[muawiyah]

It's pretty clear all of the Rembrandt's, whether originals or copies, were done with the assistance of projection technology (camera obscura) known since Aristotles time.

Most trained artists, and even some amateurs with an eye to forged printing, can differentiate between a painting done with only the artist's eye, and those where the artist has a photograph of the subject for reference.

[Sam Cree]

"It's pretty clear all of the Rembrandts, whether originals or copies, were done with the assistance of projection technology (camera obscura) known since Aristotles time."

I'm not the art historian here, but I believe you are mixing up Rembrandt with Vermeer.

I agree with you that paintings done from photographs rather than from life have characteristics that often give this away.

This leads me to wonder some at the techniques of the famous illustrators, NC Wyeth or Howard Pyle, for instance. I guess they must have hired models and used photography both, judging by the beautiful results. I have read that Andrew Loomis considered it the illustrator's job to know human anatomy well enough to draw a credible pose without any reference at all, though he also believed in the necessity of a live model for finished work.