A method is described for seismic imaging of complex subsurface volumes using prismatic seismic energy. The method receives a seismic dataset and an earth model. The earth model is perturbed such that prismatic reflections will generate perturbed seismic amplitudes in a target area and seismic imaging is performed using the perturbed model. A second seismic image is generated using a second earth model; the second earth model may be the original earth model or a second perturbed model wherein the perturbation generates different seismic amplitudes in the target area. The two seismic images are differenced to generate a prismatic seismic image that can be used to identify geologic features that are poorly illuminated in conventional imaging. The method may be executed by a computer system.