Patent Document ID: 20120316786
Application ID: 13364054
Patent Status: 0

Claim One:
1. A computer-implemented method for creating an image of sub-surface formations in a defined 2D or 3D volume of a geological structure comprising: partitioning a velocity model domain representing geophysical wavefield propagation characteristics of a sub-surface structure of the earth in said defined volume into a plurality of blocks, each block having an associated processing task for processing wave data associated with a shot; receiving, at a local memory storage device, data representing measurements of each wave produced by a shot of a sequence of plural shots; and assigning each partitioned domain block to one or more processing nodes of a distributed processing highly parallel computer device having a plurality of processing nodes interconnected through one or more communication networks; computing, in parallel at a first course resolution, using said associated processing tasks at each said processing node, data representing contributions of forward wave propagation data and reverse wave propagation at that node using said shot measurement data; using said computed forward wave propagation data and reverse wave propagation data contributions stored at each node to form an imaging condition from which an image with a current resolution of sub-surface formations is created; determining whether the sub-surface formations image needs to be examined at a finer resolution, and one of: increasing a spatial resolution of said partitioned domain blocks and repeating said computing process at the increased resolution, or terminating the computing process.