Data enhancement from a 500-channel streamer

Seismic reflection data obtained with a 500-channel digital streamer cable can be processed by array-forming techniques such as optimal weighting of individual channels and beam-steering. Such processing can improve the resolution of horizons at early and intermediate times as well as enhance the continuity and clarity of later reflections. The data may also be processed to simulate results obtainable with a wide variety of conventional streamers. To demonstrate data enhancement obtained by these processing techniques, a selected line was surveyed in the Gulf of Mexico, first with the 500-channel digital system and then with a conventional 48-channel streamer. Comparison of stacked sections shows that: 1) long steered arrays can enhance deeper events while retaining the high-frequency content of shallow data, and 2) short arrays at small group intervals allow finer vertical resolution of shallow events, as well as finer lateral resolution at all depths. When the digital streamer data were processed to duplicate the 48-channel conventional data, the digital system yielded somewhat better results; this improvement may be attributed in part to inherent advantages of digital telemetry over analog telemetry.