Shaded Relief in OpendTect Pro / Dip-Steering A seismic (dip-)steering cube is a foundational element in any OpendTect Pro interpretation project. Steering cubes store informati...
Shaded Relief in OpendTect Pro / Dip-Steering
A seismic (dip-)steering cube is a foundational element in any OpendTect Pro interpretation project. Steering cubes store information about the dip-field of a seismic volume (3D) or seismic lines (2D). They are essential for:
- Computing dip-steered multi-trace attributes and filters (structurally oriented filters). - Deriving attributes from the steering cube, such as volume curvature attributes. - Tracking horizons using inversion-based flattening (3D) or dip-steering (2D).
In this post, we introduce the “Apparent Dip” attribute (3D only). Apparent Dip is available as an option under the Dip attribute, which also includes inline dip, crossline dip, polar dip, and azimuth. Apparent Dip represents the seismic reflector dip in a user-specified direction and is OpendTect’s attribute for shaded relief displays.
In shaded relief displays, a 2D time-slice resembles a 3D topographic map, highlighting structural elements such as synclines, anticlines, folds, domes, faults, and channels. On a vertical section, it looks like a rugged canyon wall. Shaded relief interpretation is especially useful during the reconnaissance phase of a project, providing an intuitive 3D-like understanding of the data's structural complexity.
The accompanying video demonstrates Apparent Dip on a time-slice from the free Delft 3D dataset (available at www.terrabis.com). The time-slice cuts through the Top Holland horizon at 760 ms. Shaded relief displays on this time-slice clearly show anticlinal structures from three different viewing directions, each revealing distinct structural details.
author: Paul de Groot #opendtect, #seismic, #seismicinterpretation,
