The demonstrator “Photographic investigation of art works” is based on the website ‘Closer to Van Eyck – Rediscovering the Ghent Altarpiece’. The website presents more than 100 billion pixels of image data of the Ghent Altarpiece (1432) in visual light macrophotography, infrared macrophotography, infrared reflectography and X-radiography. The website provides a tremendous resource for education. For example, detailed insights can be taught on painting techniques, art restauration, imaging modalities and image processing can be shared with the students.
However during a lecture, navigating between images from one detail to another and switching between presentation and the website can be cumbersome. Therefore, we created a demonstrator that integrates the viewer in to an interactive presentation. The presentation combines typical slides with one or more interactive viewers. This allows to navigate from one view to another with a single mouse click. All functionality available on the website, such as comparing different modalities, is available in the presentation as well. Even additional possibilities are available, such as comparison of a virtually unlimited amount of viewers. This allows to put multiple details from different paintings next to each other on a single slide, for example allowing to focus on specific aspects such as pearls, faces or eyes.
To illustrate the power and usefulness, a seminar was organized in November 2016 that adopted the demonstrator in a real world setting.
The recording of the seminar is shared in the video below:
