Tim’s Vermeer

[chronovore]

Penn & Teller made a movie about their friend, Tim Jenison, inventor and creator of Video Toaster and LightWave. Tim is obsessed with the work of the Dutch artist Vermeer, and explores various optical devices which may have helped Vermeer achieve the stunningly realistic look in his work. Tim sets about re-creating Vermeer’s The Music Lesson.

Jenison is clearly, very, very smart except for the part where he willingly lives in Texas. The experts brought in to look in on Tim’s process included famed British artist David Hockney, due to his earlier research on Vermeer suggesting that a camera obscura had been used, and Prof. Philip Steadman, who has provided proof that some form of optical device must have been used in Vermeer’s work due to the consistent size ratio shown in the work produced from Vermeer’s studio. There’s also Colin Blakemore, whose credit in the cast took up three full rows of text to display all his honors. Apparently he knows a lot about vision.

This was a fascinating and surprisingly humorous work. Very inspiring.