oa Interdisciplinary Approach To Maximize Benefits of Prestack Depth Migration

The advent of massively parallel computers has made the use of fast, efficient, accurate, 3D prestack depth migration (PSDM) a viable option for the exploration and production of hydrocarbons. However, it is still a significant investment in terms of computer resources, time, money, and personnel to carry out this process. Therefore, we need a methodology to intelligently utilize this new tool and to manage the associated technical risks and expectations. In this paper, we suggest an integrated, staged approach to both predict where it's beneficial, and to anticipate its results within an acceptable confidence level. Thus we avoid the temptation to abuse PSDM as a brute force tool on all imaging problems and instead maximize our potential benefits by knowing how to apply it judiciously.