THE PERFORMANCE OF OPTIMUM STACKING FILTERS IN SUPPRESSING UNCORRELATED NOISE*

Optimum stacking filters based on estimates of trace signal‐to‐uncorrelated noise ratios are assessed and compared in performance with conventional straight stacking. It is shown that for the trace durations and signal bandwidths normally encountered in seismic reflection data the errors in estimating signal/noise ratios largely counteract the theoretical advantages of the optimum filter. The more specific the filter (e.g. the more frequency components included in its design) the more this is true. Even for a simple weighted stack independent of frequency, the performance is likely to be better than a straight (equal weights) stack only for relatively high signal/noise ratios, when the performance is not critical anyway.