SIGNAL ENHANCEMENT USING DIVERSITY SHOT STACKING FOR REVERSE TIME MIGRATIONS (DeSSeRT)

A method of processing seismic data so as to provide an image of a subsurface region, comprising the steps of:

• a) providing plurality of migrated shot gathers that contain information about the subsurface region
• b) summing the overlapping portions of the migrated shot gathers to provide a pilot stack;
• c) partitioning the plurality of migrated shot gathers into a plurality of groups, and summing the gathers in each group to provide a substack, wherein each group includes at least two migrated shots and wherein a substack is generated from each group;
• d) applying an amplitude normalization algorithm to the pilot stack so as to generate an amplitude-normalized pilot stack;
• e) calculating a weight function by comparing each substack to the amplitude-normalized pilot stack;
• f) weighting each substack using the weight function so as to generate a plurality of weighted sub stacks;
• g) summing the overlapping portions of the weighted substacks so as to generate a output stack;
• and
• h) using the output stack to generate an image of a subsurface region.