Glass painting is a medium that lends itself to being viewed from a distance. Visualised in a book, however, relations between component parts come too short. Detailed images spread over several pages make it difficult to reconstruct their overall context in the respective window. Given the somewhat linear structure of a book, any additional text-based information on the construction, designation or maintenance of a glass painted window can only be managed using a complex system of references. Filling a book with the type of colour illustrations commensurate for glass painting is not financially viable.
However, the potential behind HyperGlass is illustrated using images of the cathedral of St. Nikolaus in Stendal, Germany with its extensive and exquisite cycle of glass windows from the Middle Ages. With its Jacobinic church and the cathedral, Stendal is one of the more significant sites of glass painting from the 14th and 15th centuries in Germany. The first comprehensive publication of the cathedral’s glass paintings appeared in 1988 in series issued by Corpus Vitrearum Medii Aevi (CVMA), edited by the research project of the same name domiciled at the Berlin-Brandenburg Akademie der Wissenschaften (BBAW) in Potsdam. CVMA in Potsdam has a huge collection of colour photographs gathered from numerous sources, only a small proportion of which were used in the 1988 publication.
These photographs form the basis for the close collaboration between
the CVMA and the Humboldt University, formulated in the HyperGlass
project. Using the ground plan of the Stendal cathedral as a starting
point, HyperGlass enables the user to view each window as a whole
as well as in detail, with individual medallions or fields capable
of being viewed directly in their larger context. The highly impressive
photographs now include details on their relative conditions, with
windows from the Middle Ages and later additions also being recorded.
The centre for glass painting research at CVMA in Potsdam has also
documented the Bible window of the St. Paul’s church in Brandenburg
an der Havel using the HyperImage software.
Web
publication of the Bible window in the St. Paul’s church
in Brandenburg 
Project Director: Prof. Dr. Dorothee Haffner
until the end of March 2009, Department of Art History, Humboldt
University, Berlin
now at:
HTK Berlin, Department 5, Musem Studies
Wilhelminenhofstr. 75 A, D - 10313 Berlin
Phone +49 (0)30 / 50 19 43 01, Fax +49 (0)30 / 50 19 47 09
dorothee.haffner@htw-berlin.de
Contents:Dennis Jelonnek, Eva Britta Neumann
PD Dr. Frank Martin
CVMA Potsdam
Am Neuen Markt 8, D - 14467 Potsdam
Phone +49 (0)331 / 27 96 113, Fax +49 (0)331 / 27 96 130
martin@bbaw.de