asciiart

Convert images to ASCII art

TLDR

Read an image from a file and print in ASCII

$ asciiart [path/to/image.jpg]

Read an image from a URL and print in ASCII

$ asciiart [www.example.com/image.jpg]

Choose the output width

$ asciiart -w [50] [path/to/image.jpg]

Colorize the ASCII output

$ asciiart -c [path/to/image.jpg]

Choose the output format

$ asciiart -f [text|html] [path/to/image.jpg]

Invert the character map

$ asciiart -i [path/to/image.jpg]

asciiart converts images to ASCII art, rendering pictures using text characters. It analyzes the brightness of each region in the image and maps it to appropriate ASCII characters.The tool supports reading images from local files or URLs and can output plain text or HTML. Color output uses ANSI escape codes for terminal display.

PARAMETERS

-w, --width n

Set the output width in characters (default: 100)

-c, --color

Enable colorized output using ANSI codes

-f, --format type

Output format: text (default) or html

-i, --invert-chars

Invert the character mapping (swap light and dark)

-v, --version

Display the version number

-h, --help

Show the help message

CAVEATS

Output quality depends on the terminal font and character width. Monospace fonts produce the best results. HTML output can be viewed in web browsers for better color support. Very wide images may wrap in terminals.

HISTORY

asciiart is a Ruby gem written by Stephen Schor (nodanaonlyzuul). It is packaged for Debian and Ubuntu and installed via gem install asciiart.

RESOURCES

Source code · Documentation