What is it about?
Virtual reality has revolutionized the gaming and entertainment industries but has had little impact on the field of scientific visualization. This is especially true in oil and gas exploration where we continue to visualize seismic data using low visual resolution (LVR) displays developed in the 1960s and 1970s. Today, however, virtual reality technology can revolutionize seismic interpretation by revealing previously unobservable seismic details. In this paper I introduce the subject of high visual resolution interpretation (HVRI) and present examples of seismic data in virtual seismic reality.
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Why is it important?
Today, we need more subsurface details from our seismic data than we have ever needed before. This is not only for oil and gas exploration but also for monitoring carbon storage sights and planning offshore wind farms. Our research into HVRI strongly suggests that those details are already in the seismic data but are below the visual resolution of 1970's vintage LVR seismic displays. HVRI is important because missing those previously unobservable details can lead to both economic and environmental disasters.
Perspectives
I hope that this article will help both individuals, and the exploration industry as a whole, shake off the inertia of using what have become almost traditional seismic displays. Today, we invest vast amounts of money acquiring and processing what we believe is the best seismic data possible. But then we obliterate most of the information within it by displaying it using archaic technologies. This is wasteful and economically unjustifiable. HVRI is in its infancy and needs industry support to reach its full potential. I hope that this paper makes people think and stirs them to action.
Steven Lynch
Society of Exploration Geophysicists
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: High visual resolution interpretation: The case for virtual seismic reality, The Leading Edge, August 2023, Society of Exploration Geophysicists,
DOI: 10.1190/tle42080541.1.
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