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Musterli

ASCII Art

Turn photos into ASCII art from characters, colored characters, an LED dot matrix or braille. Export as SVG, PNG, text or HTML.

Open the generator

Runs right in your browser. Your graphics are made on your device.

Example motif made with the ASCII Art

Start from a preset

Pick a preset and it opens right in the editor, ready to adjust.

What is it?

ASCII art is a picture made of text characters: dark areas get dense characters such as @ or #, light areas dots or spaces. From a little distance the photo appears again. Musterli also draws colored characters, an LED or dot matrix and braille patterns, for posters, terminal aesthetics, README files and websites.

How it works

Upload a photo or start with the sample picture. Choose characters, dots or braille, the number of columns and a character set, including your own characters. Brightness, contrast and gamma decide how much detail shows; invert fits the picture to a dark background. Export as SVG, PNG, JPG or WebP, or as text and an HTML snippet.

Try the ASCII Art now

FAQ

Is my photo uploaded?
No. The photo is processed in your browser only and never sent to a server. Share links contain neither the photo nor the characters computed from it; a shared link shows the sample picture.
Which font is used?
Your system's monospace font, for example SF Mono, Menlo, Consolas or Liberation Mono. Musterli loads no web font. In the SVG every row is exactly as wide as the picture, so the art fits with another font too.
How large do SVG and text get?
At most 32,000 cells, or 32,000 dots for braille. More columns show finer detail; beyond that Musterli shrinks the grid evenly. That keeps an SVG under 1 MB, even in color.
What is the difference between size and lit dots?
With size, dots grow with darkness like in halftone print. With lit, all dots are the same size and their opacity follows the brightness, like an LED display. Invert makes the light areas glow.
Can I use the ASCII art as text?
Yes. The export offers plain text for README files, code comments and terminals, plus an HTML snippet with inline styles that brings its colors and the monospace font along.

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