Google Launched the Art Camera

For those who want to enjoy the Museum experience, Google launched the Art Camera. The highly intelligent digital hardware was conceived to scan paintings down to the finest details so that on-line viewers could enjoy the artwork as they would in a real-life visit to the museum.

The company founded the Google’s Cultural Institute initiative where robotic cameras, that are able to capture gigapixel images in just a fraction of the time it would take a professional scanner, create digital versions of paintings.

The project is meant to bring art closer to the public in the sense that a painting can be admired not just by looking at its entirety, but also by analyzing the brush strokes, the way in which the colors combine. Some art currents are based their work on visual effects, the paintings changing as you step closer or further away from them.

Google launched the Art Camera in an attempt to offer virtual viewers the opportunity of analyzing the beauty of a painting down to its finest brush strokes. The camera used in the project is manipulated by a robotic system that steers it across the work of art in question.

In order to focus on the details, the gadget uses both a sonar system and a laser. The first employs a high-frequency sound that measures the distance of the artwork so that it could properly position itself.

The next step, after all of the high-resolution pictures are taken, is to reassemble the data in a coherent way. According to Google, the software they created is capable of combining all of the images so that they recreate the painting down to the last detail.

Afterwards, the pictures are posted on-line so that everybody will be able to enjoy them.

The Cultural Institute has been around for some time, and in the last five years, Google shared approximately 200 gigapixel images. Up until Google launched the Art Camera, the scanning process lasted for up to a day. Now, a single painting can be scanned and ready to upload in only thirty minutes.

With the art Camera, the team involved in the project already processed more than 1000 works of art in just a few months. Moreover, they plan on sending free cameras to museums so that more paintings will make their way towards our desktops.

Image source: Pixabay