[marak]

I'm actually using .flf (FIGlet) files as fonts http://github.com/Marak/asciimo/tree/master/fonts/.

You are very right in your comment. I have ascii coding laying around right now in JavaScript that can take any image and convert it into ascii, but making it work server-side is going to be hard.

If you think you can help with any of this drop me a message on the github.

[vog]

> I have ascii coding laying around right now in JavaScript that can take any image and convert it into ascii, but making it work server-side is going to be hard.

Why do you want to code it yourself? There's the all-time favourite AAlib (http://aa-project.sourceforge.net/aalib/). [1]

However, automatically generated ASCII images aren't really art, either. It's just the generators themselves which can be called art. ASCII art almost always requires some tough hand work to become really good. For example, have a look at the Star Wars Asciimation (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1446358).

[1] The great BB demo (http://aa-project.sourceforge.net/bb/) has been created using the AAlib.

[ideamonk]

Ah the great bb demo, it comes along Knoppix, thats where I saw it first :)

[vog]

It's available on all Debian-based distributions, and maybe other distributions, too.