Leonardo da Vinci's 15th-century painting The Annunciation, shown in March 2007, is one of six paintings from the Uffizi Gallery in Florence to be put online in high-resolution format. (Marco Bucco/Reuters)

An Italian company is bringing the splendours of Florence's Uffizi gallery to the internet with images so detailed you can count the flowers at the feet of Botticelli's Spring.

Haltadefinizione worked with Italian conservation experts to photograph six paintings from the Uffizi in extremely high definition — 28 billion pixels — about 3,000 times the resolution of a standard digital camera.

The high-resolution images by artists such as Leonard da Vinci and Caravaggio will be online until January, with internet tools to examine the paintings in detail.

The advantage of creating images in such high resolution is that it captures the true colour and texture of the paintings, Haltadefinizione claims. The company envisages using the technology to help scholars who study art, as well as assist in conservation and restoration of valuable works.

For art lovers, it provides a taste of Florence's most famous gallery, without having to stand in the traditional long queue for admission. The works on display include:

• Baptism of Christ (1475), by Leonardo da Vinci and Verocchia.
• The Annunciation (1472-75) by Leonardo da Vinci.
• Portrait of Eleonor of Toledo (1545), by Agnolo Bronzino.
• Bacchus (1597) by Caravaggio.
• The Birth of Venus (1482-85), by Sandro Botticelli.
• Spring, by Sandro Botticelli.

Haltadefinizione has previously created high-resolution images of Leonardo's The Last Supper and Andrea Pozzo's Glory of St. Ignatius, as well as ancient manuscripts.