High-quality digital imaging of art in Europe

In the past decade various museums and galleries around Europe have been developing digital imaging as a tool for archiving and analysis. Accurate digital images can replace the conventional film archives which are not stable or accurate but are the standard record of art. The digital archives open up new research possibilities as well as become resources for CD- ROM production, damage analysis, research and publishing. In the VASARI project new scanners were devised to produce colorimetric images directly from paintings using multispectral (six band) imaging. These can produce images in CIE Lab format with resolutions over 10 k multiplied by 10 k and have been installed in London, England; Munich, Germany; and Florence, Italy. They are based around a large stepper-motor controlled scanner moving a high resolution CCD camera to obtain patches of 3 k multiplied by 2 k pels which are mosaiced together. The scanners can also be used for infra-red imaging with a different camera. The MARC project produced a portable scan-back, RGB camera capable of similar output and techniques for calibrated printing. The Narcisse project produced a fast high resolution scanner for X-radiographs and film and many projects have worked on networking the growing number of image databases. This paper presents a survey of some key European projects, particularly those funded by the European Union, involved in high resolution and colorimetric imaging of art. The design of the new scanners and examples of the applications of these images are presented.