Millions of Historic Images Now Online

[engine]

Fascinating. I haven't time to investigate this right now, but I sure will in due course.

An American academic is creating a searchable database of 12 million historic copyright-free images.Millions of Historic Images Now Online [bbc.com]

"Most of the images that are in the books are not in any of the art galleries of the world - the original copies have long ago been lost."

[RhinoFish]

Awesome!

[brotherhood of LAN]

Great stuff. Surely wikipedia will be rubbing their hands at this newly available data.

[tangor]

Concept grand, and should be applauded!, yet: dang little use for most. How many doodles do we need? Just remarking that "ancient" or "PD" images might not fit with "today". As always, its a pick and choose to get things done. (I prefer to roll my own, either art or camera)

[engine]

These are images that most of the planet would never see. I was once visiting a very old church and was lucky to be shown a book which was beautifully illustrated hundreds of years ago. Only the people visiting that church would see the work. To make such works available for the benefit of the many and to researchers and academics is surely a good thing. It can, of course, never replace seeing the original.

[Melmail 9494]

Amazing stuff!