Field Geophysics home page, Fall 2011
Current info: Tuesday 11/1: Review session with Danny; graded lab 8 will be returned. Thursday 11/3: no class. Tuesday 11/8: Final. Closed book, no notes. You can bring a ruler and a calculator as well as pen or pencil and paper.
Written Final is tentatively set for 11/8 at 1 pm providing all grading is done by then. An old exam is here to give you an idea what kinds of questions might be asked.
GPR lab images: (in case you don't like the photocopies)
Field geophysics uses physical principles to learn about the structure
of the Earth through measurements made by students. We will make several excursions
to the vicinity of the Caribou Mine above Nederland or to the Betasso
Preserve just up Boulder Canyon
for our field projects. Our goals are to learn the basics of the techniques,
what kinds of targets they are good for, how to make field measurements and
make simple reductions in the field to see if measurements are likely good,
how to interpret the field measurements, and finally how to take advantage
of the complementary nature of the different techniques. We will use seismic
refraction, reflection, electrical resistivity, ground penetrating radar, gravity,
and magnetics in the course.
Meeting Time: Scheduled 12:30-5:00. BESC 355 on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
Field days we will use this time and perhaps have to go a bit later. Lab days
we usually start at 1 and often finish before 4.
2011 schedule is online but always subject to change. Includes reading assignments (verified for this year when not shaded).
Meeting Place:
- When in class, 1 pm, Benson 355
on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
- When going to field: 12:30 pm, vehicle bay on west side of Benson
- Labs: as specified (probably start in classroom) , then often Benson computer lab
GEOL4714 is for undergraduate credit.
GEOL5714
is for graduate credit. Usually 5714 is the same as 4714 but the student must
complete a field final as well (this is gathering and interpreting data in
a single afternoon of the student's choice at a specific field site announced
to the student ahead of time).
Reading:
Textbook is Burger, Sheehan and Jones's Introduction to Applied Geophysics: Exploring the Shallow Subsurface. Milsom's Field Geophysics is a handy
field reference. We will be using the software from this
in this class. If you are using your own copy, please be sure to update the software as necessary from the updates page. Please note there is an errata page for the text.
Course Information Online
Field how-tos:
Instructor: Prof.
Craig Jones, Benson Earth Sciences 440C, (303-49) 2-6994
TA: Danny Feucht, BESC 462D
The 2002 class page from Dr. Sheehan's class is still
online
Software ideas:
From time to time you might want to make plots in something other than the software with the text. Most commonly, these would be scatter plots. Note that CU has site licenses and discounts for many software packages. Here are some options for you to consider, roughly in order of increasing cost:
- gnuplot is copyrighted but open source script-driven software that can be installed on most operating systems.
- Grapher (Mac only) is a utility Apple has shipped with Macs for awhile. It has the ability to generate scatter plots (kind of hidden--choose New Point Set under Equations for a default 2-D plot). Free with Mac OS 10.4-10.6. Can also be used as an equation editor. Numbers, the spreadsheet app within Apple's iWork suite, also will allow creation of scatter plots. iWork is free within the campus community.
- GMT (generic mapping tools) is a set of Unix commands to assemble postscript graphics files (somewhat like gnuplot). Although the majority of the commands are map-based, there is psxy, which can generate scatter plots. A GUI front end for GMT called iGMT is available for download. Both are free and can be installed on most computer systems (most easily through things like fink).
- Plots in Excel can be ugly and difficult to customize, but most students have Excel. A tutorial can help.
- OriginPro is Windows software for plotting and is now available on a campus site license.
- JMP is primarily a statistical analysis package for both Windows and Mac, but does have some other tools that could be useful. There is currently a campus site license for JMP Pro.
- Kaleidagraph is commercial plotting software for Mac and Windows that is far more flexible than Excel and fairly intuitive. There is a demo version and an academic rate.
- DeltaGraph is a fairly old and venerable commercial charting and graphing program for Mac and Windows. There is an academic discount. I have not used this for years, but it is an option.
- IDL is similar to Matlab but was developed at CU and so we have a great site license program. However, the focus of this software is involved visualizations, so not the easiest way to make a plot.
- Matlab can make scatter plots (and lots of other things) on Macs, Windows, and Unix machines through text commands (though some GUI interfaces can be used in some instances). CU has a site license and there is a student edition of Matlab available. Rather like using a cannon to kill gnats, though.
- Mathematica similarly is using a sledgehammer to put a marshmallow into a square hole, but it is also available through a campus site license.
- Grapher is Golden Software's venerable plotting package for Windows.
- SigmaPlot is another venerable plotting package for Windows that, like Grapher, doesn't come cheap.
- Igor Pro is a commercial scientific plotting package for Mac and Windows. Although there is an academic discount, it isn't particularly cheap. There are many scientists who rely on this.
- Aabel is commercial plotting and analysis software for Mac only. It is unique in supporting a number of earth science plotting styles like spidergrams, strat plots, and stereonets. It also has a large statistical package. It is not cheap, even with academic discounts.
Other resources:
Older stuff of interest
The Caribou Park area was the site of an illegal offroad rally 9/23/00; I've
put some photos from 1998 and 2000 together
on a special Mudfest page for your amusement.
Please send mail if
you encounter any problems or have suggestions.
C. H. Jones | CIRES | Dept. of Geological Sciences | Univ. of Colorado at Boulder
Last modified at Tuesday, February 7, 2012 12:27 PM
