SEISMIC DATA

LAND SEISMIC
PROCESSING DATA ACQUISITION
 Introduction
• A seismic measurement systems in water and on land consist basically of three
components:
– Seismic source
– Receiver
– Registration unit
 Seismic Source
• Localized region within which a sudden increase in elastic energy leads to
rapid stressing of the surrounding medium.
• Most seismic sources preferentially generate P-waves
– Easier to generate (pressure pulse);
– Easier to record and process (earlier, more impulsive arrivals)
• Requirements
– Broadest possible frequency spectrum;
– Sufficient energy;
– Repeatability;
– Safety - environmental and personnel;
– Minimal cost;
– Minimal coherent (source-induced) noise
• Problem:
– In general: The more energy is emitted the lower the frequency content.
So a good compromise between penetration and resolution must be found.
Seismic/Acoustic spectrum
 Land Source

• Explosives – chemical base

– Steep pressure pulse.
– Shotguns, rifles, blasting caps;
– …bombs, nuclear blasts…
• Surface (mechanical)
– Weight drop, hammer;
– Piezoelectric borehole sources (ultrasound );
• Continuous signal
– Vibroseis (continuously varying frequency, 10-300 Hz)
– Mini-Sosie (multiple impact);
¾ Combination with Vibroseis (Swept Impact Seismic Technique, SIST)
– Drill bit ('Seismic While Drilling’);
– sparkers, ...truck spark plugs.
 Surface Energy Sources
(less powerful, easier access)

• Thumper/weight dropper

• Dynoseis
– Mixture of O2 and propane exploded in an expandable chamber
with a metal plate as the bottom
– Mounted on a truck or used as a buried explosive charge
– Self-disarming (the metal plate rusts through and the gas
dissolves)
 Dynamite (explosive impulsive source):
• Has good, clean impulsive source
• Requires drilling holes of 10-20 feet
• Gelatin dynamite, ammonium nitrate, pentolite (SEIS-X).
• Packaged in tins, cardboard or plastic tubes ~5 cm in diameter (0.5-5 kg each).
• 40% of the seismic measurements
• Not really repeatable
• Exact time of detonation is difficult to obtain
• Detonators are sometimes used for shallow applications
• High energy
• For each application the amount of dynamite can be adjusted
 Criteria for selection of explosives
ƒ Density

– Higher density means the explosive column length is shortened, resulting in an

energy pulse of higher frequency. Higher frequency means better data quality.
Typical values are 1.2-1.8 g/cc.

ƒ Velocity
– Higher velocity means a higher frequency energy pulse will be generated because
the explosive column detonates more quickly. Typical values are 6-8 km/sec.
– Ground velocities < 5 cm/s are considered safe for structures;

ƒ Detonation pressure
– Detonation pressure is an indication of energy released by the detonation. High
detonation pressure is beneficial in seismic blasting. Typical range - 2-4 GPa (70-
250 kBar).

ƒ Self-disarming
– Unexploded charges left in the ground could be hazardous to future drilling or
excavation. Seismic explosives that self-disarm are the best choice.
 Important parameters of an explosion
• Radius of the Explosion Cavity:

R[ ft ] = BW 1/ 3 Weight in lbs
Rock type Granite Chalk Limestone Soft Sandstone Clay

B 0.46 0.6 0.3-1.0 1.3 1.3

• Pulse width: T [ms ] = 2.8W 1/ 3 Pulse width

– Frequency decreases for larger charges.
• Energy:
– Only 4 % (soft sandstone), 9% (clay) to 10-20 % (granite) of chemical energy is radiated as seismic
waves;
– Absorption and scattering cause energy loss:
• At 3 m from the source, there remains 2.5 % of available energy;
• At 30 m - 0.5 %.
• Effects of shot depth:
– If water table is shallow - place shots below it
– Seismic amplitude increases as the shot depth decreases;
¾ However, ground roll becomes broadband and hard to attenuate.
Charge emplacement
 Mechanism of generation
of seismic waves by explosion

• Stage 1: Detonation.
– Start of explosion - electric pulse ignites the blasting cap placed inside the charge. The pulse is
also transmitted to recorder to set t = 0;
– Disturbance propagates at ~ 6-7 km/s (supersonic velocity); surrounding medium is unaffected;
– The explosive becomes hot gas of the same density as the solid - hence its pressure is very high
(several GPa)
• Stage 2: Pressure pulse spreads out spherically as an inelastic shock wave
– Stresses >> material strength;
– Extensive cracking in the vicinity of the charge.

• Stage 3: At some distance, the stress equals the elastic limit

– Pressure pulse keeps spreading out spherically as an elastic wave.
 Standard for minimum distances
• International Association of Geophysical Contractors:
– Pipelines - 60 m;
– Telephone lines - 12 m;
– Railroad tracks - 30 m;
– Electric lines - 24 m;
– Oil wells - 60 m;
– Water wells, cisterns, masonry buildings – 90 m.

• Ground velocity of 5 cm/s is considered 'safe' for structures

– For seismic explosives, achieved at distances x = 23m1/3 m, where m is
the charge in kg.
 Vibroseis
Used in > ½ of land seismic exploration

• Vibroseis
– Energy introduced into the Earth in the form of a sweep of varying frequency for
several seconds
• Typical sweep time - 7-35 s;
¾ ~45 minutes in recent mantle investigations
• Typical frequencies - 12 -> 60 Hz (upsweep) or 60 ->12 Hz (downsweep);
• Low energy density - environmentally friendly;
• Time-Distributed signal - lower noise requirements.
• A control signal causes a vibrator to exert variable pressure on a
steel plate pressed against the Earth.
– Radio-controlled hydraulics allows syn-phase vibration of a group of vibrators;
– Shear-wave vibrators also shake the ground in horizontal directions
Vibroseis
• Large, heavy trucks to shake the ground
• Produces a “chirped” signal that must be
compressed by processing
• Can be used where shots are prohibited –
highways, cities, parks
Mini-Vibroseis
Seismic Imaging of Anticline
 Vibroseis Correlation

• Recorded signal is cross-correlated with the sweep sent into the ground
– As a result, matching waveform patterns (caused by reflections) are identified;
– The signal is compressed in time - the energy of the entire sweep is condensed into a
single pulse.
 Other Land Sources
(for shallow or mine investigations)

• Sosie, Mini-Sosie, SIST

– Impactor hits ground 5-15 times per second, in ~3-min long, pseudo-random series.

• Sparkers
SEISMIC RECEIVER
Historical geophones
 Refraction and Reflection
Geophones
• A variety of frequencies and styles
– 1-100 Hz (natural frequencies);
– Typically work OK up to 20 times their natural frequencies.

1 Hz
4-5 Hz
 3-component (3C)
Geophone
• 3-component geophones contain 3 sensors mounted in the same body, at 90° to
each other.
 Electromechanical Geophone
Most of the geophones are based on the
principle of a moving coil as in the picture
below. The cylindrical coil is suspended
in a magnetic field by a leaf-spring. The
passage of a seismic wave at the surface
causes a physical displacement of the
ground which moves the geophone case
and magnet in sympathy with the ground
but relatively to the coil because of its
inertia.This relative movement of the
magnet with respect to the coil results in a
small voltage being generated across the
terminals of the coil in proportion to the
relative velocity of the two components.
Geophones thus respond to the rate of
movement of the ground (i.e. particle
velocity) not to the amount of movement
or displacement.
 Geophone-Group (Array)

• To amplify the wanted signals and to suppress the unwanted signals

like surfacewaves
• The signal of the separate geophones are added to one signal for the
whole geophone group.
• The directional response of any linear array is governed by the
relationship between the apparent wavelength λa of a wave in the
derection of the array, the number of elements n in the array and their
spacing ∆x.
Response functions for different detector arrays depending on the ratio of the detector
spacing and the apparent wavelengths for different numbers of geophones.
 Seismic Recording System

amplifier

A/D Filter
converter
*S ∇R

Trace
Display

Recording

Tape
storage
 Digital cable recording systems

• For shallow and engineering work;

• Battery-powered;
• Based on a PC, typically 24-96
channels.
 Scalable portable digital cable
recording systems
• Lightweight, battery-operated;
• Data download via standard Internet connection to a laptop;
• 24-channel systems chained up to a 1000 channels.
 Sampling
By measurements using a digital system, the data is not continuously measured,
but at a specific time interval measured and transported to the AD-converter.

Analogue representation of a Digital representation of a

sinusoidal function sinusoidal function
 Aliasing
Sampling frequency is the number of sampling points in unit time or unit distance.
Thus if a waveform is sampled every two miliseconds (sampling interval:∆t=0.002),
the sampling frequency is 500 samples per second (or 500 Hz). Sampling at this rate
will preserve all frequencies up to 250 Hz in the sampled function. This frequency of
half the sampling frequency is known as the Nyquist frequency (fN) and the Nyquist
interval is the frequency range from zero up to fN.
fN=1/2∆t

No information is lost as long as the frequency of sampling is at least twice as high

as the highest frequency component in the sampled data.
 Multiplexer
Older systems or systems with many separate channels do not have for each separate channel a
separate AD converter or enough writing capacity to save all data from one shot. To solve this
problem all the values at the separate channels are sampled for each time sample, after which all
values for the next time sample are sampled and recorded. The data are not ordered for each
channel (channel 1, channel 2 channel 3 etc.), but for each time sample (Timesample 1 – all
channels, Timesample 2 - all channels, etc.). For the processing all channels must be sorted
out which is called: Demultiplexen.
 Acquisition setup
• Single channel measurements (profiling)
Only one source and receiver are used with often an equal distance between the source
and receiver. This is repeated for several positions along a line.
• Multi channel measurements
– Multi channel systems use one source and several receivers, which
measure at the same time.
Several spreads are possible to orient the sources and receiver:

Types of reflection spreads. The symbol o and + represent source and geophone-group center
locations, respectively.
 CDP, CMP and Zero-Offset, Common offset
• There are different possibilities to sort the data:
– Common shot - all traces, that belong to the same shot
– Common midpoint (CMP) - all traces with the same midpoint
– Common receiver - all traces, recorded with the same geophone
– Common offset - all traces with the same offset between shot and geophone

Difference between CMP and CDP: For a horizontal Reflector all traces that have the same midpoint, have also
the same reflectionpoint in the subsurface. Is the layer inclined than the traces have a different reflection point.
 Zero offset

• Zero offset data is characterised when the source and receiver are present on
the same location.
• There is no moveout. For a normal measurement this is seldom the case. When
the traces are corrected for the moveout and are stacked then a zero offset trace
is obtained.
 Common offset

All traces with equal offset between source and receiver. This configuration is
often used for several Single channel systems. Also Georadar measurements are
often carried out with a fixed offset between source and receiver.
 Fold

• The fold indicates the number of traces per CDP. This is often the number of
traces in a CMP. The theoretical formula for the fold is given by:

Fold = (Number of Geophones . Distance between Geophones)/2.Distance between shots

• The number of traces which are measured at a certain geophone position is

called “surface fold”
 Seismic Spreads

• The source to receiver configuration is referred to as the spread

• As the seismic crew moves, geophones at the rear of the spread are moved to the front so
that the spread leap-frogs ahead
 Seismic Spreads

• Single-sided spread
– Pushing, geophones ahead
of shot
– Pulling, geophones behind
shot

• Split-spread
Seismic Spreads
 The Common Midpoint Sort

• The common midpoint sort coverts shot gathers to common midpoint gathers
– Shot gathers have all stations recording a single shot; this is the
way the data is recorded.
– Common midpoint gathers have all the shot-receiver paths with the
same midpoint; this is the processing geometry.
Shot gathers and midpoints
CMP gathers now
Shot gathers, skipped shots
Effect of shot skips on final stack
Shot geometry variables
Shot geometry
 Split-spread source geometry

Raw field records from a land survey. Note the rapid decay in amplitude at late times
 Shot gathers

The beginning of the line is called the roll-in, the end is the roll-out
 Stacking diagram
Shot into 6 stations to give 3 fold data
Stacking diagram
A hypothetical stacking chart. Each dot
represent a single trace with the time axis
perpendicular to the plane of the page. Shot
geophone (s,g), and mid point-offset (y,h)
coordinates are superimposed with the (y,h)
plane rotated 45 degrees with respect to the
(s,g) plane. Here, (1) is common-shot gather,
(2) is common-receiver gather, (3) is CMP
gather, (4) is a common-offset section, and
(5) is a CMP stacked section.
Stacking diagram
 The seismic Trace
In Seismic reflection surveys we measure the ground motion over a short interval
of time following the triggering of a nearby seismic source. The graphical plot of
the output of a single detector is called a Seismogram or seismic trace;

The properties of the geological subsoil (density and seismic velocity) determine
the acoustic impedance of a layer. From these impedances the reflectivity function
of an interface can be derived. This function is convolved with the signal of the
seismic wave. The result is a seismic trace, on which also noise is add.

Remark: note that the wave travels half of the time downwards and the other half
upwards. This must be taken into account when the source signal is convolved
with the reflectivity function.
 Seismogram
Geological Accoustic Refflectionc Reflectivity Input seismic
section impedance coefficient coefficient pulse trace
log log

From a geological subsoil to a seismic trace.

Waves

1 2π
period τ = =
f ω
2π
wavenumber k =
λ
velocity v = λ. f
Important wave forms
 Minimum phase and zero-phase wavelet

Energy is maximally front-loaded

(Energy does not arrive before zero time) Symmetric with respect to zero time
and peaks at zero time
(Energy arrives also before zero time)
 Waveform
The most important waveforms in seismic are shown in the figure below
and are the
• Minimum-Phase wavelet
• zero phase wavelet

The most important waveforms in seismics:

(a) Minimum-Wavelet and

(b) Zero-Phase Wavelet.
Both waveforms are shown with normal and
reverse polarity.
 Representation
The traveltime is in general shown with increasing time along the vertical Increasing downwards
(larger traveltime corresponds to a larger depth). There are several ways to represent seismic
traces. The sort of representation depend on the processing used, but also on the number of traces.

Reflectivity Wiggle Variable Variable Variable

series only area density area+wiggle

Different representations of a seismic trace.

Various ways to display seismograms:

Wiggle trace/ Wiggle trace

Variable trace
Variable trace
 Representations of a seismic trace.
• Wiggle
– For the simplest representation the amplitude is depicted as a curve (Wiggle).

• Variable area+wiggle
– When there are more traces then the result is disordered. The right half of the trace
is drawn black. Standard (set by SEG) is: the positive half of the wave on the right
site is colored black. This is in seismics the most used representation.

• Variable area
– When a lot of traces are depicted close to each other, then most of the time only the
positive half of the traces is plotted. (e.g. for smaller version of seismic sections.).
To suppress noise one often plot only a part of the half of the waves(Variable
Amplitude).

• Variable density
– For the interpretation the amplitudes are often plotted in different grayscales or
colours (“variable density”). This is standard for Georadar or seismic
Interpretation. In this way the differences in amplitudes are more clear.
 Events in a seismic trace
• The important elements are
– Reflections
– Refractions
– Interface waves
– Multiples
– Noise
Reflections, Refractions and interface
waves are already discussed
 Noise
The S/N ratio “Signal-to-noise ratio” gives the ratio between the amplitude of a
signal (e.g.Reflections) to background noise(“random noise”) or noise sources
(“coherent noise”).

One aim of the dataprocessing is to increase the S/N ratio.

 Coherent Noise
• Sided-scattered noise
From irregularities or the point scatters

• Multiples (repeated pattern)

Ghost, Simple multiple, Water-bottom multiple,
Peg-leg multiple, Inter-bed multiple

• Vibration noise

• Interface wave

• Ground roll (Rayleigh surface waves on land survey)

Low frequency
Strong amplitude
Low group velocity

• Guided waves (refractions and head waves on shallow marine survey)

Strong velocity contrast with the substratum
Early arrivals
 Multiples
• Long-path multiples
– (occur when exceptionally large reflectioncoefficients are present):
-> Ghost reflections, where rays from a buried explosion on land (or an
airgun in water) are reflected back from the ground surface (or sea
surface) to produce a reflection event, known as a ghost reflection, that
arrives a short time after the primary.
-> Water layer reverberations, where rays from a marine source are
repeatedly reflected at the sea bed and sea surface

• Short-part multiples (“peg-leg multiple”):

– Involve only a short additional path length to arrive so soon after the
primary event that they extend the overall length of the pulse. (Multiples
between two interfaces of a layer)
 Random Noise

• Instrument noise

• Machinery

• Power line

• Cable noise
A, B, C, D are guided waves
trapped (refracted waves) at the sea
floor. They have a dispersive
character with low frequencies C
arriving first, higher frequencies B
arriving next, and moderate
frequencies D arriving last
A = weak reflectors
B = strong reflectors
C suggests a fault in spread
D = ground roll

Deep water shot record

• A is direct arrival
• B is water-bottom reflection
• C is shallow reflection
• M is 1rst water-bottom multiple, note double
time of B
• PL is water-bottom and peg-leg multiples of C
 Resolution
Resolution refers to the minimum separation between two features such that we
can tell that there are two features rather than only one.

Comparison between the wavelength of a 30-Hz Signal, Big Ben and a Log of a drilling.
 Vertical resolution
Vertical resolution means: How thick must a layer be, to discern the top
and bottom of the specific layer. Theoretically, a layer can be
distinguished when it has a thickness of ¼ wavelength (Rayleigh-Kriterium).
Resolution of two boundaries depends on
wavelength

Decreasing image separation

 Lateral Resolution

The lateral resolution depends on the distance between the source and receiver at
the surface and the depth of the layer. Energy that is returned to a detector within
half a wavelength of the initial reflected arrival interferes constructively to build
up the reflected signal, and the part of the interface from which this energy is
returned is known as the first Fresnel zone, or, simply, Fresnel zone.

The width of the Fresnel zone represents an absolute limit on the horizontal
resolution of a reflection survey since reflections separated by a distance smaller
than this cannot be individually distinguished. The width w of the Fresnel zone is
related to the dominant wavelength λ of the source and the reflector depth z by

w= 2zλ
for z>> λ.
Horizontal Resolution
 Fresnel Zone Examples
r2 ~ h/2

Reflector Velocity Frequency Zone Diameter

Depth
1000 m 2000 m/s 60 Hz 260 m

30 Hz 370 m

4000 m 3500 m/s 50 Hz 750 m

20 Hz 1200 m
 Sampling theorem

• At least two samples per (horizontal) apparent wavelength

must be obtained in order to recognize Features (remember
the time sampling theorem!!).

• For example, to recognize a stream channel on a horizontal

slice generally requires bin sizes no larger than 1/3 or ¼
the channel width.