opt COH Coherency Stacking

WINDOW Crosscorrelation window length
STABL Stabilization exponent
METHOD Stacking method (MEAN/MEDIAN)

Opt HDRSAVE Save Trace Header

Rep HDRNAM Name of trace header to save
METHOD Save method (AVERAGE/MAX/MIN/MINOFF)

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STACK Parameter Table

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Req *CALL STACK METHOD SCALING SCALER MAXTR
Opt OPTICAL TIME VEL
Opt ATRIM RATE MIN MAX
Opt ITER RATE
ITER THRESH
Opt COH WINDOW STABL METHOD
Opt HDRSAVE
HDRNAM METHOD

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 STACK: Stacking

STACK General Execution Parameters - Required

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*CALL STACK METHOD SCALING SCALER MAXTR

*CALL Execution directive.

Columns: 1-8

STACK Program name.

Columns: 9-16

METHOD Specifies the stacking algorithm.

Valid values:
NORMAL To implement automatic stacking, supply NORMAL, or let the parameter
default.
ATRIM To implement the alpha-trimmed mean stacking method, supply ATRIM.
COH To implement the coherency-weighted stacking method, supply COH.
ITER To implement the iterative stacking method, supply ITER.
MEDIAN To implement the median stacking method, supply MEDIAN.
OPTICAL To implement an optical stacking method, supply OPTICAL.

Columns: 17-24
Type of value: Character*8 - Enumerated list
Default value: NORMAL

SCALING Specifies the scaling method.

Valid values:
SCALE To implement the scaling option, supply SCALE, or let the parameter
default.
AVERAGE To scale the stacked trace by the number of traces in the ensemble, supply
AVERAGE.
NORM To simply scale the stacked trace by the number of non-zero samples that
contributed to the stacked sample, supply NORM.
NOSCALE To add traces together with no scaling, supply NOSCALE.
POWER To determine the scaler for fold compensation, supply POWER. Each
stacked sample is divided by the number of live samples raised to POWER.

Columns: 25-32

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Type of value: Character*8 - Enumerated list

Default value: SCALE

SCALER Specifies the scaling rate to be used in calculation of the output summed trace values (only
used for SCALE or POWER).

Columns: 33-40
Type of value: Floating point
Lower limit: 0.0
Upper limit: 1.0
Default value: 0.2

MAXTR Specifies the limit of stacking to the first MAXTR traces.

Columns: 41-48
Type of value: Integer
Lower limit: 1
Upper limit: MAXNTR
Default value: MAXNTR

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STACK OPTICAL - Optional

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OPTICAL TIME VEL

OPTICAL parameters are used for an optical stacking process.

OPTICAL Operation Name.
Columns: 1-8

TIME Specifies the starting time, in milliseconds, for processing.

Columns: 9-16
Type of value: Floating point
Lower limit: 0.0
Upper limit: Trace length
Default value: None

VEL Specifies the velocity, in feet or meters per second, at the starting time.

Columns: 17-24
Type of value: Floating point
Lower limit: 100.0
Upper limit: 100,000.0
Default value: None

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STACK ATRIM - Optional

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ATRIM RATE MIN MAX

ATRIM parameters implement the alpha-trimmed mean stacking option.

Only one of the options, COH, ATRIM or ITER, may be specified.
ATRIM Operation Name.
Columns: 1-8

RATE Specifies the trim rate. RATE determines the percentage of highest and lowest amplitude
samples to drop before the mean of the remaining samples is calculated. If it is defaulted to
30.0, the 15% highest and the 15% lowest amplitudes are dropped. The remaining 70% of
the samples are averaged to determine the output sample.

Columns: 9-16
Type of value: Floating point
Lower limit: 0.0
Upper limit: 100.0
Default value: 30.0

MIN Specifies the minimum number of samples to average for the output. The number of
samples to be dropped, as determined by RATE, is adjusted such that at least MIN samples
are averaged for the output sample.

Columns: 17-24
Type of value: Integer
Lower limit: 1
Upper limit: MAXTR
Default value: 1

MAX Specifies the maximum number of samples to average for the output. If the number of
samples, as determined by RATE, exceeds MAX, additional high and low samples are
dropped to leave MAX remaining samples.

Columns: 25-32
Type of value: Integer
Lower limit: MIN
Upper limit: MAXTR
Default value: MAXTR

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STACK ITER - Optional

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ITER RATE
ITER THRESH ITER THRESH ITER THRESH ITER THRESH

ITER parameters implement the iterative stacking option.

Only one of the options, COH, ATRIM or ITER, may be specified.
ITER Operation Name.
Columns: 1-8

RATE Specifies the rate determining the percentage of samples that must be preserved in each
iteration. A value of .8, for example, specifies that 80% of the samples be included in the
output sample. Only 20% of the live samples can be removed per iteration.

Columns: 9-16
Type of value: Floating point
Lower limit: 0.0
Upper limit: 1.0
Default value: 0.5

Parameters Optional with ITER

These parameters determine the number of iterations and the threshold trim level at each
iteration. If they are not supplied, one iteration with a threshold of 20.0 is performed.
Up to ten iterations can be performed. ITER and THRESH need not be supplied for each one.
The largest ITER value determines the total number of iterations. The threshold values for
iteration numbers not supplied are determined by linear interpolation.
ITER Specifies the number of the iteration to which the following threshold value is applied.
ITER values must be supplied in increasing order. The last value supplied for ITER determines
the total number of iterations.

Columns: 1-8
Type of value: Integer
Lower limit: 1
Upper limit: 10
Default value: 1

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THRESH Specifies the threshold level for sample exclusion in terms of standard deviations. For
example, a value of 5.0 causes samples larger and smaller than plus and minus 5 times the
standard deviation to be excluded. Each iteration drops additional samples. Once a sample is
dropped it is not included in later iterations.

Columns: 9-16
Type of value: Floating point
Lower limit: 0.2
Upper limit: None
Default value: 20.0

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STACK COH - Optional

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COH WINDOW STABL METHOD

COH parameters implement the coherency-weighted stacking option.

Only one of the options, COH, ATRIM or ITER, may be specified.
COH Operation Name.
Columns: 1-8

WINDOW Specifies, in milliseconds, the length of the crosscorrelation window. The window is moved
down the trace, sample by sample, to form a complete crosscorrelation coefficient trace.

Columns: 9-16
Type of value: Floating point
Lower limit: 0.0
Upper limit: Trace Length
Default value: 1000.0

STABL Specifies the stabilizing exponent for coherency-weighted stacking. Each correlation value is
raised to the power of STABL before the unstacked trace is scaled. The default value is
equivalent to scaling by the crosscorrelation coefficient. Values greater than 1.0 are not
recommended.

Columns: 17-24
Type of value: Floating point
Lower limit: 0.0
Upper limit: 1.0
Default value: 1.0

METHOD Determines the method for computing the preliminary stacked trace.

Valid values:
MEAN To use the mean of the input samples, supply MEAN, or let the parameter
default.
MEDIAN To use the median among the input samples, supply MEDIAN.

Columns: 25-32

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Type of value: Character*8 - Enumerated list

Default value: MEAN

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STACK HDRSAVE - Optional

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HDRSAVE
HDRNAM METHOD HDRNAM METHOD HDRNAM METHOD HDRNAM METHOD

HDRSAVE option is to allow the user to pass the minimum, maximum, average, or value of
minimum offset.
HDRSAVE Operation Name.
Columns: 1-8

Parameters Required with HDRSAVE

HDRNAM Specifies the name of the trace header to be saved.

Columns: 1-8
Type of value: Character*8
Default value: None

METHOD Specifies the method used to pass the prestack header values.

Valid values:
AVERAGE Supply AVERAGE, or let the parameter default, to pass the average value of
the specified header of the input traces to the output trace.
MAX Supply MAX to pass the maximum value of the specified header of the
input traces to the output trace.
MIN Supply MIN to pass the minimum value of the specified header of the
input traces to the output trace.
MINOFF Supply MINOFF to pass the value of the specified header HDRNAME for the
minimum offset trace in the ensemble.

Columns: 9-16
Type of value: Character*8 - Enumerated list
Default value: AVERAGE

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STACK Examples

STACK Example One

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*CALL STACK

With this input, the program sums all ensembles. The SCALING option is applied to the data. A
SCALER of .2 is used in the scalar calculation. One trace is output for each ensemble.

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