WATCH: Google unveils ‘superpower’ camera designed to snap museum art

Good news for museum curators out there. A cutting-edge camera designed by Google Cultural Institute has innovated a camera with superpowers to snap century-old masterpieces in lucid detail, unlike a smartphone.

Art Camera, the institute’s infant camera prototype, is invented for museum curators to digitalize their paintings, artifacts, and documents in the collection. It can capture gigapixel images and reveal minuscule details not visible to the naked eye, according to tech news sites The Verge and Gizmag. Also, the time for snapping photos will be efficiently scaled down from several hours to only 30 minutes.

The camera also allows any user to play around and zoom the gigapixel images in its optimized and sharpest form.

Likewise, laser and sonar technologies guarantee that the Art Camera clearly targets on each painting’s brushstroke, scratch, and hidden signature.

However, the Art Camera can only be used for flat objects, such as paintings and documents. The prototype is unable to capture 3D objects or anything particularly large, and Google is developing a separate gadget for artifacts and 3D objects.

Thanks to the Art Camera, Google tripled its production of striking and ultra-high resolution images of artworks by acclaimed painters such as Signac, Van Gogh, and Monet. To encourage art institutions to digitize their collections, the company will lend twenty Art Camera portable units to various art institutions for free. Gianna Francesca Catolico