Conclusion

We have derived a Common Azimuth migration operator for elliptically anisotropic and VTI media. The elliptically anisotropic Common Azimuth migration operator is exact for all range of the governing anisotropic parameters, namely $\delta$ and $\epsilon$. The Common Azimuth operator that we have developed for VTI media is a bounded one, meaning that it should be accurate within the certain bounds on the anisotropic parameters. But the error analysis indicates that even when these bounds are exceeded, the approximation is still good and the accuracy is comparable to the one obtained by solving the full quartic equation. 3-D impulse responses show that there are significant differences between the isotropic and anisotropic Common Azimuth downward continuation operator, which needs to be taken into account by the migration algorithm.