Reverse Time Migrations in Transversely Isotropic Media: A Comparison between Acoustic and Elastic Wave Equations with Two Wave Mode Separation Algorithms

Anisotropic reverse time migrations (RTMs) using pseudoacoustic or elastic wave equations are tested, and the migrated PP images, obtained using the same data set as input, are compared. In anisotropic elastic RTMs, both divergence operators, and localized low-rank approximations (LLA), are tested and compared for P/S separation. Tests with synthetic data indicate that elastic RTMs have better illumination apertures than pseudoacoustic RTMs in subsalt areas because of the involvement of converted S-waves in the former. Pseudoacoustic RTMs have diamond-shaped S-wave artifacts, which do not exist in elastic RTM images, provided that the P- and S-waves are separated in the elastic wavefields. LLAs provide affordable, accurate P/S separations in anisotropic media, and the separation results are better than those obtained using divergence operators. Anisotropic elastic RTMs with LLA give the best quality images. ©2019 Society of Exploration Geophysicists.