Image to Text Converters: Revisiting the Old School Through ASCII Art
I was browsing through a couple of Web sites earlier to check for software updates when suddenly, a word struck me- ASCII. ASCII is simply a character encoding based on the English alphabet. When graphical representations are made out of it, ASCII art is produced. I remembered a film I watched a year ago entitled, BBS: The Documentary by Jason Scott Sadofsky. It’s an 8-episode documentary about the subculture born from the creation of the BBS and there was a portion where the ANSI Art Scene was featured. I realized back then that computer graphics became widespread not when the first version of Photoshop or CorelDraw arrived, but during the 1970’s, when telegraphers had lesser workload (specifically on Christmas day). They would pass ASCII art to their fellow telegraphers as a form of leisure. Nowadays, we rarely see ASCII art except in text files associated with cracks and warez groups.
Would you believe that the two images I’ve shown so far are made of ANSI characters? It would have been easier to draw them in Photoshop, but creating them out of ANSI would perhaps take a lot of time and effort. They really do. In fact, these ANSI artists spend weeks to finish one masterpiece. They would then release their artwork with the help of their respective groups. Two of those groups featured in the BBS Documentary were ACiD and iCE. These rival groups would release monthly archives through their so-called art packs and then let the audience decide which artwork is the best and to which group it belongs. It was all for the sake of competition and fun.
Oh, those days should have been amusing. The BBSes, costly phone bills, 300 baud modems, Altairs, Commodores, Ataris, Apple II’s, IBM’s, and trolls were all part of the good old days. I just wish I was a part of it (I was a toddler back then). Anyway, it should be enough to be able to appreciate the days before the World Wide Web came to shape.
Now, let’s experience how computer graphic is created in those days. There are several ASCII art generators and text-image converters online. The results won’t be as attractive as the images posted above, but hey, it’s still ASCII art. Here are a few notable Web sites:
TEXT-IMAGE.com
Generate cool text-images from almost any picture you have on your computer.
ASCII Art Generator @ Glassgiant.com
Converts your picture to ASCII text art - a jumble of letters, numbers and symbols that do not appear to have any significance until you step back and look at the whole picture. Check out the Mona Lisa ASCII art sample.
ASCII Art - Image to Ascii, Text to Ascii
And here’s a free (and offline) ASCII generator for Windows. ASCII Generator dotNET needs .NET framework of 2.0 or higher in order to work.
June 12th, 2007 at 2:49
This is an old school art. Love it
June 12th, 2007 at 10:19
Me too. I dreamt of creating a logo for myself when I was younger.
April 3rd, 2008 at 21:36
I remember making ascii pictures with 24 pin dotmatrix printers. Now its historical
April 12th, 2008 at 2:13
Mona Lisa in ASCII is just amazing. Thanks for sharing. The first time I watched one of those ASCII images I was impressed. How several common characters all grouped together become a such amazing image.
Great work.
April 20th, 2008 at 12:15
Wow, these are great for generating modern logos or even backgrounds for websites.
Thank you for sharing these!
Andrew Gunther
———————
http://www.skoogo.com
May 31st, 2008 at 3:27
I agree with Andrew, I am totally going to use this to generate backgrounds for websites. I think it is perfect too for a logo for computer professionals who also fight as boxers or cage fighting. A dude kicking in ASCII would be perfect! it will be a true work of art especially since I do not know how to draw!
http://www.thegluckmethod.com
June 1st, 2008 at 21:04
Some of these pics are just crazy. It’s amazing what can be done with ASCII.
June 8th, 2008 at 9:44
These images are awesome and I love the old school looks. These would definitely be great for inserting it into your websites and showing people what art was like in the past.
Thanks for sharing the program. Keep it coming.
June 8th, 2008 at 16:56
ASCII rocks! I’m a big computer and programming geek and I just love this stuff. Thanks for the great pictures and I hope to see more of these soon.
June 13th, 2008 at 1:19
Have you seen that new show code monkeys on the cable channel G4? It is done in this art medium and it is hilarious, that is if you like cartoons like southpark and family guy.
I believe it is 8 bit
Season 2 just started.
July 26th, 2008 at 8:21
Very cool! I liked it. Thank you!
August 7th, 2008 at 3:47
I am currently learning a bit about ACCII. I find it quite hard especially if you want your art to look really good. I hope it’s going to be worth it.
Thanks!
August 11th, 2008 at 20:15
Gosh, all those images took me right back.
I remember all the graphics you used to get on free games for the amiga. Long time ago now.
September 1st, 2008 at 22:24
great i love a bit of ascii art!
September 5th, 2008 at 7:11
I am currently learning a bit about ACCII. I find it quite hard especially if you want your art to look really good. I hope it’s going to be worth it.
Thanks!
September 10th, 2008 at 19:35
I think theres something dirty about ascii text pictures. It just reminds me of spammers and software piracy.
September 11th, 2008 at 1:45
thanks very nice .
September 16th, 2008 at 6:07
THanks a lot… Very good stuff…
December 13th, 2008 at 2:20
How paintstaking it must have been to create those. You have to think like a programmer and an artist.
December 25th, 2008 at 23:42
[...] Acme Educational Blog ? NIKON UNVEILS A DIGITAL MASTERPIECE: THE D3X DIGITAL SLR Space Quest: a janitor’s epic tale in adventure-o-visionImage to Text Converters: Revisiting the Old School Through ASCII Art | Project Afterlight. Articles… [...]
January 24th, 2009 at 8:26
Wow that brings back some memories of the days when we did this kind of images. I had not thought about that in a long time. How things have changed. I will have to use one of the generators proposed here and show the grand-kids that I can do in a blink what took me days to do then. I might even teach how we used to do it. Thanks
March 11th, 2009 at 6:52
Cool art. Can’t believe they’re made out of Ansi characters.
March 27th, 2009 at 20:45
Erotik shop
April 3rd, 2009 at 3:42
I did not know what Ansii art was before stumbling on your block. Those are some cool images. It’s crazy how they all come together to form the images.
April 29th, 2009 at 11:59
I think i like the whole idea. I love the new look of each image. Great job for this!
April 29th, 2009 at 14:14
The information was too good. It just took me to the olden days. I know the art of making modern paintaings. But this is really great. Mona Lissa is good. How these pictures would have come in the earlier dot matrix printers?
June 21st, 2009 at 3:49
Very nice artwork, i like it!
July 28th, 2009 at 12:16
Ahan,i didnt know about it before,is it good for testking 70-236 and 70-270…? well i dont know,but if yes,do tell me,if u can…