Understanding a Doodlebugger

Brian Schulte

…Dedicated to all those who work on a seismic crew, and the ones who love these people. When I started to study Geology at the University of Calgary I never realized that my career would take me to some of the more interesting points in the world. I remember sitting…

Optimal marine streamer acquisition with High-Density 3D

Andrew Long, Bill Pramik and Marie Dunn

…Introduction Our goal with the reflection seismic experiment is to obtain the most clearly defined, high-resolution image of the subsurface geology, free of contaminating noise. This goal can be achieved by acquiring seismic surveys with dense and even sampling in both time and space. Historically though, 3D marine streamer acquisition…

AVO Modeling in Seismic Processing and Interpretation II. Methodologies

Yongyi Li, Jonathan Downton, and Yong Xu

…Introduction Zoeppritz’s equations with ray tracing and full elastic wave equation with finite difference method (FDM) are two most commonly used techniques in AVO modeling. The main difference between these two techniques is the former calculates the primary-only reflectivities and the latter calculates particle displacements in subsurface. Zoeppritz modeling has…

Frank Van Humbeck

An Interview with Frank Van Humbeck

…[Satinder]: Frank, let us begin by asking you about your educational background and your work experience? I grew up on a farm in central Alberta, near Rimbey, and graduated from high school in 1968. I then went on to the University of Alberta, and graduated from there with a Bachelor…

Executive Message

…It has been a pleasure and an honour to serve the Society these past three years. Reflecting back upon these years, I have noticed that the Society has changed appreciably. The Society has grown in many respects. Philosophically, it is now being run like a business. Like any business, it…

Tracing the Industry

…New job announcements... Arcis Corporation is pleased to announce that Richard Pearcy has joined the Arcis team as VP Sales. Richard brings to Arcis a wealth of sales and geophysical knowledge accumulated over his 27 years within the oil and gas industry. He's worked on the service side of the…

Grapevine

…376 Calgarians Attend SEC in Dallas The SEG Conference in Dallas, Texas was held on October 26 - 31st, 2003. There were many Calgary based companies who headed south of the border this year to exhibit at the conference including, Kelman Technologies, GEDCO, Trango Software, Divestco lnc., Geo-X Systems, CGG,…

Gabor Deconvolution: extending Wiener’s method to nonstationarity

Gary Margrave, Linping Dong, Peter Gibson, Jeff Grossman, Dave Henley, and Michael Lamoureux

…Summary Seismic data is arguably always nonstationary in its Fourier spectral character since anelastic attenuation processes are present everywhere. The major mathematical tool for dealing with this effect in seismic data processing is the Wiener deconvolution algorithm, which is at least a half century old. Paradoxically, this algorithm assumes that…

The bleeding edge of seismic imaging, 2003

Samuel H. Gray

…Introduction Earlier this year, James Sun and I gave a CSEG Luncheon presentation describing the current state of the art of seismic depth migration, as it applies to Canadian basins. Our overview was aimed at bridging the gap between depth migration and velocity analysis methods routinely applied today, and newer…

2004 Election of Officers Candidates

…ED LALANDE For Vice-President I graduated in 1975 from the U. of A. with a B.Sc. In Geophysics, and promptly headed to the field to start my career as a geophysicist in mining. After a couple of years tromping around the Territories and N. Saskatchewan, looking for uranium, I was…

Some Issues related to Seismic Imaging in Deep-Water Basins

Mike Hall

…Introduction Obtaining high fidelity seismic images in deep water basins has several challenges. These run from the issues of dealing with noise to building accurate interval velocity models for Pre-Stack Depth Migration (PreSDM). Exploration, and development, in such basins is commonly associated with deep targets that may well be associated…

AVO Modeling in Seismic Processing and Interpretation Part 1. Fundamentals

Yongyi Li, Jonathan Downton, and Yong Xu

…Introduction AVO analysis is an effective technique in reservoir characterization and its success relies on not only the quality of recorded seismic data but also data processing and understanding of rock physical properties. Since AVO modeling is able to link rock properties to offset-dependent amplitude responses, it is a tool…

Propagation of borehole derived properties via a Support Vector Machine (SVM)

Yexin Liu and Mauricio D. Sacchi

…Introduction Rock mechanical properties are an essential piece of information for applications like borehole instabilities analysis during drilling. It is estimated that borehole instability problems cost the oil industry worldwide about 1.0 billion dollars per year (Erling, et al., 1996). Traditional methods of propagating mechanical properties from a given borehole…

Presidents of geotechnical/professional societies and associations

An Interview with Presidents of geotechnical/professional societies and associations

…Could you briefly review your educational background and professional experience for the information of our members? [Peter]: I received my B.Sc. in 1973 at the University of New Brunswick (Physics and Geology), and my M.Sc. (1975) and Ph.D. (1978), both at the University of Toronto, both in Geophysics. I began…

Executive Message

…I was asked by Satinder to consider doing an Executive Message. Now I’m not a voting member of the CSEG executive, but a salaried employee of society. So I’m figuring that he (Satinder) is scraping the proverbially bottom of the message barrel, and I’m thinking what the hell, the publicity…

CAGC Column

…A few short days and Christmas will be upon us. It has been an interesting year in the markets and global community. We have seen markets rebound some 25 to 30 % this past year. However as always the oil and gas companies continue to struggle at the hands of…

Tracing the Industry

…Scott MacKay has left his position of Manger of R&D for WesternGeco and has joined Custer Resources LLC as a Senior Advisor in matters of seismic acquisition, processing, and interpretation. Scott is based in Evergreen Colorado and can be reached at (720) 560-8613 and email scottmackay@custerres.com. Effective October 1, 2003,…

Grapevine

…Get Your Brooms Ready for the 32nd Annual Doodlespiel! The 2004 Doodlespiel Committee has been busy organizing this year’s curling bonspiel in Banff, Alberta. The three-day event will be held on January 30th, 2004 through to February 2nd, 2004. Doodlespiel entries must be sent in no later than December 14th,…

Successful AVO and Cross-plotting

Satinder Chopra, Vladimir Alexeev, Yong Xu

…Introduction Cross-plotting has evolved to be a widely used technique in AVO analysis, as it enables the simultaneous and meaningful evaluation of two attributes with ease. Generally, common lithology units and fluid types cluster together in AVO cross plot space, allowing identification of both the background lithology trends and anomalous…

Coal-Bearing Formations and Coalbed-Methane Potential in the Alberta Plains and Foothills

Andrew Beaton

…Abstract Alberta contains substantial coal resources in the Plains and Foothills. Coal rank ranges from lignite and subbituminous in the eastern Plains, up to low-volatile bituminous and anthracite in the Foothills/Mountains. Potential coalbed methane targets exist in the Scollard Fm. (Ardley coal zone), Horseshoe Canyon Fm. (Carbon-Thompson, Drumheller coal zones),…