Masterpieces Online — High Culture At High Resolution

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Masterpieces Online — High Culture At High Resolution

Posted by Soulskill on Saturday October 2, 2010 @03:59AM from the extreme-close-up dept.

crimeandpunishment writes "You can now see the finest details of some of the finest Italian masterpieces with just one click of your mouse. High-resolution images of classic paintings by Leonardo da Vinci, Caravaggio, and Botticelli are now online with that opportunity. You can zoom in to the smallest details, even ones you wouldn't see when viewing the paintings in person at a museum. The images have a resolution of up to 28 billion pixels, which is about 3,000 times more than a photo from an average digital camera."

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and who said that 10Mpix is more than enough? by viking80 · 2010-10-02 04:02 · Score: 1

and who said that 10Mpix is more than enough?

--
don't cut it off www.mgmbill.org
1. Re:and who said that 10Mpix is more than enough? by Anonymous Coward · 2010-10-02 04:12 · Score: 0
  
  The logical operator "and X and X" can be simplified to just "and X".
2. Re:and who said that 10Mpix is more than enough? by hedwards · 2010-10-02 04:19 · Score: 2, Informative
  
  10Mpix is enough for anybody that is wanting to make an 8x10 print, and by enough, I mean way more than you need, even if you throw away quite a few of the pixels.
  
  You only need more pixels when you need a larger image and you need to be closer than what the current number allows. A 6mp camera is more than enough for a billboard, where you're expecting to be a hundred feet away or more. Whereas a 20mp camera wouldn't be anywhere near enough if you were expecting to stand 10 feet away.
  
  But, then again, I know you're making a lame joke based upon something that was originally a misquote, carry on.
3. Re:and who said that 10Mpix is more than enough? by ffreeloader · 2010-10-02 04:50 · Score: 2, Informative
  
  I know you're either trolling, or joking, but these images are made by taking an orderly group of images of small parts of the painting by rows and columns to get complete coverage with a professional dslr and good lens, and then stitching the images together with software. There are many, many examples of these types of images out on the internet. You can find pictures of this type of cities, mountains in the Alps, and many other subjects by Googling for giga-pixel images.
  
  --
  "while democracy seeks equality in liberty, socialism seeks equality in restraint and servitude." de Tocqueville
4. Re:and who said that 10Mpix is more than enough? by BrokenHalo · 2010-10-02 05:13 · Score: 4, Interesting
  
  You only need more pixels when you need a larger image and you need to be closer than what the current number allows.
  
  Of course, in a sense, nothing has changed here: back in the day when we all used cellulose film, we all knew that if we wanted an image that needed blowing up to a large size, we needed a larger-format negative. We used to swear by the 6x6 cm "medium" format (e.g. from Hasselblad or Rolleiflex) for quick work, but if we wanted really crisp resolution, we used 5x4" or sometimes 8x10" plates.
  
  Although I occasionally miss the discipline of black-and-white (always with Ilford film), there's only one thing that has really disappointed me with the move to digital photography: the apparent failure of print media to approximate the luminous colour and definition of Cibachrome (now, I believe, known as Ilfochrome) colour prints created from positive transparencies. Many years ago, I used to do this myself, but now I don't even have a darkroom...
5. Re:and who said that 10Mpix is more than enough? by Joce640k · 2010-10-02 05:35 · Score: 1
  
  Let's hope they used more than eight-bit color depth.
  
  --
  No sig today...
6. Re:and who said that 10Mpix is more than enough? by Anonymous Coward · 2010-10-02 05:52 · Score: 0
  
  But, then again, I know you're making a lame joke based upon something that was originally a misquote, carry on.
  Yeah, speaking of lame...
7. Re:and who said that 10Mpix is more than enough? by Anonymous Coward · 2010-10-02 07:12 · Score: 0
  
  and who said "and X" is more than enough? Aristotle or George Boole?
8. Re:and who said that 10Mpix is more than enough? by Jason+W · 2010-10-02 14:32 · Score: 1
  
  Or in other words, CSI was actually accurate all of these years. They just had better cameras.
9. Re:and who said that 10Mpix is more than enough? by Anonymous Coward · 2010-10-02 22:36 · Score: 0
  
  There are many situations where higher than "needed" resolution is very handy. One is, as mentioned, when you plan on blowing up the image. The other, is whenever you're doing any kind of post-processing on the image; it's better to work at 2 or 3 times the pixel density that you need for your final image. Another is that if you only distribute a down-sampled version of the image, you have a bullet-proof form of proof of ownership of the image, since you're the only one that can "reconstruct" the 'missing' pixels.
I Don't See ... by WrongSizeGlass · 2010-10-02 04:02 · Score: 4, Funny

I think they missed one. I don't see Dogs Playing Poker. I'm just sayin' ...
1. Re:I Don't See ... by FooAtWFU · 2010-10-02 04:12 · Score: 1
  
  Yeah; there's really no good reason that something like this shouldn't eventually be available for anything painted before copyrights started to be obnoxious, and it would be a real boon to students of the arts.
  
  --
  The World Wide Web is dying. Soon, we shall have only the Internet.
2. Re:I Don't See ... by Anonymous Coward · 2010-10-02 04:21 · Score: 0
  
  Also for people trying to inspect the Mona Lisa without having to elbow 20 tourists aside and crash through the rope barriers to get close enough to see the masterly brushstrokes.
3. Re:I Don't See ... by hedwards · 2010-10-02 04:22 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Not really, it would be better than what we currently have, but prints are barely better than nothing. You can't reproduce with pixels what was created with pigments, it just doesn't work. You cannot currently create an image on a monitor that uses brown. No combination of RBG values will give you brown. You're also not going to be able to appreciate the effect of translucent glazing or the brushwork. Not to mention the monitor calibration and control of the lighting conditions.
  
  For somebody with no or little knowledge of art, it would be sufficient, but it's really a pale shade of the real thing.
4. Re:I Don't See ... by Reziac · 2010-10-02 04:33 · Score: 4, Interesting
  
  The other day I found myself ranting to a friend on that very subject. I'd never really been interested in 1600s-era art based on prints. Once I saw some with my own eyes -- wow, the difference defies description. NO print ever shows even a hint of the depth, glow, and sense of its own reality that you get from seeing these works in person.
  I see we've killed their server so I'll have to wait on seeing what this effort looks like. However, I'm of the opinion that any access is better than NO access (since most of us cannot travel to see all these works in person).
  And as to brown on a monitor... the nearest you can come is actually a sort of grubby purple that fools the eye if you don't look too closely, or lack real brown to compare to. Very irritating (especially when trying to get it visually-right for a client's logo -- all in BROWN!)
  
  --
  ~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
5. Re:I Don't See ... by Anonymous Coward · 2010-10-02 04:40 · Score: 0
  
  I think the pictures are probably fakes. I mean, I zoomed on on that screenshot of "Adventures of Baron Munchausen", and there's no way that painted chick is Uma Thurman.
6. Re:I Don't See ... by mlts · 2010-10-02 05:11 · Score: 1
  
  You also can't look at the piece from different angles to see the raised brush strokes.
  Digital photography has come a long way. Higher end cameras have more than 8 bits for colors, megapixels are getting to a reasonable amount for even 11x17 prints viewed close up.
  However, nuances are still lost, and it probably will take a major advance in cameras, perhaps with a lens that moves around and takes a number of snapshots from slightly different angles, then uses the pictures to reconstruct as close to a gestalt of the image as possible.
7. Re:I Don't See ... by Spatial · 2010-10-02 05:19 · Score: 1
  
  No combination of RBG values will give you brown.
  Let me guess: you've never played Gears of War.
8. Re:I Don't See ... by BrokenHalo · 2010-10-02 05:20 · Score: 1
  
  No combination of RBG values will give you brown.
  
  Would that were true. Seems that for several decades of the 20th century, paint companies in Australia were only capable of producing a yucky mess known as "Mission Brown", easily replicated in RGB. And no, I'm not going to mention the code, because I want it obliterated from the visible spectrum. :-]
9. Re:I Don't See ... by Anonymous Coward · 2010-10-02 05:24 · Score: 1, Funny
  
  Yes, just the way our eyes can perceive only a pale shade of the real thing. Art is something you need to touch, to eat, to vomit on and to make love to. It's a physical thing!
10. Re:I Don't See ... by Joce640k · 2010-10-02 05:27 · Score: 1
  
  It's a pity no common image format or display device has more than 8 bits. We're way past the point in history where we should be using 16 bits for image storage and display (in fact we're probably reaching the point where it should all be floating point...)
  
  --
  No sig today...
11. Re:I Don't See ... by ColdWetDog · 2010-10-02 05:46 · Score: 1
  
  It's a pity no common image format or display device has more than 8 bits
  We have 16 bit (and 32 bit) image formats. TIFF, PSD and even JPEG2000 (may it rest in peace). Display devices are another matter however there are 16 bit, wide gamut displays available commercially - just very expensive and thus not suitable for everyday use.
  
  If you're complaining about any Internet browser's ability to display accurate color (no matter what the bit depth), well, you're sort of right. However, the newer browsers support the sRGB color space which is pretty much all that the vast majority of computer monitors can handle (see above complaints about 'brown').
  
  The underlying problem is that you are trying to display an object done in a reflective medium (a painting, where incident light hits the canvas and is reflected back to your eye) with a transmissive medium (a backlight LCD most typically). That won't ever be completely correct.
  
  --
  Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
12. Re:I Don't See ... by FooAtWFU · 2010-10-02 05:49 · Score: 1
  
  "What we currently have" is often a tiny little 2-by-3 inch thumbnail in the Art History textbook, or an 800x600 (if you're lucky) version on $website. You just can't have masterpieces to more than one museum at a time. Yeah, it won't be the real thing, and I wouldn't write a Ph.D. on it or anything, but said that it would be "a boon" (a blessing or desirable state), not a panacea.
  
  --
  The World Wide Web is dying. Soon, we shall have only the Internet.
13. Re:I Don't See ... by ZosX · 2010-10-02 06:12 · Score: 1
  
  Most imaging sensors are only capable of 12-14 bit depth. That's still greater dynamic range than film. Furthermore, most displays are only optimized for 8-bit color, rendering even 16-bit color more or less useless on a screen. Sure you can make 32-bit images in photoshop, but they won't look anything like you would expect on your 8-16 bit monitor.
  
  --
  zosxavius photography
14. Re:I Don't See ... by ZosX · 2010-10-02 06:15 · Score: 1
  
  68-48-40? Not a bad shade of brown.....I've seen far worse!
  
  --
  zosxavius photography
15. Re:I Don't See ... by noidentity · 2010-10-02 06:30 · Score: 1
  
  Or studied how human vision works. RBG (and RGB) can give you brown.
16. Re:I Don't See ... by Anonymous Coward · 2010-10-02 06:34 · Score: 1, Funny
  
  You cannot currently create an image on a monitor that uses brown. No combination of RBG values will give you brown.
  Clearly, you've never played Quake 2.
17. Re:I Don't See ... by jack2000 · 2010-10-02 06:38 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  What are you people, colorblind or something? I see a perfect brown on my 21" CRT monitor.
18. Re:I Don't See ... by Peeteriz · 2010-10-02 06:44 · Score: 1
  
  Is the customer satisfied with how his logo is displayed to common users in electronic devices like TV or internet? Even for most non-tech companies the majority of customers would interact electronically nowadays, they wouldn't see that much of your paper documents or newspaper ads, but would see quite a lot of your TV/online ads (B2C) and electronic communications in B2B - so if the logo looks poor there, then it's a weakness of the logo that can be changed only by moving to a different logo.
19. Re:I Don't See ... by Peach+Rings · 2010-10-02 07:01 · Score: 2, Interesting
  
  Um.
20. Re:I Don't See ... by Anonymous Coward · 2010-10-02 08:38 · Score: 0
  
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamut
  The standard RGB display only reproduces a small fraction of the colors the human eye can observe.
21. Re:I Don't See ... by Reziac · 2010-10-02 08:38 · Score: 2, Interesting
  
  I did get it to where it looks good, but it took a lot of swearing. And I'd started with a scan of the original (best copy available -- it was an existing print logo to be used on their website). Had to do a lot of finagling with the tint to get it to where what the eye *sees* on a monitor is the intended shade of brown. On examining it at the pixel level, the reason became clear -- there ain't no such shade as 'brown' in the CRT spectrum.
  
  --
  ~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
22. Re:I Don't See ... by Reziac · 2010-10-02 08:47 · Score: 1
  
  What you see, if you look closer (at the pixel level), is not precisely brown; it's a conglomeration of other colours. And no, I'm not only *not* colour-blind, I see fine shades of colour that most people don't. Which is why I'm so damned persnickety about my work monitor (only ViewSonic CRTs are sufficiently true).
  HTML approximates brown as "Milk Chocolate", #780000. In RBG it's R120-B0-G0, in CMYK it's C52-M98-Y96-K12.
  If you see a "perfect brown" it's because something did a good job of balancing those other colours to fool your eye (just as a mix of red and yellow pigment fools you into seeing orange). I know, I had to do that by hand with the aforementioned logo.
  
  --
  ~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
23. Re:I Don't See ... by fph+il+quozientatore · 2010-10-02 10:41 · Score: 1
  
  No brown? Clearly you haven't used Ubuntu...
  
  --
  My first program:
  Hell Segmentation fault
24. Re:I Don't See ... by durdur · 2010-10-02 13:27 · Score: 1
  
  You can't reproduce with pixels what was created with pigments, it just doesn't work.
  So true. I am no art expert, but I've been privileged to see a few incredible and memorable works in museums, including Van Gogh's "Sunflowers" and Renoir's "Luncheon of the Boating Party". What you see on a monitor does not compare.
25. Re:I Don't See ... by bertok · 2010-10-02 13:37 · Score: 3, Interesting
  
  I did get it to where it looks good, but it took a lot of swearing. And I'd started with a scan of the original (best copy available -- it was an existing print logo to be used on their website). Had to do a lot of finagling with the tint to get it to where what the eye *sees* on a monitor is the intended shade of brown. On examining it at the pixel level, the reason became clear -- there ain't no such shade as 'brown' in the CRT spectrum.
  There's no such shade as "brown" on the real spectrum. As a graphics designer, I thought you'd understand that.
  Every color other than red, green, or blue will always be a mixture on all monitors at the "pixel" level. Your monitor isn't somehow lying to you, or cheating you out of a real color, it's mixing colors using additive blending, just like it happens in with light in real life as well.
  If it looks the "same" at a distance, than for all practical purposes, it is the same. Putting your nose up to the glass and claiming that it's all "pixelated" - and hence somehow fake - is just stupid.
  For professional work, why don't you get a wide-gamut monitor like the some of the new Dell monitors? They have a narrower color gamut than the human eye, but wider than sRGB, Adobe RGB, and CMYK.
  And unlike your stone-age CRT, an LCD doesn't flicker, has a higher resolution, the pixels are perfectly square, the edge looks just as perfect as the center, and their color calibration drifts less with time. And if you get a matching video card, you can also get 30-bit color (10+10+10), which gives you 1024 shades of each color channel instead of the usual 256. It makes a significant difference when editing images with a lot of shadow detail.
26. Re:I Don't See ... by Peach+Rings · 2010-10-02 14:23 · Score: 1
  
  You mean dithering? Um, I don't think so. Check out the bottom-middle square in this. Every pixel on my screen is exactly the same color, and yes I looked closer.
27. Re:I Don't See ... by Peach+Rings · 2010-10-02 14:25 · Score: 2, Informative
  
  Real life is usually subtractive color, not additive.
28. Re:I Don't See ... by NormalVisual · 2010-10-02 15:40 · Score: 1
  
  I think he's talking about the red, green, and blue subpixels that make up each addressable display pixel. which is in fact a kind of dithering.
  
  --
  Please stand clear of the doors, por favor mantenganse alejado de las puertas
29. Re:I Don't See ... by NormalVisual · 2010-10-02 15:50 · Score: 1
  
  Agreed - even works with a much more subdued palette like "Arrangement in Gray and Black: The Artist's Mother" by Whistler represent a totally different experience when seen directly. Most of the other more colorful Impressionist stuff just blows me away.
  
  --
  Please stand clear of the doors, por favor mantenganse alejado de las puertas
30. Re:I Don't See ... by Reziac · 2010-10-02 16:46 · Score: 3, Interesting
  
  Yeah, I know there's no such colour as... [insert combo-of-whatevers here] ...but it's still a convenient shorthand for what we SEE. Imagine if these what-we-see colours had no names and you had to refer to each by its numbers!
  As to examining pixels, that's what I wound up doing because the initial brown looked wrong (like it wanted to be a bruised purple instead). There's nothing stupid about taking something down to its component parts to see why it's not working.
  I've seen exactly *one* LCD that I deemed entirely suitable, and the damned thing cost $2200 (and that was at the trade-show discount). A wee ways out of my budget, probably for the next century. -- One of the issues that drives me nuts is that they're sensitive to viewing angle. Not so much from side-to-side anymore but still from up-to-down. So if you don't always slouch at the same height, the image changes. The very expensive one lacked this visual defect.
  And as you note there's the issue of matching the video card to the LCD, notably the resolution. Not an issue with a CRT. I really hate being stuck on someone else's notion of MY ideal resolution, because otherwise the aspect ratio is munged, or it displays interlaced (I've seen both problems).
  I've also found the average LCD's total light output wearing on my eyes.
  I suppose if I was made of money, or doing graphics as a fulltime job, it would be worth whatever investment was required to get it how I want it. As it is, my stone-age solution works better for me, for a fraction of the investment.
  
  --
  ~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
31. Re:I Don't See ... by Reziac · 2010-10-02 16:57 · Score: 1
  
  I was working from a full colour scan of a print, not from a preset. I did try using an outline and single colour fill, but it looked wrong; it needed shading to look right onscreen, even tho it *appears* as all one colour. What I used for the adjacent text (cited numbers) was the closest visual match to the total effect.
  
  --
  ~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
32. Re:I Don't See ... by bertok · 2010-10-02 18:32 · Score: 2, Informative
  
  Yeah, I know there's no such colour as... [insert combo-of-whatevers here] ...but it's still a convenient shorthand for what we SEE. Imagine if these what-we-see colours had no names and you had to refer to each by its numbers!
  What you "see" is a combination of colors, essentially red, green, and blue. Technically, natural light is a continuous spectrum of colors with a complex map of varying intensities, but your eyes physically can't sense that. In effect, your eyes have only "blue-yellow" and "green-red" sensors, which are mathematically identical to an additive mixture of red, green, and blue. It's not a cheat, or an over-simplification, monitors are designed to match how humans see. There are lots of limitations to color reproduction, like the color filters not having a truly pure color, which reduces the gamut, but that's improved a lot in recent years. There's no such thing as "brown", really, either on a computer screen, or in the natural world.
  
  As to examining pixels, that's what I wound up doing because the initial brown looked wrong (like it wanted to be a bruised purple instead). There's nothing stupid about taking something down to its component parts to see why it's not working.
  Did you notice the red-green-blue sliders in the color selection dialog box of your image editor? That's exactly what it does. You don't have to get your face up close to the monitor!
  
  I've seen exactly *one* LCD that I deemed entirely suitable, and the damned thing cost $2200 (and that was at the trade-show discount). A wee ways out of my budget, probably for the next century.
  
  For a professional grade monitor, that's cheap. Most graphic artists I know work with $10K+ monitors, like the HP DreamColor range.
  
  One of the issues that drives me nuts is that they're sensitive to viewing angle. Not so much from side-to-side anymore but still from up-to-down. So if you don't always slouch at the same height, the image changes. The very expensive one lacked this visual defect.
  Mine is perfect within 20 degrees in all directions, and I got it 5 years ago for $1000, delivered. The same 24" model from Dell is about $300 now, I think. Most professionals have switched to LCDs, because the color shifting issues have been fixed on all of the high-end monitors, and they now have better color reproduction overall than CRTs.
  
  And as you note there's the issue of matching the video card to the LCD, notably the resolution. Not an issue with a CRT. I really hate being stuck on someone else's notion of MY ideal resolution, because otherwise the aspect ratio is munged, or it displays interlaced (I've seen both problems).
  If your video card can't handle 2D at common display resolutions, you seriously need to upgrade. Ancient embedded cards can handle that. I've seen people run 2560x1600 resolutions just fine with a $50 video card.
  
  I've also found the average LCD's total light output wearing on my eyes.
  They have brightness controls, you know. Mine can give you sunburn if you let it, but I just set it to a moderate level, and it's fine.
  
  I suppose if I was made of money, or doing graphics as a fulltime job, it would be worth whatever investment was required to get it how I want it. As it is, my stone-age solution works better for me, for a fraction of the investment.
  Zero investment is more like it. You can get a professional-grade monitor for under $1000 if you do you research and find a good deal.
33. Re:I Don't See ... by rdnetto · 2010-10-02 19:43 · Score: 1
  
  You cannot currently create an image on a monitor that uses brown.
  Ubuntu begs to differ
  
  --
  Most human behaviour can be explained in terms of identity.
34. Re:I Don't See ... by Anonymous Coward · 2010-10-02 23:00 · Score: 0
  
  In effect, your eyes have only "blue-yellow" and "green-red" sensors, which are mathematically identical to an additive mixture of red, green, and blue.
  True, but they are not physically identical, and this is the problem. Your general premise is correct, as well as the solution which is currently in use. Which is to say, monitors are outputting light in a format which is intended to fool the human eye into seeing the same color as it would in nature. This is a shortcut due to the fact that output technology can't actually reproduce true color spectrum, there are a ton of missing areas.
  The end solution is to develop a display which outputs a real light spectrum, so that we don't have to screw around with things just to put them onto a display. In the meantime, the solution we have is a lot cheaper and works nearly as well but requires a lot more work on the part of the producers of the images.
35. Re:I Don't See ... by Anonymous Coward · 2010-10-02 23:17 · Score: 0
  
  Real life is usually subtractive color, not additive.
  We're talking about two opposite things: Light and Pigment.
  Light- White is ALL spectrum of light, Black is NONE.
  Pigment- White is when the pigment has NO color, Black is when it has ALL the colors.
  Pigment absorbs the light spectrums we do not see. Technically speaking, a "blue" object is not really blue, it just looks blue because it reflects the blue light and absorbs the other wavelengths, so looking at it from the point of view of light it would actually be all the colors except blue.
  Then you throw a monitor in the mix- it has to output light but doesn't have a full spectrum to work with due to shortcomings in technology. This works fine for white, black, and colors which are easy to create as a composite of red, green, and blue. But some colors like various shades of Brown need certain parts of the spectrum to make them look correct which aren't easily output by the monitors (well, the cheap ones most of us use anyhow). So we settle for an approximation which fools the human eye/brain because it's good enough for most purposes.
  Eventually displays will be capable of outputting a full spectrum and intensity range and we won't have to resort to such tricks. But even then, you're not going to get the same look as you would in person when viewing such art. Those are 3-D** objects, even if there isn't a lot of depth it's still there and has quite an impact. Some of the masterpieces have paint that sticks out more than an inch in places, it's actually pretty rare to find a perfectly flat oil painting, for example.
  **3-D as in Three Dimensional, not to be confused with S3-D, or Stereoscopic 3-D, which is still a completely 2-D image. I point it out because some might suggest it as an alternate, and it's not. Anything short of an image which can be turned, tilted, or viewed from an angle which then reveals MORE of the scene, is not 3-D and won't help.
36. Re:I Don't See ... by chihowa · 2010-10-03 11:28 · Score: 1
  
  Pigment absorbs the light spectrums we do not see. Technically speaking, a "blue" object is not really blue, it just looks blue because it reflects the blue light and absorbs the other wavelengths, so looking at it from the point of view of light it would actually be all the colors except blue.
  Actually, it doesn't absorb all other wavelengths. It absorbs the color that is opposite on the "color wheel" from the color it appears to be. So a red object absorbs green, a yellow object absorbs violet, etc. We see the reflected light (which is the incident light minus the small range of absorbed light) as biased away from the absorbed wavelength and interpret it as the opposite on the color wheel. This is a natural result of using our three color sensors to recreate colors.
  
  --
  If you want a vision of the future, imagine a youtube comments section scrolling - forever.
37. Re:I Don't See ... by tehcyder · 2010-10-04 02:24 · Score: 1
  
  What you see, if you look closer (at the pixel level), is not precisely brown; it's a conglomeration of other colours.
  
  But most people do not look at digital photos at the pixel level
  
  --
  To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
38. Re:I Don't See ... by Reziac · 2010-10-04 02:48 · Score: 1
  
  Point was, it looked wrong, so I examined it at the pixel level to find out why, and to see if it could be fixed.
  That slashdotters persistently and deliberately misunderstand this... well, maybe they need to simply read posts rather than examining them pixel by pixel ;)
  
  --
  ~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
Links to the actual images... by iammani · 2010-10-02 04:19 · Score: 4, Informative

Caravaggio, Bacchus
Botticelli, The Birth of Venus
Sandro Botticelli, La Primavera
1. Re:Links to the actual images... by iammani · 2010-10-02 04:21 · Score: 2, Interesting
  
  Mmm looks like you could open one of the above links and navigate to other images within the flash app.
2. Re:Links to the actual images... by Andy+Smith · 2010-10-02 04:29 · Score: 1
  
  Damn, site is down. Can someone mirror? ;-)
3. Re:Links to the actual images... by Trufagus · 2010-10-02 05:57 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  The link in the summary goes to a page at 'skunkpost' that merely reprints an AP article.
  I don't care about skunkpost or AP, but if it is AP's article then the link should go to the original. Otherwise we will get sites simply reprinting other people's articles and then submitting their reprint to /. etc.
  I realize this problem is as old as the Internet (probably much older) but it would be SO EASY for /. to stop contributing to the problem.
4. Re:Links to the actual images... by Fearless96 · 2010-10-02 06:56 · Score: 2, Informative
  
  These, too:
  
  Verrocchio, Leonardo da Vinci, Battesimo di Cristo
  Leonardo da Vinci, Annunciazione
5. Re:Links to the actual images... by Trufagus · 2010-10-03 15:20 · Score: 1
  
  And a few hours later then is already another item - "the new data centre capitol of america" - that contains a single link and lo-and-behold that link is also to skunkpost.
  Is there some relationship between /. and skunkpost or are the skunkpost people just systematically using /. to promote their site?
DPI? by short · 2010-10-02 04:25 · Score: 1

So I have to square root the billion pixels first and guess the painting size or guess the parameters of "an average digital camera"... Why they just cannot say the DPI? slashdot is a technical magazine or - ok, it is no longer.
1. Re:DPI? by Anonymous Coward · 2010-10-02 06:08 · Score: 0
  
  So I have to square root the billion pixels first and guess the painting size or guess the parameters of "an average digital camera"... Why they just cannot say the DPI?
  I totally agree, that was just mean.
  
  slashdot is a technical magazine or - ok, it is no longer.
  I have never heard Slashdot described with such archaic terms before. Magazine? Really?
Note that these images are not... by John+Hasler · 2010-10-02 04:25 · Score: 2, Informative

...protected by copyright under USA law. If you are in the USA you are free to download them and share them.

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Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
1. Re:Note that these images are not... by lyinhart · 2010-10-02 04:39 · Score: 1
  
  ...protected by copyright under USA law. If you are in the USA you are free to download them and share them.
  Hm, I think some folks would be willing to debate that: http://yro.slashdot.org/story/09/07/11/1239244/UKs-National-Portrait-Gallery-Threatens-To-Sue-Wikipedia-User
  
  --
  Freedom is drinking a beer in the park when you're supposed to be at work.
2. Re:Note that these images are not... by game+kid · 2010-10-02 04:49 · Score: 1
  
  That, and you'll have to deal with the "HALTA DEFINIZIONE" marks baked in at least some of the image tiles. No free lunch etc.
  That aside, the closeups are a jarring reminder that these paintings will crumble forever someday. Or at least I'm scared of such art being lost after the Iraq lootings. I wonder why the first thing I zoomed into was Venus's nostril, though...
  
  --
  You can hold down the "B" button for continuous firing.
3. Re:Note that these images are not... by John+Hasler · 2010-10-02 04:50 · Score: 1
  
  See Bridgeman vs. Corel.
  
  --
  Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
4. Re:Note that these images are not... by Ethanol-fueled · 2010-10-02 05:03 · Score: 1
  
  I've mentioned this before, but I purchased an art e-book for a class because I had no other choice. Approximately every tenth image was a blank "This image removed due to copyright restrictions." In a fucking textbook I had paid for.
  
  I feel justified in my piracy of other textbooks...
5. Re:Note that these images are not... by Animats · 2010-10-02 05:26 · Score: 1
  
  Hm, I think some folks would be willing to debate that: UKs-National-Portrait-Gallery-Threatens-To-Sue-Wikipedia-User
  They threatened that back in 2009, but when Wikipedia's lawyers replied, the National Portrait Gallery never filed suit.
  It's been over a decade since Bridgeman vs. Corel, and it hasn't been overturned. At least one related US case has made it to the appellate level (Meshwerks vs. Toyota) and not only did the appeals court cite Bridgeman as good law, they extended it to 3D scans of 3D objects.
  There's some huffing and puffing from the museum community, but no museum has dared to force the issue in court, for fear of getting an even worse ruling, or being hit by a "false claim of copyright" prosecution.
6. Re:Note that these images are not... by jonbryce · 2010-10-02 07:59 · Score: 1
  
  They were trying to sue under English law.
7. Re:Note that these images are not... by Anonymous Coward · 2010-10-04 17:15 · Score: 0
  
  You bought an art e-book? Sounds like something a stupid fucking emo-fag-bitch would do!
  Quick, everybody curb stomp him!
  http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1807090&cid=33781712
Re:Another cool site by Andy+Smith · 2010-10-02 04:30 · Score: 3, Informative

Link is goatse.
I feel poorly.
Servers on Fire by Vexo · 2010-10-02 04:34 · Score: 1

This will be really cool in a week or so when the servers recover from having 10 gigapixel images slash-dotted...
Re:Another cool site by Andy+Smith · 2010-10-02 04:39 · Score: 2

Well done to whoever marked this as troll. I was trying to help!
Poor poor guy who came up with this... by santax · 2010-10-02 04:41 · Score: 2, Funny

He is probably wondering when he sees the data-costs after getting slashdotted if it wouldn't have been better to just buy a couple more paintings. From Rembrand or something like that.
Re:Yawn... by dkleinsc · 2010-10-02 04:42 · Score: 5, Insightful

That's not why I'd even consider going to an art museum. After all, since a lot of those folks don't even allow you to take photographs, if you just want to say you've been, you can just lie about it.
No, go to an art museum because you might see something interesting, unique, beautiful, or mind-bending. I'm not even very visual myself, but a good art museum's works will draw your eyes right in and convince you to spend a while exploring the details.

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I am officially gone from /. Long live http://www.soylentnews.com/
The images have logos stamped on them by Animats · 2010-10-02 04:42 · Score: 2, Interesting

Those images have "Halta Definizione" stamped all over them. But it looks like that's being done client-side; the stamps appear and disappear as you scroll and change resolution. Someone should extract the underlying images and post them to the Wikimedia Commons in PNG format. This is legal; see "Bridgeman vs. Corel".
1. Re:The images have logos stamped on them by Pawnn · 2010-10-02 05:31 · Score: 1
  
  Go right ahead! You'll be a hero.
  
  Unfortunately, to do a decent job at what you're saying would take several days of effort. Heck, even to make wallpaper sized image would take hours.
  
  I think someone smarter than me might have an easier time hacking the site and finding access to the raw images than to do what you're suggesting.
2. Re:The images have logos stamped on them by Fred+Foobar · 2010-10-03 18:00 · Score: 2, Informative
  
  Look at the source code of (for example) http://www.haltadefinizione.com/magnifier.jsp?idopera=10. In there you'll find this code:
  swf.addVariable("xml","/immagini/opere/10/imgfull/properties_krpano.xml");
  That's a relative address—the full URL is http://www.haltadefinizione.com/immagini/opere/10/imgfull/properties_krpano.xml. That file contains stuff like this:
  
  <image type="CYLINDER" hfov="1.00" multires="true" tilesize="256"> <level tiledimagewidth="181273" tiledimageheight="113625"> <cylinder url="venere_krpano/l7_%0v_%0h.jpg" /> </level> ...
  
  The URL, again, is relative (to the XML file) and points to http://www.haltadefinizione.com/immagini/opere/10/imgfull/venere_krpano/l7_%250v_%250h.jpg, where %0v and %0h are the vertical and horizontal coordinates, respectively. Since this level is 181273 pixels wide and 113625 pixels (taken from the "level" tag), and tiles are 256x256 pixels (taken from the "image" tag), you can grab all images at this level with the fusker string http://www.haltadefinizione.com/immagini/opere/10/imgfull/venere_krpano/l7_[01-444]_[01-709].jpg. Be careful downloading the whole picture at this detail level (7). It's 314,796 tiles! If you just want a wallpaper-sized image for this image, try downloading detail level 1, which is 2833x1776 pixels (84 tiles) (fusker string: http://www.haltadefinizione.com/immagini/opere/10/imgfull/venere_krpano/l1_[01-07]_[01-12].jpg).
  By the way, the watermarks are all embedded directly in the tile sets, unfortunately. They seem to be stamped on every tile whose coordinates modulo 4 are 0, meaning only 1/16 of the images are stamped.
  Happy downloading!
  
  --
  It was a really good paper.
3. Re:The images have logos stamped on them by Fred+Foobar · 2010-10-03 18:17 · Score: 2, Informative
  
  If you do decide to download the full images, keep this in mind: Each tile image is between about 15KB and 50KB or so (let's say 30KB average), so the full detail image consists of roughly 9 gigabytes of JPEG images. Please, everyone, for the sake of their servers don't try to download it all at once! (I would personally try to trickle download it over the course of a week or so to be nice on their servers.)
  
  --
  It was a really good paper.
free hit counter! by Anonymous Coward · 2010-10-02 04:45 · Score: 0

I was unable to view this page. Seems it is in REAL HIGH definition, whilst I only have an HD monitor.
law around the world... by Qubit · 2010-10-02 05:00 · Score: 1

Anyone remember what Italian copyright law says?
The html pages all have "© 2010 - Hal9000 - Tutti i diritti riservati." at the bottom, but it's entirely plausible that they could just mean the contents and derivative works of the website proper, and not the old master images.

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coding is life /* the rest is */
1. Re:law around the world... by John+Hasler · 2010-10-02 06:16 · Score: 1
  
  Italy is a Berne signatory so copyright notices are not required.
  
  --
  Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
2. Re:law around the world... by jonbryce · 2010-10-02 08:01 · Score: 1
  
  If it is anything like English law, and it probably is given they are both implementing the same EU copyright directives, the photograph has a copyright separate from the underlying image, so you can't copy it, however you could take your own identical photo of the original painting.
3. Re:law around the world... by Kam+Solusar · 2010-10-02 11:31 · Score: 1
  
  AFAIK, in most European countries reproductions of two-dimensional works don't generate new copyrights. The UK seems to be one of the few countries where museums can legally claim to own the copyrights to photos/scans of very old paintings.
  
  --
  The Angels have the Phone Box
Re:Yawn... by iammani · 2010-10-02 05:56 · Score: 1

+1! I would mod you up, if I had not posted else where.
Clunky, why? Deepzoom is open and free too... by TheNetAvenger · 2010-10-02 07:20 · Score: 2, Interesting

I don't get the sad Flash UI implemented for viewing the art. Why not just use DeepZoom or a variation to seamlessly zoom and pan the images. (Deepzoom is a MS technology, but it can be used with Silverlight or even generic HTML and is exactly what this company is trying to do.)
Love the high resolution images and availability; however, using the page UI and how freaking slow the UI is doesn't make a good impression.
DaVinci in a new....light by Tablizer · 2010-10-02 07:21 · Score: 1

Two fallen boogers and a nose-hair

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Table-ized A.I.
oh no quick!!! by Anonymous Coward · 2010-10-02 07:24 · Score: 0

I hope they put the nudes in high-speed cache memory! You just know that the slashdot crowd will go straight to the nudes!
Zoom to the smallest details yeessh as if they had to say that...
While interesting, this misses a major issue: by rootrot · 2010-10-02 07:46 · Score: 1

Looking at a digital image, *regardless* of how deep the image density might be, is experientially different from and inferior to seeing the work in person. There are elements to a painting, print, or book which simply can not be captured as a 2 dimensional image.
These digital archives are a wonderful resource and offer access to a much broader audience. They are generally, however, a pale shadow of the work in the real world.
I'm reminded of my late friend, Herb Belkin, "Digital is like pornography; analog is like actual sex" [re recorded music, though applies here as well...].
1. Re:While interesting, this misses a major issue: by Vegemeister · 2010-10-02 08:51 · Score: 1
  
  If your friend had said 'live performance' he would have been correct. Analog, however, sucks donkey balls.
That's a lot of detail. by Superdarion · 2010-10-02 07:54 · Score: 1

In all the years I had been staring at now-low-res images of the last supper, never had I hoticed it's filled with this HALTA thing everywhere.

Do you think it's some secret society Leonardo belonged to? It's all so exciting.
Re:Another cool site by Anonymous Coward · 2010-10-02 08:01 · Score: 0

DaVinci's The Last Goatse.sx?
Re:Another cool site by Andy+Smith · 2010-10-02 08:02 · Score: 4, Funny

Well done to whoever marked this as troll. I was trying to be a whiny bitch!
Re:Clunky, why? Deepzoom is open and free too... by Vegemeister · 2010-10-02 09:05 · Score: 1

Remember the shitstorm the last time somebody posted a slashdot story about a high res image and the website required silverlight? Yeah.
Re:Clunky, why? Deepzoom is open and free too... by PCM2 · 2010-10-02 09:19 · Score: 1

Love the high resolution images and availability; however, using the page UI and how freaking slow the UI is doesn't make a good impression.
Eh??? My impression was that it was basically "Google Maps for paintings." Pan, scroll, zoom... it was all pretty seamless and about as fast as I'd expect it to be.
And how exactly is a UI that "can be used with Silverlight" any better than a "sad Flash UI"?

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Breakfast served all day!
Re:Clunky, why? Deepzoom is open and free too... by Reziac · 2010-10-02 09:55 · Score: 1

IBM had such a technology, intended for retail advertising sites (so you could zoom in on product images to the level of fine details) in 1998, and it didn't need flash or much else that was fancy -- it worked in Netscape v3. However, I've never seen it deployed, so maybe it never made it past the marketing stage. They did demo it at trade shows, tho.

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~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
One of these Baroque masters was a Spongebob fan! by markzip · 2010-10-02 11:24 · Score: 2, Funny

Another direct link: http://www.haltadefinizione.com/magnifier.jsp?idopera=3
Fans of the Baroque will be aware that Andrea Pozzo is best known for his use of "quadratura", the technique intermixing paintings of architectural details with elements of fancy. What is less well known is that Pozzo was an early admirer of Spongebob Squarepants. One of these amazingly highly detailed pictures shows that his "Gloria di Sant'Ignazio", painted in 1685 for the nave of the church of St. Ignazio in Rome, include a sly tribute to our favourite right-angled undersea dweller. Hit the link and zoom in to the bottom right
http://www.haltadefinizione.com/magnifier.jsp?idopera=3
Why print? by Dog135 · 2010-10-02 14:32 · Score: 1

It use to bother me that photo printers aren't all that great, but for me at least, I found I almost never print my photos any more. I view them exclusively on my computer. Now the only time I print a photo is when I want to give a copy to my in-laws who don't have a computer. Anyone else I just give a CD or email. Heck of a lot cheaper that way! heh

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"That's so plausible, I can't believe it!" - Leela
Thank you! by Anonymous Coward · 2010-10-02 17:03 · Score: 0

Looks like I'm an 'Anonymous Cowherd'. Oh WHell.
Thanks to Soulskill for posting this.
I was truly blown away.
Perhpas, as others have noted, there are ways to do similar things. But to make this so readily available over the Web is definitely a bonus!
Any more? by beernutz · 2010-10-02 21:44 · Score: 1

My girlfriend is an artist and would like to see more like this. Anyone have a good reference for higher resolution images besides google searches?

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(stolen from DaBum) I am dyslexia of borg - your ass will be laminated.
Re:Clunky, why? Deepzoom is open and free too... by TheNetAvenger · 2010-10-04 11:00 · Score: 1

Deepzoom doesn't require silverlight....