A new look at

seismic attributes
Brian Russell

Introduction
Seismic attributes have evolved into a set of seemingly
unrelated methods:

Instantaneous attributes,
Windowed frequency attributes,
Coherency and semblance attributes,
Curvature attributes,
Phase congruency, etc.

In this talk, I want to make sense of all these attributes by

showing how they are inter-related.
In particular, I will close the loop between instantaneous
attributes and trace-by-trace correlation attributes.
To illustrate the various methods, I will use the Boonsville
dataset, a karst limestone example from Texas.
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The Boonsville dataset

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Hardage et al., 1996

The Boonsville gas

field in north Texas
(Hardage et al., 1996)
is controlled by karst
collapse features,
making it ideal for
studying attributes.
A dataset over the
field was made
available by the Texas
Bureau of Economic
Geology.
The study area is
shown on the left.
3

Boonsville Geology
In the Boonsville gas field, production is from the Bend
conglomerate, a middle Pennsylvanian clastic deposited in a
fluvio-deltaic environment.
The Bend formation is underlain by Paleozoic carbonates,
the deepest being the Ellenburger Group of Ordovician age.
The Ellenburger contains numerous karst collapse features
which extend up to 760 m from basement through the Bend
conglomerate, shown here in schematic:

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Lucia (1995)

A seismic volume
The 3D seismic
volume is shown here
in grey level variable
density format.
It consists of 97
inlines and 133
crosslines, each with
200 samples (800
1200 ms).
The karst features are
illustrated by the red
ellipses.
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Crossline or
y direction

Inline or
x direction
Time or t
direction

Slices through the volume

Here are vertical and horizontal slices through
the seismic volume:

Inline
146
1000
ms

Inline seismic section 146

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Time slice at 1000 ms

Note the karst feature at the east end of the line.

A brief history of attributes

The first attributes were single trace instantaneous
attributes, introduced by Taner et al. (1979).
Barnes (1996) extended these attributes to 2D and 3D.
From 1995-1999, Amoco researchers introduced two new
types of spatial attributes:
Spectral decomposition, based on the Fourier transform.
Coherency, based on trace-to-trace correlation.

Roberts (2001) introduced curvature attributes.

Marfurt et al. (2006) then showed the relationship between
instantaneous attributes and dip and curvature.
We shall also discuss the phase congruency attribute
(Kovesi, 1996) which was developed in image analysis.
A good place to start is with the Fourier transform.
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The Fourier transform

The Fourier transform (FT) takes a real time signal s(t) and
transforms it to a complex frequency signal S(w):

s(t ) S (w ) S (w ) e (w ) , where

w 2f , f frequency, S (w ) the Fourier transform of s(t ),

S (w ) amplitude spectrum, and (w ) phase spectrum, of s(t ).
We can also perform the inverse transform from frequency
back to time.
In using the FT for attribute analysis, note that it operates
on the complete seismic trace, so cannot be localized at a
time sample to give an instantaneous attribute value.
Partyka et al. (1999) used the FT over small seismic
windows to compute the spectral decomposition attribute.
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Spectral decomposition

x
time

x
Fourier
Transform

frequency

As shown here, spectral decomposition involves taking a small

window around a zone of interest (here: 1000 ms +/- 50 ms)
and transforming each trace window to the frequency domain.
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Spectral slices

Data slice

5 Hz

10 Hz

25 Hz

30 Hz

35 Hz

15 Hz

40 Hz

20 Hz

45 Hz

Spectral slices at various frequencies, compared with seismic amplitude.

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10

Spectral decomposition limitations

As seen in the previous slide, each frequency slice in a
spectral decomposition reveals a different underlying channel
structure in the original seismic amplitude slice.
However, this can be seen as a limitation since we really
dont know which slice to use.
Also, as the size of the window decreases, the frequency
resolution also decreases.
This resolution was improved by Sinha et al. (2005) using the
continuous wavelet transform.
However, the fact that each frequency slice gives a different
result still remained.
This leads us to the concept of instantaneous attributes,
including instantaneous frequency.
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The complex time signal

Instantaneous attributes are based on the concept of the
complex time signal, invented by Gabor in 1947 in a classic
paper called Theory of communication.
Since the Fourier transform of a real signal has a symmetric
shape on both the positive and negative frequency side,
Gabor proposed suppressing the amplitudes belonging to
negative frequencies, and multiplying the amplitudes of the
positive frequencies by two.
An inverse transformation to time gives the following
complex signal:
z (t ) s(t ) ih (t ) where :

z (t ) the complex signal, i 1,

and h(t ) the Hilbert transform of s(t ).
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12

The Hilbert transform

The Hilbert transform is a filter which applies a 90o phase
shift to every sinusoidal component of a signal.
Notice that the complex trace can be transformed from
rectangular to polar coordinates, as shown below, to give the
instantaneous amplitude A(t) and instantaneous phase F(t):
z (t ) s(t ) ih (t ) A(t )eiF ( t )
A(t ) cos F (t ) iA(t ) sin F (t ), where :

h(t)
A(t)

f(t)
s(t)

time
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h(t )
A(t ) s(t )2 h(t )2 , F (t ) tan 1
.

s(t )

The complex trace was introduced into

geophysics by Taner et al. (1979), who
also discussed its digital implementation.
13

Instantaneous frequency
Taner et al. (1979) also introduced the instantaneous
frequency of the seismic trace, which was initially derived
by J. Ville in a 1948 paper entitled: Thorie et applications
de la notion de signal analytique.
The instantaneous frequency is the time derivative of the
instantaneous phase:
dh(t )
ds(t )
s(t )
h(t )
dF(t ) d tan1 (h(t ) / s(t ) )
dt
dt
w (t )

A(t )2
dt
dt
Note that to compute w(t) we need to differentiate both the
seismic trace and its Hilbert transform.
Like the Hilbert transform, the derivative applies a 90o phase
shift, but it also applies a high frequency ramp.
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14

Instantaneous attributes
+1.0

+1.0

This figure shows

the instantaneous
attributes
associated with
the seismic
amplitude slice at
1000 ms.

Data slice

-1.0
+180o

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Inst. Phase

-180o

Inst. Amp.
Inst. Freq.

0.0
120 Hz

0 Hz

15

New attributes
Attribute analysis until the mid-90s was thus based on the
three basic attributes introduced by Gabor and Ville in the
1940s: instantaneous amplitude, phase, and frequency.
Then, in the space of two years, papers on two new
approaches to attribute analysis appeared:
The coherency method (Bahorich and Farmer, 1995)
2-D (and 3-D) complex trace analysis (Barnes, 1996)
The coherency method was a new approach which utilized
cross-correlations between traces.
The paper by Barnes actually showed how instantaneous
attributes and aspects of coherency were related.
However, let us first discuss the coherency method.
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16

The coherency method

The first coherency method involved finding the maximum
correlation coefficients between adjacent traces in the x
and y directions, and taking their harmonic average.
Marfurt et al. (1998) extended this by computing the
semblance of all combinations of J traces in a window.
This involves searching over
all x dips p and y dips q, over
a 2M + 1 sample window:
x
y
q dip
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Marfurt et al. (1998)

2M+1 samples

p dip
17

Coherency mathematics
If the covariance matrix between all locations i and j is:

c11 c1J
Mt
C ( p, q) , cij si (t pxi qyi ) s j (t px j qy j ),

t Mt
cJ 1 cJJ
then the two coherency measures are as follows:
1/ 2

a T C ( p, q ) a
c12
c13
and coh2 max
coh1 max
,

1/ 2
1/ 2
(c11c22 ) (c11c33 )
TrC ( p, q)
where a T 1, , 1 and TrC ( p, q) sum of main diagonal of C ( p, q).

A third measure, called eigen-coherence (Gursztenkorn and

Marfurt, 1999), is:

1
coh3 max
, 1 first eigenvalue of C ( p, q).

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TrC ( p, q)

18

Coherency slice
1.1

0.7
+1.0

The x, y and z slices through a coherency

volume with the 1000 ms data and coherency
slices on the right. Note the low amplitude
discontinuities and the highlighted event.
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Data slice

-1.0

19

Dip and azimuth attributes

At first glance, there appears to be no relationship between
instantaneous attributes and coherency.
However, notice that in the coherency method it is important
to find the x and y dips, called p and q.
The paper by Barnes (1996) introduced two new spatial
instantaneous attributes and showed how these attributes
could be used to find both the dips and the azimuth.
These concepts are even more important when we look at the
relationship between instantaneous attributes and curvature.
Barnes (1996) also discussed instantaneous bandwidth and
phase versus group velocity based on the work of Scheuer
and Oldenburg (1988).
However, in the following slides I will only discuss his new
spatial attributes.

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20

New instantaneous attributes

Re-visiting our earlier
3D dataset, notice that
we only computed the
frequency attribute in
the time direction
Since the Hilbert
transform is actually a
function of three
coordinates (i.e. F(t,x,y))
we can also compute
spatial frequencies in
the inline (x) and
crossline (y) directions.
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Crossline or
y direction

Inline or
x direction

Time or t
direction

21

Instantaneous wavenumber
Analogous to instantaneous frequency, Barnes (1996)
therefore defined the instantaneous wavenumbers kx and
ky (using the Marfurt (2006) notation):

h
s
s h
F(t , x, y )
kx
x 2 x , and
x
A
h
s
s h
F (t , x, y )
y
y
ky

.
2
y
A
As with instantaneous frequency, the derivative operation
can be done either in the frequency domain or using
finite differencing up to a given order.
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Dip and azimuth attributes

The instantaneous time dips in the x and y direction, p
and q, are given as:

kx

and q

ky

where : T period and wavelengt h.

Using the dips p and q, the azimuth f and true time dip
q are then given by:

f tan1 ( p / q) tan1 (k x / k y ),
and q
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p 2 q2 .
23

The dip attribute in 2D

= 36 traces
T = 50 ms
dip = 1.4
ms/trace

To understand this concept, I created a seismic volume that

consisted of a dipping cosine wave. The period, wavelength
and time dip are shown on the plot.
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24

Dip and azimuth attributes

Next, lets look at the
dipping cosine wave
in 3D.
In this display, we
have sliced it along
the x, y and time
axes.
For this dipping
event, it is clear how
the dips and
azimuths are related
to the instantaneous
frequency and
wavenumbers.
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ky

kx
q

ky

kx

w
f

ky
kx

25

Examples
Next, we will illustrate these instantaneous spatial
attributes using the Boonsville dataset.
There are many possible displays based on the building
blocks for these attributes.
These include the derivatives of seismic amplitude, Hilbert
transform and phase in the t, x, and y directions, the three
frequencies, and p, q, true dip and azimuth.
Note that the many divisions involved in the computations
make this method very sensitive to noise when compared
to correlation based methods.
In the following displays, I show the true dip and azimuth.
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True dip volume

Seismic with 3 x 3 alpha-trim mean

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True dip
27

Azimuth volume

Seismic with 3 x 3 alpha-trim mean

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Azimuth
28

Curvature attributes
Roberts (2001) shows that curvature can be estimated from
a time structure map by fitting the local quadratic surface
given by:

t ( x, y ) ax 2 by 2 cxy dx ey f
This is a combination of an ellipsoid and a dipping plane.

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29

Curvature attributes
Roberts (2001) computes the curvature attributes by first
picking a 3D surface on the seismic data and then finding the
coefficients a through f from the map grid shown below:
x
t1

t2

t3

t4

t5

t6

t7

t8

t9

As an example, the coefficient d,

which is the linear dip in the x
direction, is computed by:

t (t3 t6 t9 ) (t1 t4 t7 )
d

x
2x

Klein et al. (2008) show how to generalize this to each point

on the seismic volume by finding the optimum time shift
between pairs of traces using cross-correlation.
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30

Curvature attributes
The coefficients d and e are identical to dips p and q defined
earlier, so when a = b = c = 0, we have a dipping plane and
can also define the true dip and azimuth as before.
For a curved surface, Roberts (2001) defines the following
curvature attributes (Kmin and Kmax are shown on the surface):
2
K max K mean K mean
K gauss ,
2
K min K mean K mean
K gauss,

4ab c 2
where : K gauss
, and
2
2 1/ 2
(1 d e )
K mean
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a (1 e2 ) b(1 d 2 ) cde

.
2
2 3/ 2
(1 d e )
31

Curvature attributes
Note that the inverse relationships are:
K K max
Kmean min
and K gauss K min K max .
2
Also, can compute most positive and negative curvature K+
and K-, which are equal to Kmin and Kmax with d = e = f = 0 (or,
the eigenvalues of the quadratic involving a, b and c):
K (a b) (a b)2 c2 and K (a b) (a b)2 c2 .

Finally, we have Keuler, where d is an azimuth angle:

Keuler (d ) K min cos 2 d K max sin 2 d
Kmean Keuler (45o ), K gauss Keuler (0o ) Keuler (90o )

The next few slides show some examples from our dataset.
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32

Minimum Curvature

Seismic with 3 x 3 alpha-trim mean

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Minimum curvature
33

Maximum Curvature

Seismic with 3 x 3 alpha-trim mean

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Maximum curvature
34

Azimuth from Curvature

Seismic with 3 x 3 alpha-trim mean

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Azimuth from curvature by correlation

35

Azimuth comparison

Instantaneous Azimuth
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Azimuth from curvature by correlation

36

Curvature and instantaneous attributes

Differentiating the Roberts quadratic, we find that at x = y = 0
we get the following relationships for the coefficients:

1 p
1 q
1 p q
a , b , c , d p and e q.
2 x
2 y
2 y x
This leads to the following quadratic relationship:

1 p 2 1 q 2 1 p q
t ( x, y ) x y xy px qy f
2 x
2 y
2 y x
Thus, all of the curvature attributes can be derived from
the instantaneous dip attributes described earlier, using
a second differentiation.
The next figure shows a comparison between maximum
curvature derived the two different ways.

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Max Curvature Comparison

High

Low
Data slice

Instantaneous maximum
curvature

Correlation maximum
curvature

Notice that the curvature features are similar, but that

instantaneous curvature shows higher frequency events.
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38

Possible instability
However, there is a lot of complexity hidden in the second
differentiation.
To see this, lets expand the p term:

s h
s
h
s h s h
x t
t
p (k x / w )
x

, where :

x
x
x
s seismic volume and h Hilbert transform volume.
Performing this differentiation will produce a large number of
seismic and Hilbert transform derivatives in both the
numerator and denominator, which can cause instability in
some datasets.
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39

Amplitude curvature
To avoid this instability, Chopra (2012) recommends a new
approach to curvature called amplitude curvature (as
opposed to the previous structural curvature), which involves
first and second derivatives of only the seismic data:

s s 2 s 2 s
, , 2, 2
x y x y
s
s
s
1 2s 2s
a
cos
sin
and emean 2 2 .

x
y
2 x
y
In the above options, a represents the amplitude
curvature at an azimuth angle and emean is the mean
amplitude curvature.
Examples are shown in the next slides.
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X derivative

Seismic with 3 x 3 alpha-trim mean

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Amplitude derivative in x-direction

41

Y derivative

Seismic with 3 x 3 alpha-trim mean

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Amplitude derivative in y-direction

42

45 azimuth amp curvature

Seismic with 3 x 3 alpha-trim mean

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Amplitude curvature at 45o azimuth

43

The phase congruency method

This concludes our discussion of the most common
attributes available to interpreters.
But I want to finish with yet another spatial attribute, which
is not as commonly used.
This attribute is called the phase congruency algorithm
(Kovesi, 1996), and was developed to detect corners and
edges on 2D images.
The algorithm is applied on a slice-by-slice basis to the
seismic volume and produces results that are similar to
coherency.
The following few slides give a brief overview of the theory
and then an application to our dataset.
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44

The phase congruency method

The concept behind the phase congruency algorithm in
the 1D situation is shown below:
Imaginary
An

E(x)

f(x)

f (x)
Real

Note that the Fourier components in

the above figure are all in phase for
a step.
November, 2012

By lining these components up

as vectors, we can measure the
phase congruency.
Figures from Kovesi, 1996

45

Phase congruency flow chart

Input data slice
in x-y space

Create N radial
filters in kx-ky space

Create M angular
filters in kx-ky space

2D FFT

Data slice in
kx-ky space

Multiply to create
N*M filters

Apply filters
Inverse 2D FFT
Normalize and sum radial
terms for each angle

Minimum moment
= corners

Apply moment
analysis

Maximum moment
= edges

Phase Congruency on 3D Seismic

Seismic Volume

Time slices

FFT

Frequency partitioning Phase spectrum at Freq

Partitions

Map the Phase

The phase congruency algorithm is applied to seismic slices,

as shown above.
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47

Movie of seismic slices

Animation of seismic amplitude Animation of seismic amplitude

for each vertical slice in the
for each time slice in the
Boonsville dataset.
Boonsville dataset.
48

Coherency and phase congruency

Animation of seismic phase

congruency for each time slice
in the Boonsville dataset.

Animation of seismic
coherency for each time slice
in the Boonsville dataset.
49

Seismic vs Phase Congruency

A vertical slice showing karst features superimposed on a

horizontal slice at 1080 ms, roughly halfway through the karst
collapse. Seismic on left and the phase congruency on right.
Note the good definition of the collapse on phase congruency.
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Seismic vs Coherency

A vertical slice showing karst features superimposed on a

horizontal slice at 1080 ms, roughly halfway through the karst
collapse. Seismic on left and coherency on right.
Note the definition of the collapse on the coherency volume.
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51

Conclusions
In this document, I have given an overview of most of the
commonly used attributes and how they are related.
The most basic attributes are derived from the Fourier
transform, but cannot be localized.
Instantaneous attributes involve combinations of the
derivatives of the seismic amplitude volume and its Hilbert
transform, and were initially just done in the time direction.
Correlation attributes involve computing the cross-correlation
between pairs of traces in the inline and crossline directions.
Coherency is based on the correlation amplitude and
curvature on the correlation time-shift.
Instantaneous attributes in all three seismic directions can be
combined to give dip, azimuth and curvature.
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52

Conclusions (continued)
Finally, we discussed the phase congruency algorithm which
involved both the 2D Fourier transform and radial filters, and
looks at where the Fourier phase components line up.
I illustrated these methods using the Boonsville dataset,
which was over a gas field trapped in karst topography.
It is important to note that the seismic volume itself is
probably our best seismic attribute!
However, each of the attributes that I discussed has its own
advantages and disadvantages when used to extend the
interpretation process.
By helping to show the relationships among the various
attributes, I hope that I have shed some light on when these
attributes can be used to best advantage by interpreters.
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53

Acknowledgements
I first met instantaneous attributes while working at Chevron
Geophysical in Houston in 1979 and am indebted to Tury
Taner, Fulton Koehler and Bob Sheriff for introducing them.
I became fascinated by the coherency and spectral decomp
attributes introduced by Mike Bahorich, Kurt Marfurt, Greg
Partyka and their colleagues at Amoco in the 1990s, but did
not at first see their relationship to the earlier methods.
I also failed to see the importance of Art Barnes work on 2D
and 3D instantaneous attributes when it first appeared, but
now appreciate how important his work has been.
The ongoing work by Professor Kurt Marfurt and his students
also provided the inspiration for much of this talk.
Finally, my thanks go to Satinder Chopra for both his work on
attributes and his book, co-authored with Kurt Marfurt.
November, 2012

54

References
al-Dossary, S., and K. J. Marfurt, 2006, 3D volumetric multispectral estimates of
reflector curvature and rotation: Geophysics, 71, 4151.
Bahorich, M. S., and S. L. Farmer, 1995, 3-D seismic discontinuity for faults and
stratigraphic features, The coherence cube: The Leading Edge, 16,
10531058.
Barnes, A. E., 1996, Theory of two-dimensional complex seismic trace analysis:
Geophysics, 61, 264272.
Cohen, L., 1995, Time-Frequency Analysis: Prentice-Hall PTR.

Gabor, D., 1946, Theory of communication, part I: J. Int. Elect. Eng., v. 93,
part III, p. 429-441.
Gersztenkorn, A., and K. J. Marfurt, 1999, Eigenstructure based coherence
computations as an aid to 3D structural and stratigraphic mapping:
Geophysics, 64, 14681479.
Klein, P., L. Richard and H. James, 2008, 3D curvature attributes: a new
approach for seismic interpretation: First Break, 26, 105111.
November, 2012

55

References
Marfurt, K. J., 2006, Robust estimates of 3D reflector dip: Geophysics, 71, 29-40
Marfurt, K. J., and R. L. Kirlin, 2000, 3D broadband estimates of reflector dip and
amplitude: Geophysics, 65, 304320.
Marfurt, K. J., R. L. Kirlin, S. H. Farmer, and M. S. Bahorich, 1998, 3D seismic
attributes using a running window semblance-based algorithm:
Geophysics, 63, 11501165.
Marfurt, K. J., V. Sudhakar, A. Gersztenkorn, K. D. Crawford, and S. E. Nissen,
1999, Coherency calculations in the presence of structural dip:
Geophysics 64, 104111.
Roberts, A., 2001, Curvature attributes and their application to 3D interpreted
horizons: First Break, 19, 85100.
Taner, M. T., F. Koehler, and R. E. Sheriff, 1979,Complex seismic trace analysis:
Geophysics, 44, 10411063.

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