Renaissance art: a CG re-creation lets viewers get up close and personal with a unique 15th-century masterpiece.(Art)

In 1432, painter Jan van Eyck completed a towering work of art, titled The Adoration of the Lamb, in the then-new medium of oil paint. Approximately 570 years later, digital artists working in the contemporary medium of computer graphics re-created the set of paintings for a DVD titled De Visione Dei, which focuses on the creation of the original art, also known as the Ghent Altarpiece.

The 21st-century art history production is the brainchild of Ghent University (Belgium) professor Marc de Mey, who created the project with architect/animator Wim de Boever. The concept was born from their academic research into the crossover within the arts, sciences, and religion. The team, working with a multi-disciplinary group, transformed the masterpiece from the early Renaissance period into virtual art using Discreet's 3ds max software.

In doing so, the group not only made the original work accessible to people throughout the world, but also provided an intimate view of the piece that is unattainable today because of its current exhibition arrangement inside the Vijd chapel at Ghent's grand St. Bravo Cathedral, where it is now displayed in a small space behind a protective casing.

The original work was created as an enormous set of paintings on panels, also known as a polyptych, by the two van Eyck brothers: Hubert, who started them, and Jan, who completed them. The masterpiece measures 11 feet 3 inches high by 14 feet 5 inches wide and includes a fixed central segment of four panels and a pair of wings, each of which contains four additional panels.

By manipulating the 3ds max model, viewers today are able to see the position of the panels as they were originally displayed, thereby ...