Tutorial Overview

The following tutorials will help the first-time user understand the basic functions of MESA , such as layout
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and shooting.

Lesson #1: Receiver and Source Layout:

In the first lesson, you will be creating an eight-square-mile 3-D survey. The parameters will be:

Receiver Interval 220’

Receiver Line Interval 880’
Source Interval 220’
Source Line Interval 1320’

An 8 x 36 patch size will be used to shoot the survey. The purpose of the lesson is to demonstrate one of
the methods used to lay out a survey and how to shoot the program with the automatic template
centering. Some design editing will be done, and the coordinates will be output to an ASCII file in a
standard format.

Lesson #2: Importing Coordinates and Grid Based Shooting:

In the second lesson, you will be importing the coordinates that were output in Lesson #1. After
importing, you will be using the shooting grid method to reshoot the 8 x 36 patch.

Lesson #3: Exclusion Zones and Survey Editing:

In the third lesson, you will take the survey created from Lesson #1 and add some exclusion zones. We
will then briefly introduce you to the editing functions for repositioning receiver and source positions.

Lesson #4: Unit Template:

This lesson will familiarize you with the Unit Template layout option. The exercise demonstrates how to
define a template that will create a survey and simultaneously shoot it, while fitting the survey to a
predefined area. This is a different design methodology from Lesson #1, in which we laid out the
receivers and sources sequentially and then defined the shooting parameters.

Lesson #5: Transition Zone Example:

This lesson is not a step-by-step tutorial, but an overview of how several of the advanced features of
MESA can be used together to solve a complicated design problem. In this transition zone example,
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user-defined attributes, data filtering, and multiple shooting methodologies will be used to design a
survey.

LESSON #1: Receiver & Source Layout

The first lesson allows you to become familiar with laying out a 3-D seismic survey using MESA . The ®

exercise demonstrates a direct path through MESA without much diversion. You will be laying out
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sources and receivers, defining a bin grid, shooting the survey, and calculating diagnostics.

Different types of geometries can be created. Layout types such as slant, zig-zag, radial, button, random,
etc., can all be created. This exercise will focus on a simple, straight line orthogonal layout.
1) From the Layout menu, select Receivers to open a drop-down menu listing the options available for
layout.

2) Select the Lines/Bricks option to bring up the Line/Brick Layout dialog. In this dialog, you can input
the receiver and line intervals, line bearings, overall size, numbering, etc. Fill in the dialog as shown in
the following diagram
Survey size can be defined by numbers of receivers and lines or by the inline and crossline size. In this
lesson we will be defining by the number of lines and receivers per line (25 lines by 48 receivers). Press
the OK button to generate the receiver lines. The Design Window will show the receiver lines you have
just generated.
3) Return to the Layout menu and select Sources. Again, choose the option for Lines/Bricks to open
the Line/Brick Layout dialog for sources. Fill in the dialog parameters as shown in the following diagram
The survey in the Design Window is now an eight-square-mile survey. Receivers have a 220’ group
interval and an 880’ line interval for a total of 1200 receivers Sources have a 220’ source interval and a
1320’ line interval for a total of 864 sources. These values can be verified by selecting Land Survey
Statistics from the
Save the project now as "lesson1". This project will be used again in Lesson #3. Select Save Database
from the File menu and enter the name lesson1 when prompted.

4) You are now going to translate the project from the (0,0) grid origin, renumber the survey, define the
bin grid, shoot the program, calculate diagnostics, and then write the coordinates to an ASCII
format. From the Utilities menu, select Translation. This will open the Translation/Rotation dialog. Fill
in the parameters as shown in the following diagrams.
This dialog allows you to change from a theoretical coordinate system to a real-world coordinate
system. In this example, receiver 10001 is assigned the coordinate (500000, 750000), and all other
points in the survey are translated accordingly. The survey can also be rotated to a different azimuth, but
the orientation will be left alone in this lesson.

5) In the next step we will change the numbering scheme for the sources and receivers. In the Design
Window, select the drop-down menu next to the Receiver Display button. Select Renumbering and
then select Sequential Receiver to open the Sequential Renumbering dialog. (Note: The Source
Display button has an identical drop-down menu for renumbering source points.)
7) The survey will now be shot using an 8 x 36 shooting patch. From the toolbar at the top of the Design
Window, press the Shoot button.

This will open the Shoot dialog as shown below. In this dialog, press the Create Template button to
open the Rectangular Template dialog. Fill in the Number of Lines with an 8 and Receivers Per Line
with 36 to create the template. Press the OK button in the Rectangular Template dialog to return to the
Shoot dialog. Your new template will be named "8x36" and listed in the Select Template list box. Make
sure your 8x36 template is selected in the list.

Next, select the Automatic Template Centering radio button. Finally, press the Shoot button to assign
your 8x36 template to every source in the survey.
12) As the last step in this lesson, we will be writing our edited survey coordinates to an ASCII
file. These files can be used to transfer survey information to acquisition, processing, or modeling
systems. Source and receiver files will be named “lesson1.sps” and “lesson1.rps” respectively.
From the Output menu, select SPS to open the SPS Output dialog. In the Source File group box, press
the Select button. You will be prompted to name the output source coordinate file. Enter the name
lesson1.sps. In the Receiver File group box, press the Select button. You will be prompted to name the
output receiver coordinate file. Enter the name lesson1.rps.