Applications of image processing technologies to fine arts

Over the past years the progresses of electronic imaging have encouraged researchers to develop applications for the fine arts sector. In particular the aspects that have been mostly investigated have regarded, the high quality acquisition of paintings (both from the point of view of spatial resolution and of colour calibration), the actual restoration of the works (for giving to restorers an aid to forecast the results of the tasks they choose), the virtual restoration (to try to build a digital copy of the painting as it was at the origin), and the diagnosis (to automatically highlights, evaluate and monitor the possible damages that a work has suffered). Partially related to image processing are also the technologies for 3D acquisition and modelling of statues. Finally particular care has been given recently also to the distribution of the digital copies of cultural heritage objects over the Internet, thus posing novel problems regarding the effective browsing of digital multimedia archives, and the protection of the Intellectual Property connected to art-works reproductions. The goal of this paper is to review the research results that have been obtained in the past in this field, and to present some problems that are still open and can represent a challenging research field for the future.