ASCII Art

Some time ago, I was looking for the FORTRAN program or data deck used to print the large Mona Lisa picture that I saw back in the '70s. I was directed to Dave Gesswein's PDP-8 site, and a collection of vintage ASCII art files: http://www.pdp8online.com/ftp/ascii_art/ A 2-page wide version of the Mona Lisa was there, along with Buzz Aldrin on the moon, Spock holding a model of the Enterprise and a huge picture of the moon. These were all designed to be printed on a chain or drum printer using overstrike to create pseudo grayscale values. I printed off several images on a Data General LDM-800 line matrix printer, and was happy with the results. Several of the print files had the name "Sam Harbison" on them, from Princeton in 1973. I managed to locate an email address for Sam, and sent him a note asking about the process used in creating those pictures. With his permission, I posted his response on my ASCII Art page: http://sturgeon.css.psu.edu/~mloewen/Oldtech/ASCII/ He gives a very detailed explanation about the process. Photos of my printouts are there, as well. Mike Loewen mloewen at cpumagic.scol.pa.us Old Technology http://sturgeon.css.psu.edu/~mloewen/Oldtech/