natgal-dl

Download high-resolution images of paintings in the National Gallery collection.

Prerequisites

• Ruby
• The Ruby progressbar library
• ImageMagick
• FasterCSV
• Mechanize

On Ubuntu:

sudo apt-get install ruby libprogressbar-ruby imagemagick

Usage

natgal-dl <uri> [<uri> [...]]

E.g.

natgal-dl http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/paintings/hans-holbein-the-younger-the-ambassadors

If you want all the images:

natgal-dl all

The first time you run the script with all a list of links is saved to file. As the script works through that list each completed item is added to a 'done' list. In this way if the process is interrupted for any reason (network timeouts seem common on the gallery's server) the job picks up where it left off.

What it does

Downloads each tile of the image at the highest available zoom level and stitches them together.

Rationale

You can browse the collection of the National Gallery online via a panning/scrolling/zooming widget. However, looking at paintings through a tiny porthole (even with the "full screen" view) is limiting.

Cultural icons should not be locked away. This tool lets you view paintings that are part of British and European cultural heritage on your own terms. Indeed, the aims of the Gallery itself support this view:

The Gallery aims to study and care for the collection, while encouraging the widest possible access to the pictures

Charles Eicher's article, How to copyright Michelangelo, may also be of interest.