14 ms·

Vermeer's paintings might be 350 year-old color photographs

749 points by famousactress 12y ago

famousactress 12y ago
FYI, the trailer for the documentary at the bottom of this article has a clip that makes it clearer what exactly he does with the mirror to help him paint photo-realistically. It wasn't super clear to me until seeing that.
- devb 12y ago
  I'm guessing a mirror pointed at the subject over one eye with the other eye looking at the blank canvas? Then it would just be a matter of filling in paint on the canvas where it should match up with the original.
  - famousactress 12y ago
    Oh interesting. That may be it. I wasn't sure whether he was actively using both eyes that way, or if he was tilting the mirror in and out while painting. I think it's probably hard to sort out how well it would work without trying it yourself.
  - deleted 12y ago
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  - Anjin 12y ago
    No, the mirror is on a stick and doesn't move. When Tim is looking down at the mirror from above he can see the reflected image he wants to paint, and also the paint surface he is going to paint on. He keeps adding color until the edge of the mirror disappears at which point he knows that he got the color on the surface to match the color in real life. Here's a screenshot. The mirror is on the top, and the painting surface is below: http://i.imgur.com/Uk7vSQ5.png http://i.imgur.com/Uk7vSQ5.png Or on the painting of his father-in-law: http://i.imgur.com/WP2ls3A.png http://i.imgur.com/WP2ls3A.png
freshyill 12y ago
I've been waiting for this to come out on DVD. Time to add it to the Queue. Is it wrong for me to think that Tim's Vermeer is better than Vermeer's Vermeer? Vermeer: http://media.boingboing.net/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/xl_music.jpg http://media.boingboing.net/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/xl_mu... Tim: http://media.boingboing.net/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/ML2s.jpg http://media.boingboing.net/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/ML2s....
- voidlogic 12y ago
  Consider that Tim's painting doesn't have centuries of aging to contend with- in regards to vibrancy and cracking.
- lisper 12y ago
  Side by side: http://www.flownet.com/ron/vermeer.html http://www.flownet.com/ron/vermeer.html
  - voidlogic 12y ago
    I like how Vermeer directs our focus by making things like the roof slightly out of focus, kind of an emulation of the effect of having peripheral vision. Tim's lacks this. Also, the woman is facing the wrong way in Tim's.
    - pbhjpbhj 12y ago
      Is that "Tim's" feet in the reflection in the mirror? I first saw a piece about this painting a long time ago, possible an Open University / BBC collaboration - it was concerned with the room being the wrong length to allow for the optical method people thought was used, or some such, I don't recall too well. Other (?) speculation has been on here not too long ago.
      - anigbrowl 12y ago
        It's the corner of the carpet on the floor tile - the one farthest from us, not the one in the foreground of the painting. I work in film and one thing cinematographers love doing is shooting into mirrors, so I've gotten used to checking them for continuity purposes :) As for the dimensions of the room, being 'wrong', that may be deliberate. Again in film props and furniture are adjusted out of their natural position surprisingly often, in pursuit of aesthetic harmony. If you analyzed an interior scene that had been shot from multiple angles in hopes of mapping the room's contents accurately, you'd be disappointed to discover that many things had changed position by ~10% of their own size from shot to shot. Part of the craft is the ability to look at the image on a tiny monitor and be able to identify whatever it is that is distracting your eye from where you're supposed to be looking, like a table which looks fine in one shot but feels too small following a change in the focal length of the camera lens for a different shot. Solution - move the table towards the lens a bit. Don't even get me started on lighting and related tricks, which can further mess up your spatial intuition. For example, a very common and cheap effect is to make a room feel bigger by painting adjacent walls slightly different shades of the same color. Lots of these techniques are stolen from painting, where the deliberate falsification of perspective has long been used for both aesthetic and semantic effect. Check out this especially famous example: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ambassadors_(Holbein) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ambassadors_(Holbein)
lisper 12y ago
Wow, this guy is seriously hard-core: > I needed a CNC lathe to make the legs for the harpsichord and the blue chair. I couldn't find a CNC lathe large enough to make these parts so I came up with the simple hack of bolting a cheap wood lathe onto the bed of the milling machine. Then, I programmed the mill to trace out the contour of the leg while the lathe spun the wood underneath the mill head. ... > The legs of the instrument turned out to be a few inches too long for my wood lathe so I pulled the lathe out of the milling machine and cut it into two pieces on a band saw. I then bolted both pieces back into the mill, separated by a few inches. Now the lathe could accommodate a longer piece of wood. Adam and Jamie would be proud.
- tlrobinson 12y ago
  And: > Since lenses in the 17th century were less perfect than modern lenses, I decided to make my own lens using 17th century techniques. That's some serious dedication.
  - logicallee 12y ago
    What's really amazing is that this -- all this -- was for rank speculation!!! There was not one scrap, not one scrap of evidence of any mechanical interest, or ability, or optical devices in Vermeer's life or among his possessions. It would be one thing if he thought Da Vinci had done it. But Vermeer? And yet he said, no, you can tell by the paint chips. That is an absolutely amazing amount of dedication to verifying something without looking at any evidence whatsoever but the end result. I couldn't have done it. I would have given up after a lack of any corroborating evidence.
    - speleding 12y ago
      Although the article doesn't mention it, there is evidence that Vermeer had access to optical devices: Antoni van Leeuwenhoek, inventor of the microscope, born in the same year (1632) lived very close to Vermeer in Delft and was named the executor of his will, so they must have known each other well.
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m0nty 12y ago
It's interesting to see David Hockney there, since he made a documentary many years ago (the 90s?) about how Vermeer might have used lenses and mirrors to create his paintings. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynrnfBnhWSo http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynrnfBnhWSo He points out that the intricacy of Vermeer's paintings, and peculiarities of perspective, strongly suggest the use of a camera obscura (or other optical device) to aid his work. This is not to detract from the investigation in the OA, just point out that others have been this way before.
- kencausey 12y ago
  I've not seen the film but I have heard Penn discuss it to some extent and I believe he has made it clear that the idea in a general sense and certainly in particular to the use of a camera obscura well predate Tim's interest. Where Tim goes further than any example I'm aware of is in actually implementing and spending a significant amount of time testing a specific implementation to which Vermeer can reasonably be expected to have had access.
  - justincormack 12y ago
    Hockney did that sort of test too, I believe, although as an artist so perhaps saw it differently eg he knew how to paint first so could perhaps work with less.
- sp332 12y ago
  The article points out the problem with using a camera obscura: when it's dark enough to see the color of the scene, you can't see the color of your paint. This new build apparently addresses that particular problem.
- acomjean 12y ago
  David Hockney plays a not insignificant part in the documentary. They're pretty honest that the idea that these painters where using tools to help them did not originate with them.
spacecadet 12y ago
Tim's is better. ;D
brianmcdonough 12y ago
I was recruited to work as editor on this project about two years ago. My reason for not taking the job at the time was that it would be hard to make the ending interesting enough to justify the effort. Two years have passed and now that I see the reproduction, I've changed my mind, it was impossible to make the ending interesting enough. Would have made a good magazine article in the Smithsonian though. "what a sweep of vanity comes this way!" - Shakespeare
- samstave 12y ago
  Are you saying this is all one big ego trip on Tim's part?
  - brianmcdonough 12y ago
    It costs a lot of money to make a film. I don't know Tim and I suspect he's a nice and interesting guy, but movies that lack broad appeal are sometimes referred to as vanity projects. I'd like to know how much money was spent making the film, where that money came from and what the theatrical run took in. If I had that information, I could tell you whether this was a vanity project.
- tbirdz 12y ago
  I saw the film and I thought the ending was interesting. What was it about the ending that made you think it was impossible to make interesting?
  - brianmcdonough 12y ago
    Anyone who has seen a Vermeer painting up close, knows how hypnotic the experience can be. Is it true that in the movie Tim never gets to see the original and is reproducing based on a poster?
    - tbirdz 12y ago
      Tim gets to see the original Vermeer, but they weren't allowed to film it. However his reproduction is not based exactly on the poster or the original. Instead what Tim did was build a replica of the room Vermeer painted in, including all the props, and make his own painting by using his mirror device to observe this replica room.
huxley 12y ago
There was a Kickstarter done to build a modern camera lucida, they are still building batches of them (they even have DYI including prescription lucidas): http://neolucida.com http://neolucida.com (not affiliated, just an art geek)
mzs 12y ago
This will be a neat documentary and the idea clever to recreate the painting, but the camera obscura idea has been pretty well know for a while. Here is some evidence due to the quality of 17th C lens: http://www.essentialvermeer.com/camera_obscura/co_three.html http://www.essentialvermeer.com/camera_obscura/co_three.html I can't find a link but there was also good evidence of how the image shifts as focus changes in another painting. Some people even claim it's visible here: http://www.archiviobolano.it/img/arnolfini_SPECCHIO.JPG http://www.archiviobolano.it/img/arnolfini_SPECCHIO.JPG
- mzs 12y ago
  Shoot it was a van Eyck painting that I mentioned, sorry, good explanation here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hockney%E2%80%93Falco_thesis http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hockney%E2%80%93Falco_thesis
avani 12y ago
Pablo Garcia and Golan Levin at CMU reconstructed the Camera Lucida, which was a common artists' tool up until the last century, and describe the history of it here: http://neolucida.com/history/lucida-history/ http://neolucida.com/history/lucida-history/ Basically, it's a tiny prism on a stick that projects what is in front of you to your drawing surface. (disclaimer: I have no financial connection to these guys, but I did buy one of their Neolucidas, and it is a lot of fun)
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bane 12y ago
It's really clever, and I enjoyed the process involved immensely. The whole project is a work of art IMHO. I'm looking forward to watching the documentary of it all. I also like this conclusion. > My experiment doesn't prove that Vermeer worked this way, but it proves that he COULD have worked this way. I do take issue with the hypothesis. >The way Vermeer painted this wall is consistent with a photograph. It is not consistent with human vision. If you were standing in the room that Vermeer painted, you would see that wall as a pretty even shade of off-white. The retina in your eyeball does some image processing to minimize the effect of light and shadow. To your eye, the wall appears to have far less contrast than it actually has. And if you can't see it, you can't paint it. Then you can't see it through this device either. I'm not an artist, but I've taken a few art classes, and one of the transformative things that happens during formal art training is that you learn to look at things in non-intuitive ways. For example, when most people are told to "draw a dog", even if they're looking at one, they reach back into their semantic memory, look up the mental function for "draw dog" and reproduce that. The same thing is true for colors, brightness values, etc. A great deal of formal art education is learning to detach your visual stimulus from the semantic association you would otherwise naturally make...and perhaps reattach it to new semantic associations like "negative space" and "comparative brightness" and "relative white value". When you get really good you can even start reprocessing a scene or a model, deconstructing it in your mind and then reconstructing it via some other technique. You can go from photorealistic reproduction to complete abstraction. http://www.etsycreative.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/vince-low-portraits-550x660.jpg http://www.etsycreative.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/vince... https://3.bp.blogspot.com/_94URbVj_t8A/SZ7v2Iw28qI/AAAAAAAAAs0/KtyBdLmQohg/s320/tina+marker+on+canvas.jpg https://3.bp.blogspot.com/_94URbVj_t8A/SZ7v2Iw28qI/AAAAAAAAA... http://uploads2.wikiart.org/images/vincent-van-gogh/the-starry-night-1889(1).jpg http://uploads2.wikiart.org/images/vincent-van-gogh/the-star... https://gs1.wac.edgecastcdn.net/8019B6/data.tumblr.com/e8b9914990f75a949b1dbb9b1724ab6b/tumblr_mie7raQqj91ql98k2o1_1280.jpg https://gs1.wac.edgecastcdn.net/8019B6/data.tumblr.com/e8b99... http://www.mde-art.com/art-blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/abstract-portrait-face-lines-color.jpg http://www.mde-art.com/art-blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/a... I think a better hypothesis might have been "techniques at the time weren't suited to such exact reproduction of scenes, even great artists slightly distort objects and subjects in their work. Yet these paintings don't appear to suffer from such distortion, the shape and color reproduction is as exact as a tracing or photograph. There must have been a technique or tool used to assist the artist in not only tracing the shape, but reproducing the colors."
rquantz 12y ago
The way Vermeer painted this wall is consistent with a photograph. It is not consistent with human vision. If you were standing in the room that Vermeer painted, you would see that wall as a pretty even shade of off-white. For an untrained eye casually glancing at the wall, sure, the brain edits out variations. But a big part of training to be a painter is learning to see, and even with an untrained eye, if you stare at a wall long enough you'll start to see color and texture variations. Not saying he couldn't have used a camera obscura or some other machine, but this in itself is hardly evidence that he had mechanical help.
- pcurve 12y ago
  I studied art for many years and I agree. I also wouldn't consider his paintings particularly photographic-like, and you certain don't need mechanical aid to paints that are far more photo-like that Vermeer's paintings. John Singer Sargent's work demonstrates that it's more about the lighting and selective details. upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/26/Sargent_Lady_Agnew_of_Lochnaw.jpg 37.media.tumblr.com/a815602d0a7437c561817b5153e59bc9/tumblr_mjdy7uWvkL1s6fgo9o1_1280.jpg
kelvin0 12y ago
Bis? This story has already ran ... I guess this is fine for the 'new' crowd at HN
- kelvin0 12y ago
  My self-esteem just took a serious hit. I guess I should blame my bluntness and my ability to recall old stories. Seriously though, is there some type of algorithm on HN which 'discourages' posting the same story within an allotted time period (say 2-6 months)?
acomjean 12y ago
I saw the documentary. Its good, I enjoyed it. I'm involved in arts (open studios board and website operator) in massachusetts and have been talking to painters about this (none had seen the documentary yet). Generally they don't see it as changing things, unless a lot of people start doing this. Also painters enjoy the freedom to create stuff that doesn't exist, where is this technique is kinda like a photograph where what you capture has to exist. Makes you question art and its valuation (a lot does these days). No matter how its done the end result is what should be judged.
JustSomeNobody 12y ago
Good grief, talk about yak shaving.
- deleted 12y ago
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ludwigvan 12y ago
Here is some criticism from the Guardian: http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/2014/jan/28/tims-vermeer-fails http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/20...
- anigbrowl 12y ago
  Here is the same critic a year ago sneering that Vermeer is wildly overrated, and that people just like him because his slavish attention to detail is more accessible to people who are used to looking at photographs. http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/2013/jun/20/johannes-vermeer-pearl-national-gallery http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/20... And here's the same critic going on about how Vermeer's paintings are full of mystery and eroticism: http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/2013/jun/27/vermeer-music-seductive-national-gallery http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/20... Jones is a prime example of why I find most art critics insufferable.
- deltaqueue 12y ago
  The technology Jenison relies on can replicate art, but it does so synthetically, with no understanding of art's inner life What a bunch of rhetorical diarrhea. This was nothing more than an exercise in curiosity, an exploration and evaluation of a hypothesis. This was not an attempt to disprove Vermeer's creativity, disprove artists in general, or disprove art.
  - anigbrowl 12y ago
    Indeed. For the historical investigation that forms the backbones of the story, they had to do an imitation of the original work. The paint strokes on the canvas are literally the superficial aspects of the painting. There is much more 'art' in the choice of subject, perspective, layout and so on. But had Tim chosen his own subject matter freely, then comparison's with Vermeer's technique would have been almost impossible.
- jamesbritt 12y ago
  FTFA: The film implies anyone can make a beautiful work of art with the right application of science. There is no need for mystical ideas like genius. The film implies no such thing. I saw the movie a few months ago and it was pretty clear they believed that a Vermeer was more than simply technique.
mgr86 12y ago
did anyone else notice the photo/painting's caption read "Click to Embiggen"? Could this be a subtle nod to the animators who painstakenly produce live cartons at the sacrifice of their wrists?
- jbenz 12y ago
  I, for one, am hoping this word slowly seeps into public consciousness and then into dictionaries. If it is a subtle nod, it's a perfectly cromulent one.
jacquesm 12y ago
Very interesting article but this: "I couldn't find a CNC lathe large enough to make these parts" Makes absolutely no sense. I've worked on CNC rigs that would turn shafts for ocean liners and wheels for cranes, a couple of table legs should not have been a problem. As for the theory, very interesting. Here is the artist painting himself in his studio: http://www.essentialvermeer.com/catalogue/image-paintings/art_of_painting.jpg http://www.essentialvermeer.com/catalogue/image-paintings/ar... I don't see anything like lenses, mirrors or other tricks, mostly just brushes, paint, canvas, the artist and the subject. There is that little black stick on the top right of the canvas, wonder what that is? Maybe there is a mirror at the end of it ;) It would be funny if the evidence for all this was sitting in plain view for a few hundred years but likely there is a more ordinary explanation for that stick, maybe someone with more experience in painting can chip in about what that is. The about box at the bottom lists Tim as the guy behind DigiPaint of Amiga fame, and his company is also the one behind LightWave 3D.
- pcl 12y ago
  I couldn't find a CNC lathe large enough to make these parts My interpretation was more like "when looking around my basement full of awesome tools, I didn't have anything readily on hand, so I built one from what I had," not that no such machines existed.
- qbrass 12y ago
  >There is that little black stick on the top right of the canvas, wonder what that is? Maybe there is a mirror at the end of it ;) You mean like that round, brass colored thing that would otherwise look like his hand?
  - beernutz 12y ago
    No, I think he means the stick he used to partially rest his hand on. Remember, mirror and lens or not, it takes a LONG time to do that kind of detail work. If they really worked at that angle, I imagine your arm would get VERY tired, and the stick there might offer a bit of relief while working.
  - 12y ago
atiffany 12y ago
This is getting philosophical, but even if this was incontrovertible proof that Vermeer used these techniques to produce his works, it wouldn't detract from my appreciation. It would reshape my appreciate a bit, but I think that discovering these methods (by both Jenison and potentially Vermeer) is remarkable in itself. All artists use tools to produce their work - Vermeer may have just been innovative to find some really unique ones in his time.
Htsthbjig 12y ago
I love the process he follows, but Vermeer the biggest painter of all time?. He must be kidding. Vermeer painting is ok, but there are better paintings and certainly better painters. Rembrandt or Velazquez run circles around Vermeer in photorealism, but if you consider other things Vermeer is not even in the top ten, probably in top 100.
kyleowens10 12y ago
Another interesting post on the topic from awhile ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6823528 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6823528
11001 12y ago
There is so much more to Vermeer's art than just clever use of tools. I like this article much better (it got completely ignored on HN): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7254447 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7254447
- aw3c2 12y ago
  I took a look, read the subtitle, the first paragraph, scrolled to the bottom and closed the tab. I would like to at least remotely know what the topic is before reading something this long and dense.
  - aw3c2 12y ago
    Sorry for sharing an honest reaction as to why that article might not have worked on HN...
- anigbrowl 12y ago
  It also discusses other tools he used, and other approaches to using those tools by other artists. Well worth a read, thanks for reposting it.
- shadowmint 12y ago
  To be fair though, the technical excellence of his paintings has always been a subject of considerable interest to people. That's an article about Vermeer and his art. This is an article about the technical aspects of his painting. They're different topics and it's not really surprising to see this one generating more interest; but yes, indeed. There's a lot more to his work than simply the technical means by which he produced them; that's true of any artist (composition, etc). Also, that site has a really horrid and hard to read layout. The densely packed sans-serif font blocks that academic sites seem to favor are terrible. It's ironic given the attention that typesetting gets for academic papers seemed to get completely ignored once the web comes into it. -__-
gojomo 12y ago
Sci-fi author Greg Egan has a disturbing short-story on similar themes, 'The Caress', part of the collection Axiomatic. (The full collection is just $2.99 via the author's self-published ebooks: http://gregegan.customer.netspace.net.au/BIBLIOGRAPHY/Ebooks.html#Axiomatic http://gregegan.customer.netspace.net.au/BIBLIOGRAPHY/Ebooks...) It could make a great Blade Runner-like movie, and then that movie would be a perfect double-feature with Tim's Vermeer. And in digging up links about 'The Caress', I came across a cool word, ekphrasis, that also applies to Tim's Vermeer: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ekphrasis http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ekphrasis
zedshaw 12y ago
I had been waiting to see this movie forever and finally did right when it came out, and I can tell you it is awesome. It's a fantastic example of science and technology being used to solve a problem that just happens to be art. It's also a very compelling theory about the possible ways Vermeer did his more photorealistic paintings. Pretty much after this and spending the last year teaching myself to paint I can safely say if it looks like a photo, it's from a photo. Another great book to check out is David Hockney's "Secret Knowledge", which covers how this is done in other ways, how projection devices were used by Kepler and others, how it could have been considered a guild secret among painters, and how when the photograph first came out people remarked how much the looked like "finished" paintings. His latest exhibit at the De Young was actually based on the research from this book where he cranked out a metric ton (quite literally) of art using various projection devices. Another fun thing to do is "spot the laptop". You know how people are doing impressive hyperrealistic paintings like this: http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/pictured-eloy-morales-stunning-self-portraits-3166130 http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/pictured-eloy-morale... These are amazing, until you realize he's getting the fidelity he needs by making the paintings huge, then taking pictures of them from farther away. Can't tell a painting's size on the internet, so it looks super realistic until you see it in person. Next, if you look carefully at that first photo, he's looking off in the distance at....a laptop most likely, or a projection. If you look in youtube or at various artist's blogs you start to catch them with a laptop sitting right there, or an ipad stuck to their easel with the image right on it. If you check out these hyperrealists (they don't say photo 'cause that's a bad word) you can sometimes catch them with a laptop, image on it squared off, sometimes even zoomed in. What modern "Vermeers" are doing is they're using computers and screen technology to get very exacting details and color harmony using combinations of large size projections (you can see Eloy's pre-drawn lines), gridded images, and zooming on a computer screen. So the awesome thing about Tim's Vermeer is he shows that if someone's using enough technology to make art then they become just a mechanical photo printer. Might as well be a photographer. Here's another artist you can see copying a photo: http://www.littleobservationist.com/2013/05/22/artist-interview-francoise-nielly/ http://www.littleobservationist.com/2013/05/22/artist-interv... Françoise Nielly at least interprets them, but I bet if you looked she probably uses the hell out of computers at first to get studies right. What's interesting is many artists use technology like this, and many of them get into this "cheating" when they run into disabilities or time constraints. The problem isn't the technology though, it's whether they pretend they don't use any, which is what a lot of these hyperrealists try to get away with. But, take an artist like Richard Schmid and you find he started using a computer after a major back injury and he freely admits he uses photos and computers to do painting. What I liked about Tim's Vermeer is it's at least proof that someone with zero talent can use technology to create an equivalent to what's considered a masterpiece. David Hockney's book also demonstrates that much of the art we consider painted using pure skill is actually just clever uses of technology to do photo reproductions with oil paint.
awestley 12y ago
I am going to add my own useless commentary and say that I absolutely love things like this. It is the idea of applying a scientific approach to something for fun and because why not? This is Having Fun + Learning = Win in its purest form.
Marinlemaignan 12y ago
he's so cool, clever and can do anything
roschdal 12y ago
I tried to buy the video, and got this error message from Amazon: "We could not process your order because of geographical restrictions on the product which you were attempting to purchase. Please refer to the terms of use for this product to determine the geographical restrictions." Where can I buy this in Europe? In today's globalized world, online videos should be available everywhere at once.
- lstamour 12y ago
  It's apparently for sale via Amazon, iTunes and Vudu. E.g. http://www.amazon.co.uk/Tims-Vermeer-Tim-Jenison/dp/B00K2YVAUI/ref=sr_1_cc_1?s=aps&ie=UTF8&qid=1402436584&sr=1-1-catcorr&keywords=Tim%27s+vermeer http://www.amazon.co.uk/Tims-Vermeer-Tim-Jenison/dp/B00K2YVA... It's not yet on Netflix (streaming) anywhere in the world. http://www.moreflicks.com/titles/movies_tim-s-vermeer_2014 http://www.moreflicks.com/titles/movies_tim-s-vermeer_2014
  - roschdal 12y ago
    However, I'm not able to buy it on Amazon, due to "geographical restrictions on the product". Searching for it on iTunes gives 0 results. So it's clear that they don't want me to buy it in Europe.
    - tim333 12y ago
      It's on kickass.to if you are so inclined
    - lstamour 12y ago
      Last I checked the UK was a part of Europe, but since you didn't specify further I can't help ya. Call or complain to Sony Pictures Classics. Or find ways to buypass regional restrictions. I do it all the time to get Spotify which has yet to make it to Canada.
- rodh 12y ago
  Have you tried searching for it on amazon's site with the TLD for your country, or the one of a neighboring country? It is available on Amazon instant on amazon.co.uk. I haven't tried playing it yet, though. And I don't know if it would work outside of the UK.
shmerl 12y ago
While the theory works fine for static objects, how can it work for people? Did they have to precisely repeat their position while posing? Wouldn't it ruin the copying aspect?
- ecubed 12y ago
  He's using mannequins in the main picture at the top of the article, so I assume one technique would be to use mannequins as placeholders until you needed to do the distinctly human parts of the painting (hands, faces), then you could substitute a person into place and paint that part.
emmelaich 12y ago
If you want to have a look at some Vermeer paintings in great detail, go to the Rijksmuseum (Dutch Royal Museum). They digitised all their paintings (not just Vermeer) in great detail. You can zoom in and see the flecks of paint. https://www.rijksmuseum.nl/en/explore-the-collection/overview/johannes-vermeer https://www.rijksmuseum.nl/en/explore-the-collection/overvie...
mavdi 12y ago
Just watched the film, absolutely mind blowing.
jwallaceparker 12y ago
Norman Rockwell painted over projections of photographs to achieve his photo-realistic results. This article shows his paintings and photo sources side-by-side: http://petapixel.com/2012/12/27/the-photographs-norman-rockwell-used-to-create-his-famous-paintings/ http://petapixel.com/2012/12/27/the-photographs-norman-rockw...
mknappen 12y ago
Perhaps if art were taught in US schools with the systematic rigor of mathematics and rhetorical essay composition, as it should be, people would cease being surprised that artists exploit technological advances like everyone else. The LAX International Terminal features digital installations, not frescos.
taternuts 12y ago
I just finished this movie and I have to say it was awesome. The near obsessive lengths he took to re-create this painting was amazing to watch - it was probably some of the worst burn-out that veteran software engineer ever experienced
malloreon 12y ago
This post reminded me of Adam Savage's "Obsession" TED talk. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rEg-ZNB3qyI http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rEg-ZNB3qyI "...maybe, then maybe! I will have reached the end of the exercise. Except, if I'm being honest with myself, reaching the end of the exercise was never really the point of the exercise, was it?"
Splendor 12y ago
Here's an hour long interview with Tim Jenison where they discuss some of this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5D0AMvdt11g https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5D0AMvdt11g
andrewliebchen 12y ago
OMG! Vermeer used a camera lucida! I'm surprised! ...Said no art historian ever.
- modarts 12y ago
  Do you have a background in art history? How do you know that wasn't the case?
  - andrewliebchen 12y ago
    I don't, but I am a designer, with a graduate degree from RISD, if that qualifies for something. I don't think you understand sarcasm. The point is that it has been long assumed that Vermeer used at least a camera lucida to construct his paintings. This Guardian article has been mentioned on this thread, but it really gets to what bothers me about this "study." http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/2014/jan/28/tims-vermeer-fails http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/20... > So what does it lack? The film implies anyone can make a beautiful work of art with the right application of science. There is no need for mystical ideas like genius. > But the mysterious genius of Vermeer is exactly what's missing from Tim's Vermeer. Edit: Added more for the downvoters to downvote.
- kosievdmerwe 12y ago
  You do realise that Vermeer predates the patenting of the camera lucida by a hundred years? 1807 vs 1675, respectively.
  - andrewliebchen 12y ago
    Doesn't mean he didn't use something similar. David Hockney made this point in 2001 (if I recall). Besides, Brunelleschi used a mirror to demonstrate the effectiveness of his perspective drawings in the 1400s: http://zeiteye.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/c1450_brunelleschi_mirror-perspective-tool.jpg?w=510 http://zeiteye.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/c1450_brunellesch... Durer used string and moveable panel in his perspective studies: https://www.dartmouth.edu/~matc/math5.geometry/unit11/durer.gif https://www.dartmouth.edu/~matc/math5.geometry/unit11/durer..... And of course, there was the camera obscura. I can't believe there wasn't any development in drawing aids in the 400 years since Bruneschelli's demonstration.
tubelite 12y ago
Reminds me of Teller's article: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/teller-reveals-his-secrets-100744801/?no-ist http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/teller-reveals-hi... "..You will be fooled by a trick if it involves more time, money and practice than you (or any other sane onlooker) would be willing to invest." Teller's friend Tim appears to have taken the same attitude towards checking out his Vermeer hypothesis. Amazing effort.
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grondilu 12y ago
If that's true, and after having watched the documentary it's hard for me to believe it's not, then Vermeer was kind of like a magician : his paintings were made with a trick that he kept secret. On one hand the whole story is charming but on the other hand I have the feeling Vermeer was kind of a dick not to reveal this technique to the World.
kauphy 12y ago
Hmm, wonder how Johannes Vermeer did all of his self portraits ...
NAFV_P 12y ago
Tim did a damn good job of the rug on the table.
userbinator 12y ago
Having not seen any of Vermeer's paintings before, I was astonished for a few moments as I thought the very first picture in the article was a painting. Then I scrolled down...
cabirum 12y ago
Every year some ancient artist becomes a photographer. The last time it was Caravaggio using mercury salt and a pinhole camera setup. http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2009/mar/11/caravaggio-art-studio-photography-first http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2009/mar/11/caravagg...
ssdfsdf 12y ago
For what it's worth, for all the people I never told that I thought this to be true. I told you so :)
cinitriqs 12y ago
Saw the documentary which was enlightening, whether or not Vermeer actually produced his works like this, doesn't do it less good. An artist is still an artist, no matter which tools he uses (of course, printing a photograph with a 3d-printer to get some relief i still a 3d-printed photograph, reproducing it by hand however is still a wholly diff thing, and if you can see how much time "Tim" spent on his Vermeer, you can only applaud the fact that he persisted in his try to copy one of the greater works in history). Nice docu and a fun way to get acquainted with some artsy work. In the end, "photorealists" are just that, "photorealists" who like to get as close to the real deal as they possibly can, whatever means necessary. (what or what isn't "photograph" is not up to discussion here at all)
autokad 12y ago
this was really i^3 (interesting, informative, and innovative). thanks!

749 points by famousactress 12y ago

FYI, the trailer for the documentary at the bottom of this article has a clip that makes it clearer what exactly he does with the mirror to help him paint photo-realistically. It wasn't super clear to me until seeing that.

devb 12y ago
I'm guessing a mirror pointed at the subject over one eye with the other eye looking at the blank canvas? Then it would just be a matter of filling in paint on the canvas where it should match up with the original.
- famousactress 12y ago
  Oh interesting. That may be it. I wasn't sure whether he was actively using both eyes that way, or if he was tilting the mirror in and out while painting. I think it's probably hard to sort out how well it would work without trying it yourself.
- deleted 12y ago
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- Anjin 12y ago
  No, the mirror is on a stick and doesn't move. When Tim is looking down at the mirror from above he can see the reflected image he wants to paint, and also the paint surface he is going to paint on. He keeps adding color until the edge of the mirror disappears at which point he knows that he got the color on the surface to match the color in real life. Here's a screenshot. The mirror is on the top, and the painting surface is below: http://i.imgur.com/Uk7vSQ5.png http://i.imgur.com/Uk7vSQ5.png Or on the painting of his father-in-law: http://i.imgur.com/WP2ls3A.png http://i.imgur.com/WP2ls3A.png

freshyill 12y ago

I've been waiting for this to come out on DVD. Time to add it to the Queue. Is it wrong for me to think that Tim's Vermeer is better than Vermeer's Vermeer? Vermeer: http://media.boingboing.net/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/xl_music.jpg http://media.boingboing.net/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/xl_mu... Tim: http://media.boingboing.net/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/ML2s.jpg http://media.boingboing.net/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/ML2s....

voidlogic 12y ago
Consider that Tim's painting doesn't have centuries of aging to contend with- in regards to vibrancy and cracking.
lisper 12y ago
Side by side: http://www.flownet.com/ron/vermeer.html http://www.flownet.com/ron/vermeer.html
- voidlogic 12y ago
  I like how Vermeer directs our focus by making things like the roof slightly out of focus, kind of an emulation of the effect of having peripheral vision. Tim's lacks this. Also, the woman is facing the wrong way in Tim's.
  - pbhjpbhj 12y ago
    Is that "Tim's" feet in the reflection in the mirror? I first saw a piece about this painting a long time ago, possible an Open University / BBC collaboration - it was concerned with the room being the wrong length to allow for the optical method people thought was used, or some such, I don't recall too well. Other (?) speculation has been on here not too long ago.
    - anigbrowl 12y ago
      It's the corner of the carpet on the floor tile - the one farthest from us, not the one in the foreground of the painting. I work in film and one thing cinematographers love doing is shooting into mirrors, so I've gotten used to checking them for continuity purposes :) As for the dimensions of the room, being 'wrong', that may be deliberate. Again in film props and furniture are adjusted out of their natural position surprisingly often, in pursuit of aesthetic harmony. If you analyzed an interior scene that had been shot from multiple angles in hopes of mapping the room's contents accurately, you'd be disappointed to discover that many things had changed position by ~10% of their own size from shot to shot. Part of the craft is the ability to look at the image on a tiny monitor and be able to identify whatever it is that is distracting your eye from where you're supposed to be looking, like a table which looks fine in one shot but feels too small following a change in the focal length of the camera lens for a different shot. Solution - move the table towards the lens a bit. Don't even get me started on lighting and related tricks, which can further mess up your spatial intuition. For example, a very common and cheap effect is to make a room feel bigger by painting adjacent walls slightly different shades of the same color. Lots of these techniques are stolen from painting, where the deliberate falsification of perspective has long been used for both aesthetic and semantic effect. Check out this especially famous example: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ambassadors_(Holbein) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ambassadors_(Holbein)

lisper 12y ago

Wow, this guy is seriously hard-core: > I needed a CNC lathe to make the legs for the harpsichord and the blue chair. I couldn't find a CNC lathe large enough to make these parts so I came up with the simple hack of bolting a cheap wood lathe onto the bed of the milling machine. Then, I programmed the mill to trace out the contour of the leg while the lathe spun the wood underneath the mill head. ... > The legs of the instrument turned out to be a few inches too long for my wood lathe so I pulled the lathe out of the milling machine and cut it into two pieces on a band saw. I then bolted both pieces back into the mill, separated by a few inches. Now the lathe could accommodate a longer piece of wood. Adam and Jamie would be proud.

tlrobinson 12y ago
And: > Since lenses in the 17th century were less perfect than modern lenses, I decided to make my own lens using 17th century techniques. That's some serious dedication.
- logicallee 12y ago
  What's really amazing is that this -- all this -- was for rank speculation!!! There was not one scrap, not one scrap of evidence of any mechanical interest, or ability, or optical devices in Vermeer's life or among his possessions. It would be one thing if he thought Da Vinci had done it. But Vermeer? And yet he said, no, you can tell by the paint chips. That is an absolutely amazing amount of dedication to verifying something without looking at any evidence whatsoever but the end result. I couldn't have done it. I would have given up after a lack of any corroborating evidence.
  - speleding 12y ago
    Although the article doesn't mention it, there is evidence that Vermeer had access to optical devices: Antoni van Leeuwenhoek, inventor of the microscope, born in the same year (1632) lived very close to Vermeer in Delft and was named the executor of his will, so they must have known each other well.
- 12y ago

m0nty 12y ago

It's interesting to see David Hockney there, since he made a documentary many years ago (the 90s?) about how Vermeer might have used lenses and mirrors to create his paintings. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynrnfBnhWSo http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynrnfBnhWSo He points out that the intricacy of Vermeer's paintings, and peculiarities of perspective, strongly suggest the use of a camera obscura (or other optical device) to aid his work. This is not to detract from the investigation in the OA, just point out that others have been this way before.

kencausey 12y ago
I've not seen the film but I have heard Penn discuss it to some extent and I believe he has made it clear that the idea in a general sense and certainly in particular to the use of a camera obscura well predate Tim's interest. Where Tim goes further than any example I'm aware of is in actually implementing and spending a significant amount of time testing a specific implementation to which Vermeer can reasonably be expected to have had access.
- justincormack 12y ago
  Hockney did that sort of test too, I believe, although as an artist so perhaps saw it differently eg he knew how to paint first so could perhaps work with less.
sp332 12y ago
The article points out the problem with using a camera obscura: when it's dark enough to see the color of the scene, you can't see the color of your paint. This new build apparently addresses that particular problem.
acomjean 12y ago
David Hockney plays a not insignificant part in the documentary. They're pretty honest that the idea that these painters where using tools to help them did not originate with them.

spacecadet 12y ago

Tim's is better. ;D

brianmcdonough 12y ago

I was recruited to work as editor on this project about two years ago. My reason for not taking the job at the time was that it would be hard to make the ending interesting enough to justify the effort. Two years have passed and now that I see the reproduction, I've changed my mind, it was impossible to make the ending interesting enough. Would have made a good magazine article in the Smithsonian though. "what a sweep of vanity comes this way!" - Shakespeare

samstave 12y ago
Are you saying this is all one big ego trip on Tim's part?
- brianmcdonough 12y ago
  It costs a lot of money to make a film. I don't know Tim and I suspect he's a nice and interesting guy, but movies that lack broad appeal are sometimes referred to as vanity projects. I'd like to know how much money was spent making the film, where that money came from and what the theatrical run took in. If I had that information, I could tell you whether this was a vanity project.
tbirdz 12y ago
I saw the film and I thought the ending was interesting. What was it about the ending that made you think it was impossible to make interesting?
- brianmcdonough 12y ago
  Anyone who has seen a Vermeer painting up close, knows how hypnotic the experience can be. Is it true that in the movie Tim never gets to see the original and is reproducing based on a poster?
  - tbirdz 12y ago
    Tim gets to see the original Vermeer, but they weren't allowed to film it. However his reproduction is not based exactly on the poster or the original. Instead what Tim did was build a replica of the room Vermeer painted in, including all the props, and make his own painting by using his mirror device to observe this replica room.

huxley 12y ago

There was a Kickstarter done to build a modern camera lucida, they are still building batches of them (they even have DYI including prescription lucidas): http://neolucida.com http://neolucida.com (not affiliated, just an art geek)

mzs 12y ago

This will be a neat documentary and the idea clever to recreate the painting, but the camera obscura idea has been pretty well know for a while. Here is some evidence due to the quality of 17th C lens: http://www.essentialvermeer.com/camera_obscura/co_three.html http://www.essentialvermeer.com/camera_obscura/co_three.html I can't find a link but there was also good evidence of how the image shifts as focus changes in another painting. Some people even claim it's visible here: http://www.archiviobolano.it/img/arnolfini_SPECCHIO.JPG http://www.archiviobolano.it/img/arnolfini_SPECCHIO.JPG

mzs 12y ago
Shoot it was a van Eyck painting that I mentioned, sorry, good explanation here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hockney%E2%80%93Falco_thesis http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hockney%E2%80%93Falco_thesis

avani 12y ago

Pablo Garcia and Golan Levin at CMU reconstructed the Camera Lucida, which was a common artists' tool up until the last century, and describe the history of it here: http://neolucida.com/history/lucida-history/ http://neolucida.com/history/lucida-history/ Basically, it's a tiny prism on a stick that projects what is in front of you to your drawing surface. (disclaimer: I have no financial connection to these guys, but I did buy one of their Neolucidas, and it is a lot of fun)

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bane 12y ago

It's really clever, and I enjoyed the process involved immensely. The whole project is a work of art IMHO. I'm looking forward to watching the documentary of it all. I also like this conclusion. > My experiment doesn't prove that Vermeer worked this way, but it proves that he COULD have worked this way. I do take issue with the hypothesis. >The way Vermeer painted this wall is consistent with a photograph. It is not consistent with human vision. If you were standing in the room that Vermeer painted, you would see that wall as a pretty even shade of off-white. The retina in your eyeball does some image processing to minimize the effect of light and shadow. To your eye, the wall appears to have far less contrast than it actually has. And if you can't see it, you can't paint it. Then you can't see it through this device either. I'm not an artist, but I've taken a few art classes, and one of the transformative things that happens during formal art training is that you learn to look at things in non-intuitive ways. For example, when most people are told to "draw a dog", even if they're looking at one, they reach back into their semantic memory, look up the mental function for "draw dog" and reproduce that. The same thing is true for colors, brightness values, etc. A great deal of formal art education is learning to detach your visual stimulus from the semantic association you would otherwise naturally make...and perhaps reattach it to new semantic associations like "negative space" and "comparative brightness" and "relative white value". When you get really good you can even start reprocessing a scene or a model, deconstructing it in your mind and then reconstructing it via some other technique. You can go from photorealistic reproduction to complete abstraction. http://www.etsycreative.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/vince-low-portraits-550x660.jpg http://www.etsycreative.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/vince... https://3.bp.blogspot.com/_94URbVj_t8A/SZ7v2Iw28qI/AAAAAAAAAs0/KtyBdLmQohg/s320/tina+marker+on+canvas.jpg https://3.bp.blogspot.com/_94URbVj_t8A/SZ7v2Iw28qI/AAAAAAAAA... http://uploads2.wikiart.org/images/vincent-van-gogh/the-starry-night-1889(1).jpg http://uploads2.wikiart.org/images/vincent-van-gogh/the-star... https://gs1.wac.edgecastcdn.net/8019B6/data.tumblr.com/e8b9914990f75a949b1dbb9b1724ab6b/tumblr_mie7raQqj91ql98k2o1_1280.jpg https://gs1.wac.edgecastcdn.net/8019B6/data.tumblr.com/e8b99... http://www.mde-art.com/art-blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/abstract-portrait-face-lines-color.jpg http://www.mde-art.com/art-blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/a... I think a better hypothesis might have been "techniques at the time weren't suited to such exact reproduction of scenes, even great artists slightly distort objects and subjects in their work. Yet these paintings don't appear to suffer from such distortion, the shape and color reproduction is as exact as a tracing or photograph. There must have been a technique or tool used to assist the artist in not only tracing the shape, but reproducing the colors."

rquantz 12y ago

The way Vermeer painted this wall is consistent with a photograph. It is not consistent with human vision. If you were standing in the room that Vermeer painted, you would see that wall as a pretty even shade of off-white. For an untrained eye casually glancing at the wall, sure, the brain edits out variations. But a big part of training to be a painter is learning to see, and even with an untrained eye, if you stare at a wall long enough you'll start to see color and texture variations. Not saying he couldn't have used a camera obscura or some other machine, but this in itself is hardly evidence that he had mechanical help.

pcurve 12y ago
I studied art for many years and I agree. I also wouldn't consider his paintings particularly photographic-like, and you certain don't need mechanical aid to paints that are far more photo-like that Vermeer's paintings. John Singer Sargent's work demonstrates that it's more about the lighting and selective details. upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/26/Sargent_Lady_Agnew_of_Lochnaw.jpg 37.media.tumblr.com/a815602d0a7437c561817b5153e59bc9/tumblr_mjdy7uWvkL1s6fgo9o1_1280.jpg

kelvin0 12y ago

Bis? This story has already ran ... I guess this is fine for the 'new' crowd at HN

kelvin0 12y ago
My self-esteem just took a serious hit. I guess I should blame my bluntness and my ability to recall old stories. Seriously though, is there some type of algorithm on HN which 'discourages' posting the same story within an allotted time period (say 2-6 months)?

acomjean 12y ago

I saw the documentary. Its good, I enjoyed it. I'm involved in arts (open studios board and website operator) in massachusetts and have been talking to painters about this (none had seen the documentary yet). Generally they don't see it as changing things, unless a lot of people start doing this. Also painters enjoy the freedom to create stuff that doesn't exist, where is this technique is kinda like a photograph where what you capture has to exist. Makes you question art and its valuation (a lot does these days). No matter how its done the end result is what should be judged.

JustSomeNobody 12y ago

Good grief, talk about yak shaving.

deleted 12y ago
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ludwigvan 12y ago

Here is some criticism from the Guardian: http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/2014/jan/28/tims-vermeer-fails http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/20...

anigbrowl 12y ago
Here is the same critic a year ago sneering that Vermeer is wildly overrated, and that people just like him because his slavish attention to detail is more accessible to people who are used to looking at photographs. http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/2013/jun/20/johannes-vermeer-pearl-national-gallery http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/20... And here's the same critic going on about how Vermeer's paintings are full of mystery and eroticism: http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/2013/jun/27/vermeer-music-seductive-national-gallery http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/20... Jones is a prime example of why I find most art critics insufferable.
deltaqueue 12y ago
The technology Jenison relies on can replicate art, but it does so synthetically, with no understanding of art's inner life What a bunch of rhetorical diarrhea. This was nothing more than an exercise in curiosity, an exploration and evaluation of a hypothesis. This was not an attempt to disprove Vermeer's creativity, disprove artists in general, or disprove art.
- anigbrowl 12y ago
  Indeed. For the historical investigation that forms the backbones of the story, they had to do an imitation of the original work. The paint strokes on the canvas are literally the superficial aspects of the painting. There is much more 'art' in the choice of subject, perspective, layout and so on. But had Tim chosen his own subject matter freely, then comparison's with Vermeer's technique would have been almost impossible.
jamesbritt 12y ago
FTFA: The film implies anyone can make a beautiful work of art with the right application of science. There is no need for mystical ideas like genius. The film implies no such thing. I saw the movie a few months ago and it was pretty clear they believed that a Vermeer was more than simply technique.

mgr86 12y ago

did anyone else notice the photo/painting's caption read "Click to Embiggen"? Could this be a subtle nod to the animators who painstakenly produce live cartons at the sacrifice of their wrists?

jbenz 12y ago
I, for one, am hoping this word slowly seeps into public consciousness and then into dictionaries. If it is a subtle nod, it's a perfectly cromulent one.

jacquesm 12y ago

Very interesting article but this: "I couldn't find a CNC lathe large enough to make these parts" Makes absolutely no sense. I've worked on CNC rigs that would turn shafts for ocean liners and wheels for cranes, a couple of table legs should not have been a problem. As for the theory, very interesting. Here is the artist painting himself in his studio: http://www.essentialvermeer.com/catalogue/image-paintings/art_of_painting.jpg http://www.essentialvermeer.com/catalogue/image-paintings/ar... I don't see anything like lenses, mirrors or other tricks, mostly just brushes, paint, canvas, the artist and the subject. There is that little black stick on the top right of the canvas, wonder what that is? Maybe there is a mirror at the end of it ;) It would be funny if the evidence for all this was sitting in plain view for a few hundred years but likely there is a more ordinary explanation for that stick, maybe someone with more experience in painting can chip in about what that is. The about box at the bottom lists Tim as the guy behind DigiPaint of Amiga fame, and his company is also the one behind LightWave 3D.

pcl 12y ago
I couldn't find a CNC lathe large enough to make these parts My interpretation was more like "when looking around my basement full of awesome tools, I didn't have anything readily on hand, so I built one from what I had," not that no such machines existed.
qbrass 12y ago
>There is that little black stick on the top right of the canvas, wonder what that is? Maybe there is a mirror at the end of it ;) You mean like that round, brass colored thing that would otherwise look like his hand?
- beernutz 12y ago
  No, I think he means the stick he used to partially rest his hand on. Remember, mirror and lens or not, it takes a LONG time to do that kind of detail work. If they really worked at that angle, I imagine your arm would get VERY tired, and the stick there might offer a bit of relief while working.
- 12y ago

atiffany 12y ago

This is getting philosophical, but even if this was incontrovertible proof that Vermeer used these techniques to produce his works, it wouldn't detract from my appreciation. It would reshape my appreciate a bit, but I think that discovering these methods (by both Jenison and potentially Vermeer) is remarkable in itself. All artists use tools to produce their work - Vermeer may have just been innovative to find some really unique ones in his time.

Htsthbjig 12y ago

I love the process he follows, but Vermeer the biggest painter of all time?. He must be kidding. Vermeer painting is ok, but there are better paintings and certainly better painters. Rembrandt or Velazquez run circles around Vermeer in photorealism, but if you consider other things Vermeer is not even in the top ten, probably in top 100.

kyleowens10 12y ago

Another interesting post on the topic from awhile ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6823528 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6823528

11001 12y ago

There is so much more to Vermeer's art than just clever use of tools. I like this article much better (it got completely ignored on HN): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7254447 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7254447

aw3c2 12y ago
I took a look, read the subtitle, the first paragraph, scrolled to the bottom and closed the tab. I would like to at least remotely know what the topic is before reading something this long and dense.
- aw3c2 12y ago
  Sorry for sharing an honest reaction as to why that article might not have worked on HN...
anigbrowl 12y ago
It also discusses other tools he used, and other approaches to using those tools by other artists. Well worth a read, thanks for reposting it.
shadowmint 12y ago
To be fair though, the technical excellence of his paintings has always been a subject of considerable interest to people. That's an article about Vermeer and his art. This is an article about the technical aspects of his painting. They're different topics and it's not really surprising to see this one generating more interest; but yes, indeed. There's a lot more to his work than simply the technical means by which he produced them; that's true of any artist (composition, etc). Also, that site has a really horrid and hard to read layout. The densely packed sans-serif font blocks that academic sites seem to favor are terrible. It's ironic given the attention that typesetting gets for academic papers seemed to get completely ignored once the web comes into it. -__-

gojomo 12y ago

Sci-fi author Greg Egan has a disturbing short-story on similar themes, 'The Caress', part of the collection Axiomatic. (The full collection is just $2.99 via the author's self-published ebooks: http://gregegan.customer.netspace.net.au/BIBLIOGRAPHY/Ebooks.html#Axiomatic http://gregegan.customer.netspace.net.au/BIBLIOGRAPHY/Ebooks...) It could make a great Blade Runner-like movie, and then that movie would be a perfect double-feature with Tim's Vermeer. And in digging up links about 'The Caress', I came across a cool word, ekphrasis, that also applies to Tim's Vermeer: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ekphrasis http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ekphrasis

zedshaw 12y ago

I had been waiting to see this movie forever and finally did right when it came out, and I can tell you it is awesome. It's a fantastic example of science and technology being used to solve a problem that just happens to be art. It's also a very compelling theory about the possible ways Vermeer did his more photorealistic paintings. Pretty much after this and spending the last year teaching myself to paint I can safely say if it looks like a photo, it's from a photo. Another great book to check out is David Hockney's "Secret Knowledge", which covers how this is done in other ways, how projection devices were used by Kepler and others, how it could have been considered a guild secret among painters, and how when the photograph first came out people remarked how much the looked like "finished" paintings. His latest exhibit at the De Young was actually based on the research from this book where he cranked out a metric ton (quite literally) of art using various projection devices. Another fun thing to do is "spot the laptop". You know how people are doing impressive hyperrealistic paintings like this: http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/pictured-eloy-morales-stunning-self-portraits-3166130 http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/pictured-eloy-morale... These are amazing, until you realize he's getting the fidelity he needs by making the paintings huge, then taking pictures of them from farther away. Can't tell a painting's size on the internet, so it looks super realistic until you see it in person. Next, if you look carefully at that first photo, he's looking off in the distance at....a laptop most likely, or a projection. If you look in youtube or at various artist's blogs you start to catch them with a laptop sitting right there, or an ipad stuck to their easel with the image right on it. If you check out these hyperrealists (they don't say photo 'cause that's a bad word) you can sometimes catch them with a laptop, image on it squared off, sometimes even zoomed in. What modern "Vermeers" are doing is they're using computers and screen technology to get very exacting details and color harmony using combinations of large size projections (you can see Eloy's pre-drawn lines), gridded images, and zooming on a computer screen. So the awesome thing about Tim's Vermeer is he shows that if someone's using enough technology to make art then they become just a mechanical photo printer. Might as well be a photographer. Here's another artist you can see copying a photo: http://www.littleobservationist.com/2013/05/22/artist-interview-francoise-nielly/ http://www.littleobservationist.com/2013/05/22/artist-interv... Françoise Nielly at least interprets them, but I bet if you looked she probably uses the hell out of computers at first to get studies right. What's interesting is many artists use technology like this, and many of them get into this "cheating" when they run into disabilities or time constraints. The problem isn't the technology though, it's whether they pretend they don't use any, which is what a lot of these hyperrealists try to get away with. But, take an artist like Richard Schmid and you find he started using a computer after a major back injury and he freely admits he uses photos and computers to do painting. What I liked about Tim's Vermeer is it's at least proof that someone with zero talent can use technology to create an equivalent to what's considered a masterpiece. David Hockney's book also demonstrates that much of the art we consider painted using pure skill is actually just clever uses of technology to do photo reproductions with oil paint.

awestley 12y ago

I am going to add my own useless commentary and say that I absolutely love things like this. It is the idea of applying a scientific approach to something for fun and because why not? This is Having Fun + Learning = Win in its purest form.

Marinlemaignan 12y ago

he's so cool, clever and can do anything

roschdal 12y ago

I tried to buy the video, and got this error message from Amazon: "We could not process your order because of geographical restrictions on the product which you were attempting to purchase. Please refer to the terms of use for this product to determine the geographical restrictions." Where can I buy this in Europe? In today's globalized world, online videos should be available everywhere at once.

lstamour 12y ago
It's apparently for sale via Amazon, iTunes and Vudu. E.g. http://www.amazon.co.uk/Tims-Vermeer-Tim-Jenison/dp/B00K2YVAUI/ref=sr_1_cc_1?s=aps&ie=UTF8&qid=1402436584&sr=1-1-catcorr&keywords=Tim%27s+vermeer http://www.amazon.co.uk/Tims-Vermeer-Tim-Jenison/dp/B00K2YVA... It's not yet on Netflix (streaming) anywhere in the world. http://www.moreflicks.com/titles/movies_tim-s-vermeer_2014 http://www.moreflicks.com/titles/movies_tim-s-vermeer_2014
- roschdal 12y ago
  However, I'm not able to buy it on Amazon, due to "geographical restrictions on the product". Searching for it on iTunes gives 0 results. So it's clear that they don't want me to buy it in Europe.
  - tim333 12y ago
    It's on kickass.to if you are so inclined
  - lstamour 12y ago
    Last I checked the UK was a part of Europe, but since you didn't specify further I can't help ya. Call or complain to Sony Pictures Classics. Or find ways to buypass regional restrictions. I do it all the time to get Spotify which has yet to make it to Canada.
rodh 12y ago
Have you tried searching for it on amazon's site with the TLD for your country, or the one of a neighboring country? It is available on Amazon instant on amazon.co.uk. I haven't tried playing it yet, though. And I don't know if it would work outside of the UK.

shmerl 12y ago

While the theory works fine for static objects, how can it work for people? Did they have to precisely repeat their position while posing? Wouldn't it ruin the copying aspect?

ecubed 12y ago
He's using mannequins in the main picture at the top of the article, so I assume one technique would be to use mannequins as placeholders until you needed to do the distinctly human parts of the painting (hands, faces), then you could substitute a person into place and paint that part.

emmelaich 12y ago

If you want to have a look at some Vermeer paintings in great detail, go to the Rijksmuseum (Dutch Royal Museum). They digitised all their paintings (not just Vermeer) in great detail. You can zoom in and see the flecks of paint. https://www.rijksmuseum.nl/en/explore-the-collection/overview/johannes-vermeer https://www.rijksmuseum.nl/en/explore-the-collection/overvie...

mavdi 12y ago

Just watched the film, absolutely mind blowing.

jwallaceparker 12y ago

Norman Rockwell painted over projections of photographs to achieve his photo-realistic results. This article shows his paintings and photo sources side-by-side: http://petapixel.com/2012/12/27/the-photographs-norman-rockwell-used-to-create-his-famous-paintings/ http://petapixel.com/2012/12/27/the-photographs-norman-rockw...

mknappen 12y ago

Perhaps if art were taught in US schools with the systematic rigor of mathematics and rhetorical essay composition, as it should be, people would cease being surprised that artists exploit technological advances like everyone else. The LAX International Terminal features digital installations, not frescos.

taternuts 12y ago

I just finished this movie and I have to say it was awesome. The near obsessive lengths he took to re-create this painting was amazing to watch - it was probably some of the worst burn-out that veteran software engineer ever experienced

malloreon 12y ago

This post reminded me of Adam Savage's "Obsession" TED talk. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rEg-ZNB3qyI http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rEg-ZNB3qyI "...maybe, then maybe! I will have reached the end of the exercise. Except, if I'm being honest with myself, reaching the end of the exercise was never really the point of the exercise, was it?"

Splendor 12y ago

Here's an hour long interview with Tim Jenison where they discuss some of this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5D0AMvdt11g https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5D0AMvdt11g

andrewliebchen 12y ago

OMG! Vermeer used a camera lucida! I'm surprised! ...Said no art historian ever.

modarts 12y ago
Do you have a background in art history? How do you know that wasn't the case?
- andrewliebchen 12y ago
  I don't, but I am a designer, with a graduate degree from RISD, if that qualifies for something. I don't think you understand sarcasm. The point is that it has been long assumed that Vermeer used at least a camera lucida to construct his paintings. This Guardian article has been mentioned on this thread, but it really gets to what bothers me about this "study." http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/2014/jan/28/tims-vermeer-fails http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/20... > So what does it lack? The film implies anyone can make a beautiful work of art with the right application of science. There is no need for mystical ideas like genius. > But the mysterious genius of Vermeer is exactly what's missing from Tim's Vermeer. Edit: Added more for the downvoters to downvote.
kosievdmerwe 12y ago
You do realise that Vermeer predates the patenting of the camera lucida by a hundred years? 1807 vs 1675, respectively.
- andrewliebchen 12y ago
  Doesn't mean he didn't use something similar. David Hockney made this point in 2001 (if I recall). Besides, Brunelleschi used a mirror to demonstrate the effectiveness of his perspective drawings in the 1400s: http://zeiteye.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/c1450_brunelleschi_mirror-perspective-tool.jpg?w=510 http://zeiteye.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/c1450_brunellesch... Durer used string and moveable panel in his perspective studies: https://www.dartmouth.edu/~matc/math5.geometry/unit11/durer.gif https://www.dartmouth.edu/~matc/math5.geometry/unit11/durer..... And of course, there was the camera obscura. I can't believe there wasn't any development in drawing aids in the 400 years since Bruneschelli's demonstration.

tubelite 12y ago

Reminds me of Teller's article: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/teller-reveals-his-secrets-100744801/?no-ist http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/teller-reveals-hi... "..You will be fooled by a trick if it involves more time, money and practice than you (or any other sane onlooker) would be willing to invest." Teller's friend Tim appears to have taken the same attitude towards checking out his Vermeer hypothesis. Amazing effort.

deleted 12y ago

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grondilu 12y ago

If that's true, and after having watched the documentary it's hard for me to believe it's not, then Vermeer was kind of like a magician : his paintings were made with a trick that he kept secret. On one hand the whole story is charming but on the other hand I have the feeling Vermeer was kind of a dick not to reveal this technique to the World.

kauphy 12y ago

Hmm, wonder how Johannes Vermeer did all of his self portraits ...

NAFV_P 12y ago

Tim did a damn good job of the rug on the table.

userbinator 12y ago

Having not seen any of Vermeer's paintings before, I was astonished for a few moments as I thought the very first picture in the article was a painting. Then I scrolled down...

cabirum 12y ago

Every year some ancient artist becomes a photographer. The last time it was Caravaggio using mercury salt and a pinhole camera setup. http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2009/mar/11/caravaggio-art-studio-photography-first http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2009/mar/11/caravagg...

ssdfsdf 12y ago

For what it's worth, for all the people I never told that I thought this to be true. I told you so :)

cinitriqs 12y ago

Saw the documentary which was enlightening, whether or not Vermeer actually produced his works like this, doesn't do it less good. An artist is still an artist, no matter which tools he uses (of course, printing a photograph with a 3d-printer to get some relief i still a 3d-printed photograph, reproducing it by hand however is still a wholly diff thing, and if you can see how much time "Tim" spent on his Vermeer, you can only applaud the fact that he persisted in his try to copy one of the greater works in history). Nice docu and a fun way to get acquainted with some artsy work. In the end, "photorealists" are just that, "photorealists" who like to get as close to the real deal as they possibly can, whatever means necessary. (what or what isn't "photograph" is not up to discussion here at all)

autokad 12y ago

this was really i^3 (interesting, informative, and innovative). thanks!