Exploring seismic data through virtual reality and hybrid knowledge base

Abstract

This paper discusses a VR-based system that aims to support professionals of the Oil & Gas Industry in interpreting seismic data. Seismic interpretation plays an important role in decision making prior to oil exploration. Part of the seismic interpretation process consists in visualizing slices from a volume generated by a seismograph and looking for specific patterns and features. In this work, we take this volume and render it in a VR environment. Our system integrates with a knowledge base to better support the decision-making process. With such an integration, experts can explore the 3D volume of a given seismic cube and spatially visualize semantic information of that area that is stored in the knowledge base. Therefore, our proposed system is intended to assist users in the whole process by combining visual inspection with immersion, semantic information retrieval, and structured storage.