this is a re-hash, i know, but you can’t teach a florentine new tricks…perspective! as alberti’s story goes, brunelleschi stood in front of santa maria del fiore in florence with an easel and a mirror through which he could see the baptistry, and copied the mirrored image onto the canvas. by flattening the image in a mirror, he was able to produce an objective representation of the octagonal building, creating a believable simulation of reality in the process and closing the book on the middle ages for good. for a description of his demo and why it changed the world as we know it, go here>
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