image2ascii

Image to ASCII Converter

This Go program converts an input image into an ASCII art representation. It uses a character set to replace the pixels in the image with characters based on brightness, generating an ASCII-styled version of the original image.

Features

• Supports PNG, JPEG, and GIF image formats.
• Converts the image into ASCII art using a customizable character set.
• Automatically resizes the image based on the character dimensions.
• Outputs the resulting ASCII art image in the same format as the input image.

Prerequisites

• Go 1.18 or higher.
• A valid .ttf font file (for customizing the font).

Installation

1. Clone this repository:

git clone https://github.com/msmcntmr/image2ascii.git
cd image2ascii

1. Install dependencies:

go mod tidy

Ensure that you have a compatible Go environment set up.

Usage

1. Prepare Your Image:

   • Ensure your image is in PNG, JPEG, or GIF format.

2. Run the Program:

   go run main.go <filename>
   

   Replace <filename> with the path to your image file. Example:

   go run main.go example.png
   

3. Output:

   • The processed image will be saved as <filename>_processed.<ext> in the same directory as the input image.

Example

go run main.go input.jpg

• This will generate a file named input_processed.jpg with the ASCII art version of the image.

Customization

You can modify the following aspects of the program:

• Character Set: The charset variable contains the characters used for ASCII conversion. Modify this string to customize the characters used.
• Font: The program uses the basicfont.Face7x13 font for rendering text. You can replace this with a custom font by loading a .ttf font file.
• Character Dimensions: The charW and charH variables define the width and height of each character block. Adjust these values to fit your needs.

How it Works

1. Image Resizing: The image is resized to match the dimensions of the ASCII grid, determined by the character width and height.
2. Brightness Calculation: For each pixel in the resized image, the brightness is calculated by averaging the red, green, and blue components.
3. Character Mapping: The brightness value is used to map the pixel to a corresponding character from the charset.
4. ASCII Art Rendering: The characters are rendered onto a new image, preserving the original colors but replacing pixels with ASCII characters.

Limitations

• Small images may result in overly compressed or unclear ASCII art. You can adjust the font size or the character dimensions to improve the output.
• The program currently supports a fixed set of font dimensions. You can modify the code to use a dynamic font size based on the image dimensions.