‘Lobster’ nodes: Designing a unique FWI OBN survey at Atlantis field

There have been numerous examples lately in the literature showing the successful application of full waveform inversion (FWI) providing a detailed subsurface model. Recently a derivative product of FWI; FWI image or FWI-derived reflectivity (FDR) has shown significant uplift over conventional images. The Atlantis field in the Gulf of America has seen these substantial improvements in seismic image fidelity because of the application of FWI. However, there remain areas at Atlantis—especially beneath the highly complicated salt overburden—where the image quality is still deficient for future field development. To help address this limitation, we designed a targeted long-offset OBN acquisition specifically aimed at increasing diving-wave illumination in a key subsalt region of interest. We went to the field and acquired this unique ‘lobster’ node layout and preliminary elastic FWI results have validated this design.