Applications of Wave-like Rays for Traveltime Tomography and Depth Imaging

Modeling seismic propagation is critically important to our work, and unhappily we often must trade simulation accuracy for reduced computational expense. We present a seismic modeling method that is as simple and computationally efficient as raytracing, but provides propagation paths and arrival times that are more consistent with finite bandwidth data. A significant benefit of finite frequency wave-like rays is the increased stability of propagation times and paths with respect to small changes in velocity. This leads to increased robustness of tomography and depth imaging, and can improve confidence in downstream interpretation. We refer to the modeling method as "wavetracing", and illustrate the advantages with field data examples for the crosswell seismic geometry.