"Sediment color on the continental margin reflected differences of composition, texture, physiography, and sedimentary processes active now in the recent geological past."

This course of modern and ancient deep-sea fan sedimentation provides the framework for understanding the morphology, physiography, geometry, depositional processes and reservoir potential of deep-sea fan deposits. Focus is chiefly on the principles that control fan sedimentation and the resultant morphology of fans deposited in various types of settings. Through the comparison of modern and ancient examples of deep-sea fan sedimentation, the authors hope to increase understanding of the principal characteristics of fans.

This workshop provided an opportunity to view cores from a variety of deep water depositional settings and to demonstrate the application of process sedimentology in the interpretation of depositional environments from the study of cores and associated subsurface data. The studies deal with sedimentary sequences which have been interpreted as having been formed by deposition of non-calcareous, clastic sediment in relatively deep water and also have been concerned principally with coarser deep-water sediments of such stratigraphic sequences because of their potential as hydrocarbon reservoirs.