METHOD FOR ELABORATING PSEUDO-LOGS OF IMAGE OF WELL WALLS FROM PHOTOGRAPHS OF GEOLOGICAL OUTCROPS

Description

CROSS-REFERENCES TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application claims the benefit of and priority to Brazilian Patent Application No. 1020230243657 filed on Nov. 22, 2023, the contents of which are hereby incorporated by reference in their entirety for all purposes.

FIELD OF THE APPLICATION

The present invention belongs to the field of well wall imaging technologies, specifically in the field of means for processing images capable of analyzing geological structures, whether for oil prospecting, geothermal exploration or subsurface rock studies, wherein their indirect recognition by characteristics of geometry and textural contrasts is considered.

STATE OF THE ART

Geological structures visualized in logs of image of well walls, whether for oil prospecting, geothermal exploration or subsurface rock studies, are indirectly recognized by their geometries and textural contrasts. Sometimes, wells exclusively for rock studies are drilled in outcrops at high costs and logged with the aim of recording analogous structures in geophysical logs.

The interpretation of geological structures in logs of image is commonly done through visual comparison with photographic images of geological structures in known rock outcrops, and its accuracy depends on the interpreter's experience in recognizing these structural rock features and understanding the different geometries present in cylindrical well sections and in flat outcrop sections. Validation, that is, confirmation of this interpretation can be done by visually comparing these logs with a photographic image or the 360° tomographic log of the rock core cylinder of the well wall at the same depth. In the last decade, computational advances have made it possible to perform this comparison virtually, in the same graphical interface in which the logs of image are interpreted, allowing the log of image of the well wall and the image of the rock core to be viewed side by side, as per document WO 2015/148666 A1. However, due to the high cost, rock cores are not acquired in all wells, nor across the entire extension of the zones of interest. Therefore, interpretation methods based on logs of image have been created, such as the creation of pseudo-cores that can be used in the elaboration of stratigraphic models, as per document US 2007/0239359 A1. This method of creating pseudo-cores with logs of image of the well wall uses the interpretation validated by the core in the rest of the wall that was not core-sampled. Although the degree of certainty in the interpretation of structures where there is no core is lower, the method has proven to be well used, since the interpreter has at hand a visual rock-log calibration for the type of rock being investigated.

Recently, also for investigative purposes in the oil and gas field, outcrop images have been digitized to extract fracture segments and study the same at different observation scales, according to document CN112307803A.

All of these works aim at improving the geological and petrophysical interpretation of the rock formation under investigation in logs of image, but even so, the interpreting geologist or geophysicist faces difficulties in recognizing some geological structures in the logs of image of well walls mainly because: (1) there is not always a rock core for visual calibration and, consequently, there is no possibility of applying the method according to WO 2015/148666 A1; (2) when there is rock core, it has a partial representation of the well, and the rest of the zone of interest, which only has logs of image, is not calibrated rock x log; and (3) the most widely used method, which is based on visual comparison in the search for similarities of geological features with photos of rock outcrops, does not consider the geometric distortions existing between the two types of images (longitudinal x flat projection of an unrolled cylinder) and does not represent the ideal geometry for comparison.

Additionally, the state of the art includes document BR9606077A, which describes a method for digital acquisition and processing of images of geological outcrops, with the aim of minimizing the distortions that normally occur when tracking their lithofaciological and architectural elements through manual processes, based on extensive mosaic on photographic paper. Said method involves integrated terrestrial photogrammetry, digital image processing and geoprocessing techniques, which allows the analysis of these outcrops to be carried out with the highest resolution and the least possible distortion. Notwithstanding, it is clear that the aforementioned document BR9606077A does not present any description of how to achieve a set of steps that allow the creation of pseudo-logs of image of well walls from photographs of geological outcrops.

In addition, the state of the art comprises document CA3019124C that describes enabling automatic core descriptions. In particular, CA3019124C refers to core samples as a piece of rock (e.g. cylindrical in shape and of varying lengths) including one or more lithofacies extracted from a well bore below the Earth's surface that provides real/precise physical evidence of the reservoir formation characteristics, e.g. rock type, formation thickness, grain size or permeability. The core description is mentioned as a fundamental task in reservoir characterization to predict well properties, and typically includes descriptions of stratification, lithology, sedimentary structures, fossils and any other micro/macro characteristics of the rocks. In this sense, CA3019124C describes that automated core description uses conventional well logs that do not include image logs, such as well images, in combination with computational intelligence (CI) techniques. Although CA3019124C is in a technical field similar to that of the invention, CA3019124C does not identify a set of steps programmed in the present invention, such as those associated with achieving pseudo-logs of image of well walls from photographs of geological outcrops.

Finally, the state of the art includes document BR 10 2023 009929-7, wherein a set of steps is indeed identified for achieving pseudo-logs of image of well walls from photographs of geological outcrops. However, the technical field similar to the invention consists of creating pseudo-logs of image of well walls by duplicating and inverting the cropping of the outcrop photo, which generates images with artifacts in the center of the image obtained. These artifacts cause medium to high angle planar structures to generate corners at the junction of the mirror planes, instead of recreating their sinusoidal shape, which would be predicted in real logs of image, as shown in FIG. 2 (26). These corners hinder the comparison between the pseudo-log and the real image of the well wall, since, in the cylindrical projection of any planar body such as fractures or geological bedding, these structures are seen as sinusoids, and should not present edges, as occurs in this similar technical field. In addition, this method considers that the crop of the outcrop photo may be half the size of the perimeter of the diameter of the well to be compared, as shown in FIG. 2 (22). The latter, that is, the crop of the photo to the size of half the perimeter of the diameter, extrapolates the planar dimension of the structure, which should have the maximum size relative to the diameter of the drilled well (21). In other words, the method included in document BR 10 2023 009929-7, to generate a pseudo-log with a size equal to a 2D projection of an image of the well wall (25), extrapolates the measurement of the well diameter, oversampling structures that, in fact, would not be contained within a borehole with any dimension that one wants to use as an analogue of real logs of image. To exemplify this problem, when studying the geometry of edges of non-uniform or non-planar rock bodies such as stromatolite heads in carbonate rocks or edges of pillow lava lobes in igneous rocks, the ideal pseudo-log used for comparison with these bodies would be the one that was the size and visually most similar to these bodies as if they had been drilled by a well with common dimensions when the images are recorded by well wall imaging tools. If an interpreter wants to compare a non-planar geologic structure shown in a 12.25-inch (31.115 cm) borehole wall image, he or she should use an outcrop photo with a diameter of 31.115 centimeters, to be realistic about the size of the structure as is the case with the present invention and contrary to the similar technique, which would use 48.8 cm, equal to half the perimeter of the well. This oversampling can cause errors in comparing geologic structures of non-planar bodies.

The document Pseudo-Outcrop Visualization of Borehole Images and Core Scans (Mirkes, E. M.; Gorban, A. N.; Levesley, J.; Elkington, P. A. S.; Whetton, J. A. Mathematical Geosciences 49: 947-964. 2017) presents a method of obtaining pseudo-outcrops from logs of image, which is also similar to the document BR 11 2014 016042-2. These two documents do not use photos of geological outcrops at any time. These methods use images obtained from well walls to try to represent a geological outcrop. Since logs of image of well walls are restricted to mapping the circumference relative to a cylinder with a maximum diameter of 31 cm, the pseudo-outcrop is restricted to this dimension, which limits the use of the pseudo-outcrop for the evaluation of planar structures. Thus, the pseudo-outcrops created by the methods described in these two references do not allow the study of non-planar bodies that, in 3 dimensions, extrapolate the dimensions mapped by the logs of image of well walls. On the other hand, the present invention uses outcrop photos, already established in geological studies, which are used by the interpreter to compare the real morphology of rock structures in the 2D view of an unrolled cylinder in specific well size diameters, in the same way as a log of image. The interpreter can use several crops in the same geological outcrop photo to study several different sections of the same structure that extrapolate the well diameter, generating several pseudo-logs of image for comparison with their real logs of image of well walls. In this way, the interpreter can obtain better correlations to support their geological interpretations by studying and comparing the morphology of geological structures in the logs of image with pseudo-logs of image generated by real outcrops.

Patent document CN 112307803 describes a method and device for extracting cracks from geological outcrops, comprising the following steps:

• • grayscale transformation,
  • image enhancement and image binarization processing;
  • adopting a Beamlet transform method to perform linear feature extraction in the geological outcrop image after image processing and extracting crack line segments; and
  • connecting the crack line segments according to the distance and angle difference between the crack line segments to form the geological outcrop crack.
  • the fissures of the geological outcrops are filtered according to the direction of the strata, and the fissures of the geological outcrops corresponding to the target strata are filtered.
  • filter the fracture line segments according to the direction of the formation and filter the fracture line segments corresponding to the target formation.

Document CN 112307803 does not disclose the solution presented by the present invention, as it does not contemplate any transformation of the outcrop photo into a projection of an unrolled cylinder so that it could resemble some log of image of well walls.

The present invention solves the interpreter's search for quality visual analogues when he or she needs to interpret facies by geometric similarities of features, as it provides a way to use images of rock outcrops with structures established in geological studies in geometric proportions similar to a flat projection of a cylindrical log, digitized and in the same color scale in which the logs of image of well walls are interpreted. And as already mentioned, this method also proves to be the most suitable for studying planar and non-planar bodies because it represents sinusoidally (without corners or edges) the planar geological structures of medium and high angle, as is in fact expected in real logs of image of well walls, and because it uses crops of photos of outcrops equal to the size of the diameter of the well that will be used for comparison. This invention also presents advantages due to its low implementation cost, requiring only the prior selection of a high-resolution outcrop photo and computational resources with a Python environment and with the ability to analyze data from logs of image to elaborate a pseudo-log, in addition to the possibility of obtaining multiple example images for machine learning with the aim of developing geological pattern recognition methods. Also, catalogs of pseudo-logs of image can be created and used in petrophysics and stratigraphy software to support the interpreter during the interpretation of logs of image, offering robustness for the geological modeling. Additionally, other software with programming languages widely used in web applications, for software development, data science and machine learning can also be used, such as NodeJS, Rust, Ruby, TypeScript, C#, Kotlin, and others.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to a method for defining logs of image of well walls from photographs of geological outcrops. The objectives of the present invention are related to the creation of a flat projection of a pseudo-cylinder from longitudinal 2D images of available photographs of geological outcrops. By means of the present invention, said projection created can be used by specific intelligence mechanisms, obtaining pseudo-logs of image for correlation with real logs of image. This solution, unlike the state of the art, allows obtaining pseudo-logs of image at low cost.

More specifically, in the preferred embodiment of the present invention, a method is described for defining logs of image of a well wall from photographs of geological outcrops, which comprises the steps of: Step a) Selecting a photographic image of a geological outcrop; Step b) Cropping the photographic image of the geological outcrop; Step c) Performing the extrusion of the photographic crop of the geological outcrop; Step d) Cutting a cylindrical shell from the volume formed; Step e) Performing a flat projection of the cylindrical shell; Step f) Saving the new image constructed from the projection of the cylinder of a 2D plane; and Step g) Applying geophysical log analysis.

The aforementioned selection of the photographic image of a geological outcrop in Step a) comprises determining the base photographic image, whose longitudinal section of a photographic crop on this base image will be transformed into a flat projection of a cylindrical pseudo-log. Additionally, the selection of the photographic image of the geological outcrop of Step a) preferably occurs with the image presenting the expected dimensions of an outcrop photo crop for comparison with the well wall. Also, the selection of the photographic image of the geological outcrop of Step a) preferably occurs with photographs of a geological outcrop in which the geological structures under investigation are visible to the naked eye on a computer screen. Additionally, the selection of the photographic image of the geological outcrop of Step a) preferably occurs with the scale of the photo (14) known so that a crop of precise size and known dimensions can be made. Finally, the selection of the photographic image of the geological outcrop of Step a) preferably occurs with a resolution greater than 120 dpi.

In particular, the cropping referred to in Step b) is performed using a commercially available image viewing or vector illustration graphic design program; said cropping has a width relative to the diameter of the wall of the well being investigated.

Meanwhile, in Step c) of performing the extrusion of the image of the photographic crop of the geological outcrop, the image is extruded to form a volume in the form of a cube from the same image (31), using a graphic design technique known as extrusion.

Step d), of cutting a cylindrical shell from the formed volume, is carried out using a mathematical equation for a cylinder.

In turn, in Step e), the crop of the cylindrical shell is projected in two dimensions, to obtain a flat projection of a cylindrical pseudo-log (34).

In Step f) the flat projection of the pseudo-log is saved in the digital formats jpg, tif, png, or other available digital formats.

Sequentially, in Step g), the image saved from Step e) is loaded into a commercially available geophysical logs analysis intelligence mechanism, such that it preferably has a module that converts the figure of the flat projection of the pseudo-cylinder (34) into matrices with RGB values (35); wherein the image of the pseudo-cylinder converted into a matrix of values (35) in Step f) is capable of being recognized in intelligence mechanisms that have petrophysical interpretation capacity, as it presents the same format as a log of image, as well as being capable of being viewed with the same color scale and being horizontally rotated, in relation to the position of the cylinder that one wishes to observe, between 0° and 360° (36).

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE FIGURES

The patent or application file contains at least one drawing executed in color. Copies of this patent or patent application publication with color drawing(s) will be provided by the Office upon request and payment of the necessary fee.

FIG. 1 is a graphical representation of a selection of an outcrop photo crop with the desired dimensions to be correlated with logs of image obtained in wells with a diameter equal to 31.115 cm (12.25 in).

FIG. 2 is a graphical representation of an outcrop crop being transformed into a flat projection of a pseudo-cylinder by the method of the invention and being compared with the state of the art.

FIG. 3 is a presentation of a verification of the method of the present invention with tomographic logs of carbonate rock core.

FIG. 4 is a representation of outcrop images viewed throughout the application of the steps of the method of the invention and compared with real logs of image.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to a method for defining logs of image of well walls from photographs of geological outcrops. The objectives of the present invention are related to the creation of a flat projection of a pseudo-cylinder from longitudinal 2D images of available photographs of geological outcrops. By means of the present invention, said projection created can be used by specific intelligence mechanisms, such as software, and pseudo-logs of image are obtained for correlation with real logs of image. This solution, unlike the state of the art, allows the production of pseudo-logs of image at low cost.

For information purposes, the high-resolution logs of image of well walls are generated from a high density of electrical or acoustic data (Prensky, Stephen E. 1999. “Advances in Borehole Imaging Technology and Applications”. Geological Society, London, Special Publications 159 (1): 1-43). These logs are recorded by logging tools along the inner surface of the cylindrical wall of the wells, and the data are visualized, by default, through the flat projection of the cylindrical wall of wells. The geological formation is horizontally and vertically sampled in small continuous areas of the well wall, in order to form a dense matrix of measurements (Rider, M. (1996). Image Logs. In M. Rider, The Geological interpretation of well logs (pp. 199225)). These logs are widely used in the oil industry and in other subsurface geological researches.

Specifically in the present invention, with the objective of achieving images of geological structures that can be compared with logs of image of well walls of high-resolution, the use of longitudinal crops of photographs of geological outcrops with a fixed size width and a height that can have varied size is proposed.

It should be noted in detail that the preferred width defined in the present invention is fixed to meet the size of the well diameter in which the geological features will be viewed for comparison. High-resolution well imaging tools are typically used in wells measuring 31.115 cm, 21.59 cm and 15.24 cm in diameter (12.25 in, 8.5 in and 6 in). On the other hand, there is no preferred height defined in the present invention because the actual acquisition of logs of image of well walls is done continuously, vertically, without restrictions. What is important for the comparison is that the geological structure existing in the outcrop photo is visible in the longitudinal crop taken from the original photograph.

To this end, more specifically, it is noted that the method for defining logs of image of well walls from photographs of geological outcrops, as described in the present invention, comprises, at least, the steps of:

• • Step a) Selecting a photographic image of a geological outcrop;
  • Step b) Cropping the photographic image of the geological outcrop;
  • Step c) Performing the extrusion of the image of the photographic crop of the geological outcrop;
  • Step d) Cutting a cylindrical shell from the volume formed;
  • Step e) Performing a flat projection of the cylindrical shell;
  • Step f) Saving the new image constructed from the projection of the cylinder on a 2D plane; and
  • Step g) Applying geophysical log analysis.

In step a) of the present invention, a photographic image of a geological outcrop is selected to be the basis for the transformation of a longitudinal section of the photographic crop into a flat projection of a cylindrical pseudo-log. Therefore, preferably, the selection of the photographic image of the geological outcrop must meet the following requirements:

• • i) the image must present the expected dimensions of a photo crop of an outcrop for comparison with a well wall. To contribute to the perfect description of the invention, FIG. 1 exemplifies a well with a diameter equal to 31.115 cm (12.25 in) (13). In this case, the perimeter is equal to 97.7 cm and the image of the geological outcrop (11) must allow a longitudinal crop (12) of approximately the diameter of the well, in this case, approximately 31 cm wide, and a height that can be variable; this requirement is not limited to a well with the same diameter as the one shown, and longitudinal crops of sizes that represent wells of other diameters may be used. The photo of the outcrop shows, as an example, an igneous rock with Pillow Lava structures found in Aci Castello, Sicily—Italy. The height of the longitudinal crop in FIG. 1 is 117 cm (13), but it should be noted that the height may vary. Preferably, a minimum of 1.0 m is recommended to facilitate its visualization through a digital device, such as a computer;
  • ii) the geological structures under investigation must be visible to the naked eye. It is recommended that, on a computer screen, the structure be visible in a size smaller than 147×102 mm (¼ of an A4 sheet);
  • iii) the scale of the photo (14) must be known so that a precisely sized crop can be made with the dimensions described in i);
  • iv) the resolution must be greater than 120 dpi to avoid generating low-resolution images later in the digital transformation of the data.

In Step b), the photograph of the geological outcrop is cropped. To achieve this crop, a commercially available image viewing or vector illustration graphic design program can be used, such as WordPad®, CorelDRAW® or PowerPoint®. The crop must have a width relative to the diameter of the wall of the well being investigated. In FIG. 2, it can be seen that image (23) is the crop (21) extracted from the photograph of the outcrop (20).

In Step c) of performing the extrusion of the image of the photographic crop of the geological outcrop (34), the image is extruded to form a volume in the shape of a cube from the same image (23) (31).

In Step d), a cylinder is cropped as exemplified in FIG. 3 (35), and the amplitude values of the pixels of the image in the cylindrical shell are projected onto a plane (36), generating the pseudo-log. Steps c) and d) described conceptually above are mathematically performed, preferably in a Python environment, in a single step: the amplitudes in the cylindrical shell, located in terms of the cylindrical coordinates rho (ρ), theta (θ) and z shown in FIG. 3 (392), are obtained by interpolating the values of the pixels of the original photo, considering that the same pixel repeats itself indefinitely along the extrusion direction. The projected pseudo-log of image is obtained by sectorizing the theta (θ) coordinate into the number of chosen sectors (for example, every 3 degrees totaling 120 sectors), for each slice of the original image along the z coordinate. However, for theta (θ) angles close to 0° and 180°, the sampling is performed more sparsely, every 6°, to avoid distortions in the final image. If this procedure reduces the total number of sectors, the resulting image is interpolated to return to a width of 120 pixels.

In Step e), the flat projection of this shell is performed in the counterclockwise direction, although the projection can also be done in the clockwise direction (24) (36).

For information purposes, it is mentioned that the presented image mirroring technique was verified with tomographic logs of limestone rock cores, as shown in frame (30) of FIG. 3. It was possible to confirm that the longitudinal tomographic image (33), relative to the rock core cut (32), when performing steps (c), (d) and (e) (36), presents a geometry similar to that of the tomographic log image from the core cylinder (39). The similarity can be verified by comparing (38) and (39) in frame (391). This verification confirms that it is possible to create an image of a flat projection of a pseudo-cylinder (36) from rock images seen in a 2D longitudinal section (33). This image presents a geometry similar to that of the rock structures, if they were from the wall of a well.

In Step f) of saving the newly constructed image, the image can be saved in the digital formats jpg, tif, png, or other available digital formats. The image saved in this Step f) is, in this way, the flat projection of a cylindrical pseudo-log (24) (36) obtained in Step e).

In Step g) of applying geophysical log analysis, it occurs that: after obtaining the flat projection image of the pseudo-cylinder (36) originating from the longitudinal tomographic log (33), as per Step e) and Step f), the data is now (Step g) loaded into a specific intelligence mechanism for analyzing geophysical logs; as a commercially available example, the Techlog® and Interactive Petrophysics® software can be cited, but not limited to these two. The intelligence mechanism must preferably have a module that converts the figure of the flat projection of the pseudo-cylinder (36) into matrices with RGB values (37). RGB is the color system used to represent colors in electronic devices. The matrix must contain the same number of pixels relative to the width of the input image or in such a way that the user can choose the number of pixels. Tests were carried out with a data matrix of 180 and 360 horizontal pixels every 5 mm of vertical distance (35) and (36), which meets the requirements to honor the scale of the photographic image, transformed into a matrix of values, on a computer screen.

The image of the pseudo-cylinder, now converted into a value matrix (37) in Step g), can be recognized in any intelligence mechanism, such as software, that has petrophysical interpretation capabilities, since it will have the same format as a log of image and can be viewed with the same color scale and be horizontally rotated, in relation to the position of the cylinder that one wishes to observe, that is, between 0° and 360° (38).

The horizontal rotation, between the 0-360° axis of the pseudo-cylinder, can be performed so that it is possible to view the geological features from different angles, and can be performed by using a petrophysical application software. In the example shown in FIG. 3, the pseudo-log of image (38) was oriented to be in the same position as the tomographic log of the rock core cylinder (39), for better visual comparison of the structures (391). To perform this horizontal movement of the pseudo-cylinder, a fictitious orientation curve must be created, which will act as the azimuth curve of pad 1 (orientation curve of the data acquisition of real logs of image, also called Pad1-Azimuth, necessary for viewing logs of image oriented in relation to the Earth's magnetic north). This curve will be used as a reference for positioning the data, as occurs with the real log of image when loaded into the software. The fictitious orientation curve can be created with the value zero (0), for example, with the vertical sampling equal to that of the pseudo-cylinder image or with the standard sampling of 0.1524 cm (0.5 ft). The rotation of the image around its horizontal axis can be used to choose a position that best characterizes the geological structure that will be used for comparison with the real logs of image.

The obtained pseudo-log images can be used to compose catalogs for private or collective use, in addition to serving as input data in stratigraphic, petrophysics, geological modeling and machine learning programs for pattern recognition.

Examples of Embodiments of the Invention

Tests were performed with photos of igneous rock outcrops. The igneous rock outcrop (42) in FIG. 4 comes from the city of Uberlandia, Minas Gerais, Brazil, and presents “pillow” structures related to lava deposits in a subaqueous environment, classically called pillow lavas. The igneous rock outcrop (47) in FIG. 4 is a diabase intrusion from the Isle of Mull, in Scotland, which presents sub-vertical columnar disjunctions and horizontal disjunctions originating from the magmatic cooling of this rock.

The results were surprising in the case of the pillow lava outcrop (42) in FIG. 4, when the geological structures are larger than the perimeter of the cylindrical wall of the well. The geometric aspect of the edges of this structure in the flat projection of the pseudo-cylinder (43), (44) and (45) is very different from what is seen in the outcrop section (42) and similar, in ellipsoidal or curvilinear shape, to what is seen in real logs of image on the well wall (46).

The results obtained with the pseudo-log of image generated with the cooling joints in the intrusion (41) in FIG. 4 are also very useful, as they make it clear what the visual effect of these planar features will be in the real logs of image (51) and can be distinguished from natural fractures originating from tectonic processes. In the case (41) in FIG. 4, the interpretation of the real log of image (51) could have been of fractures associated with tectonism. However, when observing the pseudo-logs of image (49 or 50), which come from the outcrop photo (47) and the flat projection of its pseudo-cylinder (48), this interpretation is corrected for cooling joints because it contains the same angular relationship between the horizontal and vertical fractures of the cooling joints.

Other tests were performed, for example, on breccia deposits with clasts at least five times smaller than the perimeter of the well cylinder and without apparent stratification. In this case, the application of the method did not show major modifications to the apparent geometry of the structures and masked the real result, since they appear duplicated as in a mirror. These clasts or small lobes will not actually be reflected in a mirror in the cylindrical shell of a well. This is why this method is effective for planar features or for bodies in which the 3 dimensions are equal to or greater than the dimension of the well cylinder under study. For smaller structures without planar surfaces, such as, for example, a debris flow, the method of the invention was not necessary and the geological outcrop photograph crop can be carried out with a width equal to the perimeter of the cylinder, before being transformed into a data matrix.

It is worth noting that the present invention has great advantages over the state of the art, as it respects the dimensions of the size of wells used for comparison and generates structures without corner or edge artifacts, which more adequately represent planar and non-planar bodies when viewed in a flat projection of an unrolled cylinder relative to the shape of their bodies in 3D space.

The present invention is described in terms of its preferred embodiment, and it is clear that modifications can be made to the subject matter described herein, and such modifications are still included in the set of component claims of this description.