KUSA – Dutch artist Johannes Vermeer is considered by some to be the greatest painter of all time. His work mainly focused on a middle-class life and a domestic home life. Vermeer died in 1675, many years before the invention of the camera.
Tim Jenison was intrigued by the works of Vermeer. The colors and the details in Vermeer's work is so lifelike, it's like he took an actual photograph and painted from the image.
"I had this epiphany that there was this very simple optical device that could explain how Vermeer worked," Jenison said.
Following his epiphany, Jenison decided to try to replicate a Vermeer painting.
The trouble being, Jenison isn't a painter. He works in computer graphics.
"I look at pictures from a technical point of view," Jenison said. "I saw some stuff in the Vermeer that made me go, 'there's got to be something other than just a guy with a paintbrush.'"
Jenison is friends with renowned illusionist Penn Jillette. Jenison brought his theory and plans to try to replicate a Vermeer to Jillette and they decided to film a documentary.
"He was going to make his own paints, use all the technology available in the 17th century and try to prove that he had reinvented the machine that Vermeer used to … It's not overstating it to say, took photographs 350-years-ago," Jillette said.
Jenison crafted a lens and went to work building all his materials for his project. He used items, only available during Vermeer's time.
"I had to make my own paint using pigments he had," Jenison said. "Mercury, lead and stuff like that."
The five-year project resulted in the film Tim's Vermeer. The documentary is out now on DVD and blu-ray.
(KUSA-TV © 2014 Multimedia Holdings Corporation)
