R/GA University, April 2015

1. Hacking Art
History for Fun
and Profit
John Resig

17. Lot 55: 20 Japanese Woodblock Prints
Each depicting a female/Geisha figure with
calligraphy throughout each print. Prints
measure 13.75" H x 9.375" W. Toning to
each print, some losses around edges.
Estimated Price: $400 - $600

18. Step 1: Acquire and read tons of expensive books.

19. Step 2: Learn to read Japanese. *
Japanese from the 17th to 19th century. *
You’re not going to learn this from Rosetta Stone.

20. Step 3: Learn to read Japanese calligraphy.

21. Solution: A fast-loading, responsive, i18ned, web
site: Ukiyo-e.org

26. Digital Ocean
Amazon S3
Amazon Cloudfront
Digital Ocean
Images
Data
(HTML,
XML, JSON)
Images JS, CSS
Images JS, CSS
nginx
(w/ cache)
node.js
express
node.js
express
naught
mongodb
Elastic
Search
Scraper

28. https://github.com/jeresig/jquery-imgscrubber

29. Collecting Tons of Woodblock Print Data

30. Search
Page Page Page
HTML
Image
HTML
Image
HTML
Image
Search
Page Page Page
HTML
Image
HTML
Image
HTML
Image
Queue-based Crawling using PhantomJS
Processing Queue

31. Some Website
WebKit
PhantomJS
CasperJS
SpookyJS
Save Data
XML Files
Mongo Log
libxml (+ xpath)
MongoDB
Extract Data
Process Data
Artists
Images
Correct Artist
and Date
Add to Site!

32. module.exports = function() {
return {
scrape: [
{
start: "http://ukiyo-e.org/search",
visit: "//a[@class='img']",
next: "//a[contains(@rel,'next')]"
},
{
extract: {
"title": "//p[contains(@class, 'title')]//span",
"dateCreated": "//p[contains(@class, 'date')]//span",
"artists[]": "//p[contains(@class, 'artist')]//a",
"images[]": "//div[contains(@class,'imageholder')]//a/@href"
}
}
]
};
};

33. "locale" : "ja",
"given" : "Okiie",
"given_kana" : "おきいえ",
"surname" : "Hashimoto",
"surname_kana" : "はしもと",
"name" : "Hashimoto Okiie",
"ascii" : "Hashimoto Okiie",
"plain" : "Hashimoto Okiie",
"kana" : "はしもとおきいえ",
"_id" : ObjectId("530c0825d9a80976b2000437")
}
],
"names" : [
{
"original" : "Hashimoto Okiie (橋本興家)",
"locale" : "ja",
"kanji" : "橋本興家",
"given" : "Okiie",
"given_kana" : "おきいえ",
"surname" : "Hashimoto",
"surname_kana" : "はしもと",
"given_kanji" : "興家",
"surname_kanji" : "橋本",
"name" : "Hashimoto Okiie",
"ascii" : "Hashimoto Okiie",
"plain" : "Hashimoto Okiie",
"kana" : "はしもとおきいえ",
"_id" : ObjectId("530c0825d9a80976b2000439")
}
],
"extract" : [
"53dfc997cbf9fa7501d78e4820b24a9c"
],
"created" : ISODate("2014-02-25T03:04:05Z"),
"__v" : 0
}

34. “Stack Scraper”
https://github.com/jeresig/stack-scraper
https://github.com/jeresig/ukiyoe-scrapers

35. Image Similarity

36. https://github.com/jeresig/node-matchengine

45. Image Similarity Search

52. Idyll: Offline Image Cropping
• https://github.com/jeresig/idyll
• Crop images offline and on a mobile
device.
• Saves the selections back to a server.
• Data is synced and saved using HTML 5
appcache.
• https://github.com/jeresig/node-
appcache-glob

53. by David Chester
at Shutterstock
https://github.com/dchester/perl-image-crop-calibration-target

54. http://www.ersatzlabs.com/

55. Aiding Woodblock Print
Studies with Image Analysis

68. Miyagawa Shuntei
Printed in 1897
Sold for: $550
Prints sell for $100-$400 individually
True Estimate: $2100 - $8400 *
* You just have to find
someone willing to buy them!

69. Does this work for other art forms?
• Collaborating with the Frick Art Reference Library
• Analyzing their Anonymous Italian Art Photo Archive
• Also working with the Zeri Foundation at the University
of Bologna in Italy
• Analyzing their Italian Art Archives

70. Similar Images
Different photo, same work of art.

71. Similar Images
Different photo, slightly different cropping.

72. Similar Images
Different photo, dramatically different lighting.

73. Alternate Images
Partial Image vs. Full Image

74. Alternate Images
Color vs. Black-and-White

75. Alternate Images
Partial Image vs. Much Larger Image

76. Conservation

77. Conservation
Repairs and possibly removal of later additions.

78. Conservation
Analysis even spots dramatic conservation work.

79. Copies

80. Copies

81. Copies

82. Copies

83. Copies

84. Graph Analysis with neo4j

85. Frick 420
420
Zeri 1583642090
Frick 417
417
?

87. Frick 347
347
Zeri 12227
33526
Frick 348
348
33525
?

89. 8132a 8132
57129
57134
57130
57138
8131a 8131
?

93. • http://ejohn.org/research/
• http://ukiyo-e.org/
• https://github.com/jeresig

94. Correcting Print Data

95. Japanese Names
• Utagawa Hiroshige
• Ando Hiroshige
• Andō Hiroshige
• Hiroshige
• 歌川広重
• 広重

96. 安⼟土
安堂
安島
安東
安籐
安藤
安道
安達
阿藤
Andō

97. 安藤
andō
antō
anzō
yasuzuka
A many-to-many mapping!

98. Sharaku Toshusai
東洲斎写楽

99. Sharaku Toshusai
東洲斎写楽
Is this the family name?
Where are the stress marks?
How do you “split” this name?
Which name parts
correlate?

100. Tools (all are Node modules!)
• https://github.com/lovell/
hepburn
• https://github.com/jeresig/
node-enamdict
• https://github.com/jeresig/
node-ndlna
• https://github.com/jeresig/
node-romaji-name
ndlnahepburn enamdict
romaji-name

101. Hepburn
• https://github.com/lovell/
hepburn
• Takes in the English form of a
Japanese word.
• Returns it written in Hiragana or
Katakana (phonetic Japanese
alphabets).
ndlnahepburn enamdict
romaji-name
うたがわひろしげUtagawa Hiroshige

102. Enamdict
• https://github.com/jeresig/
node-enamdict
• Downloads and queries the
ENAMDICT database
• (A mapping of Japanese proper
names to Hiragana and
English.)
• Used to correct typos and figure
out surname/given name.
ndlnahepburn enamdict
romaji-name

103. NDLNA
• https://github.com/jeresig/
node-ndlna
• Queries the NDLNA database
• Finds the correct Kanji for an
English name.
• Or the correct English for a
Kanji name.
ndlnahepburn enamdict
romaji-name

104. ndlnahepburn enamdict
romaji-name

105. {
"original" : "Sharaku Toshusai (東洲斎写楽 )",
"locale" : "ja",
"kanji" : "東洲斎写楽",
"given" : "Sharaku",
"given_kana" : "しゃらく",
"surname" : "Tōshūsai",
"surname_kana" : "とおしゅうさい",
"surname_kanji" : "東洲斎",
"given_kanji" : "写楽",
"name" : "Tōshūsai Sharaku",
"ascii" : "Tooshuusai Sharaku",
"plain" : "Toshusai Sharaku",
"kana" : "とおしゅうさいしゃらく"
}

106. Dates
• https://github.com/jeresig/node-yearrange
var yr = require("yearrange");
yr.parse("1877")
// {"start": 1877, "end": 1877}
yr.parse("1847-48")
// {"start": 1847, "end": 1848}
yr.parse("ca. 1810-20s")
// {"start": 1810, "end": 1829, "circa": true}
yr.parse("18th–19th century")
// {"start": 1700, "end": 1899}
yr.parse("Meiji era")
// {"start": 1868, "end": 1912}

107. Artist Rectification