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Another fine example of typewriter art was posted on USENET a few years back. A reader found an article in an unnamed magazine (1960) about a man named Guillermo Mendana Olivera. The article states that Mr. Olivera was a stenographer by day in Leon, Spain, and a keyboard artist by night. He used small o's and x's and periods, dashes, and commas to create his typewriter art masterpieces. And each picture took about 70 hours to complete! Incredible! |
=> ./ascii_history_jgs/asciibg.gif ascii_bg.gif |
(The .gif of the magazine article is posted on the internet at: http://mypage.direct.ca/r/rcrawfor/ascii_bg.gif but I flagrantly copied it. With web sites coming and going, I wanted to make sure that I had this wonderful part of text art history. Good thing too, if you go to that URL, you'll find a big 404 error.) |
There are very few books about ASCII art. Most computer art text books deal with modern graphics and programming. Eventually I'd love to put together a publication of my ASCII art creations, information on the history of text art, and the "how-to create" guidelines for ASCII art. (Are there any publishers out there interested in such a project?) In the meantime, you're stuck reading my cyberspace meanderings. |
At right, you'll find a listing of typewriter art books that I've been able to identify. |
* "Typewriter Art" by Dan Carlinsky (1978, Price Sloan Publishers) ISBN 0843104333 |
* "Typewriter Art" edited by Alan Riddell (1975, London Magazine Editions) ISBN 0-900626-99-2 (Thank you Andrew Belsey for finding this book and forwarding it to me!) |
* "Art Typing" by Nathan Krevolin (1962, Fearon Pittman/MacMillan Publishers) ISBN 0028306104 |
* "Typewriter Art" by Bob Neill |
* "Second Book on Typewriter Art" by Bob Neill (1984, The Weavers Press) |
The book, "Art Typing", written by Nathan Krevolin, describes creating images-- mostly text and borders-- with typewriter characters. Many of the pictures are made entirely out of "X"s... For example: |
``` |
XXXXXXXXXXXXXX XXXXX |
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXX |
XXXXXXXXXXXXXX XX XXXXXXXXXXX |
XXXXXXXXXXXXXX XX XXXXXXXXXXX |
XXXXXXXXXXXXXX XX XXXXXXXXX |
X X X XXXXX |
X XX XX X XXX X X |
X XX XX X XXX X X |
X X XXX X X |
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX X |
``` |
This is a house and a tree as illustrated in the 1962 book, "Art Typing" |
There is a section on how to make type-written reports, price lists, and menus, as well as how to make a card. (Perhaps a precursor to 'Print Shop'?) Some mention is made of half-spaces and tilting type paper to get a unique look-- neither of which apply to ASCII art. One page identifies 'cartooning' with keyboard characters-- this is the page which reminded me most of today's ASCII art... Here are two of the ten items pictured... |
``` |
* |
/ |
HH |
SSSSSS |
SSSSSSSS |
S )))) S |
SS - - SS |
SSS o o SSS |
SSSS 6 SSSS |
SSS __ SSS |
SSS SSS |
W W |
WW WWW |
WWWW WWWW |
WWWWWWWWWW |
XXXXXXXXX |
XXXXXXXXXXXXX |
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX |
(__________)XXXXXX |
( ___ ___ XXXXXX |
o/ o XXXXX |
( / XXXXX |
/___) XXXXX |
( XXXX |
( ____ ) XXX |
( XX |
( ) X |
( ) * |
( ) *** |
* |
http://www.dataweb.net/~mic/typewriterart/cat.htm |
Typewriter Art by Bob Neill - Persian Cat |
``` |
Two cartoon characters from the 1962 book, "Art Typing". |
## TEXT AS PICTURES -- TELETYPE (RTTY) |
Similar text images were broadcast via Radio Teletype (RTTY). RTTY is a machine-to-machine method of communication which takes place over radio or telephone lines. Its purpose is not for text art transmissions, but for text communication between operators. The teletypewriter (or teleprinter) was invented in the early 1900s. The largest manufacturer of the teleprinter in the United States was the Teletype Corporation. The term "teletype" is used to refer to the teleprinter. However the word "teletype" is actually a trademark of the AT&T Teletype Corporation (much like how the word "xerox" took over the copying machine industry). The radio teleprinter became popular with the public after World War II when surplus teletype machines became available at a reasonable cost. These large machines provided a keyboard for input and a paper roll for printed output. Video monitors didn't become feasible until the mid-1970s. Even today, there are many active RTTY operators and clubs. |
RTTY operators (ham operators) have used various codes to transmit messages. These codes include BCD, EBCDIC, Morgan code, and Baudot code. However RTTY transmissions typically used the five-bit, 32 character Baudot code. Initially, RTTY did not use seven-bit ASCII (American Standard Code for Information Interchange). ASCII was not standardized until 1968. There are differences between Baudot and ASCII. Differences include bit-size and number of characters allowed. The Baudot code uses numbers, upper case letters, and some punctuation characters. It does not allow for lower case letters. The ASCII code uses upper and lower case letters, numbers, and more of the "standard" punctuation characters. |
There are, of course, other differences between the two codes. For a more technical explanation, visit George W. Henry Jr.'s web site. George Henry (K9GWT) has put together a paper which describes the differences between the two codes. It provides some definitions for RTTY terms and examines the various interfacing standards used with ASCII and Baudot terminals: http://fido.wps.com/ITA/index.html Even though most radio amateurs In the United States use the Baudot code, they have been authorized by the FCC to use ASCII as well as the older Baudot code for RTTY communications. This took effect in March of 1980. |
Several RTTY enthusiasts have started to translate Baudot code to ASCII. If you have some paper tapes of Baudot/ RTTY art which need to be converted, you can find a program to transform them at: http://fido.wps.com/Baudot/index.html |
The text art images sent in the ham radio community consist of capital letters and are sent on long paper tapes. RTTY is slow. Transmissions are sent at 45 baud -- 50 baud is standard in New Zealand. Compare that to the 53,000 baud modem connections that we're using with our computers today! A large RTTY art image could take an hour to transmit. The speed of the RTTY transmission is approximately 60 -100 words per minute. To get an idea of what it would look like, view one of the JAVA applets that simulates an RTTY transmission at http://www.megalink.net/~n1rct/sta/onair.html. (URL no longer valid 8/00)I I would imagine that watching an RTTY art image materialize line-by-line would be quite mesmerizing. |
RTTY Home page and History |
http://www.rtty.com |
RTTY Information |
http://www.teleport.com/~nb6z/rtty.htm |
Teleprinter Museum |
http://www.peine.net/telex/index.htm |
=> https://web.archive.org/web/20091028050914/http://www.rtty.com/history/index.htm History of RTTY and Major Contributors - When and where and how it started, and how it advanced and changed over the years. Stories and short biographies of those individuals whose efforts advanced the hobby and made it better for others. |
According to a chapter in the "RTTY Handbook", text images have been sent via teletypewriter as early as 1923. However, I have not discovered any of this "old" RTTY art. From what I have found, the text images appeared frequently on radio teletype in the 1960s and the 1970s. They were sent from ham operator to ham operator via radio transmissions. I've been told that there was an article about RTTY art in an early 1960s issue of "73 Magazine" -- the publication for RTTY enthusiasts. I've had no such luck in locating it -- yet. |
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