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Tim’s Vermeer (2013) is a fascinating documentary film. It’s as much about the obsession and fanaticism of one man as it is about art history or technology. Tim is Tim Jenison, a video engineer and inventor, who due to his financial success with the Video Toaster, Lightwave 3D, and TriCaster (all great video production tools), has more time and money on his hands than he knows what to do with. From his base in San Antonio, he invents things like a fan that you can wear on your back to push you forward when you’re on roller skates. Tim is an eccentric (in a good way, I think), with friends like magicians Penn & Teller, who help him produce the film.

Tim has been reading books that suggest 17th century Dutch master painter Johannes Vermeer might have used lenses, mirrors, optics, and other technology of the time to create his highly detailed, almost photographic paintings of people and scenes that make up his work.

If you’re not familiar with Vermeer, you might know his most famous painting, Girl With a Pearl Earring, the subject of a 2003 movie with Scarlett Johansson and Colin Firth.

After some experimenting, Tim decides to reproduce a Vermeer paining using techniques that could have been used in the 17th century. His fanaticism is so extreme that he goes to Vermeer’s hometown of Delft in the Netherlands, takes measurements and details so that he can recreate the original studio. He learns Dutch and immerses himself in Vermeer’s world. In order to make lenses that would have been available three hundred years ago, he melts and grinds his own glass. He grinds his own pigments and mixes his own paint. He builds replicas of all the furniture from the studio, including a very elaborate harpsichord. He even goes so far as to copy the leaded glass windows from the original room, spending 213 working days just on getting the room right.

By the time he’s finished, Tim spends 1,825 days on the project between 2008 and 2013. He takes 130 days on the painting alone.

Tim hangs the finished painting over the fireplace in his bedroom. How does it turn out? Is it a glorified paint-by-numbers project or is it a masterpiece? I’ll leave that for you to decide. It’s not your typical documentary, but I think it’s a film that has crossover appeal for many audiences. If you enjoy art, history, science, psychology, or technology, this movie has something for you. I found Tim’s Vermeer on DVD from Netflix.

Reviewed by: Tom Bell on June 30, 2015