RAW ASCII // DOCS

[ RETURN TO CAM ]

> QUICK START // HOW TO USE

To launch the application and capture your raw ASCII output:

  1. ALLOW CAMERA: Click [ START FEED ] or press Space. Your browser will prompt you for camera access. You must "Allow" to inject video into the Canvas.
  2. TWEAK IN REAL-TIME: As the feed runs, adjust the Hardware Mod sliders (Density, Brightness, Dithering) on the right panel. The settings apply instantly to the live visual engine.
  3. CAPTURE MEDIA: Keep the feed running and press [S] to generate a 4K Image Snapshot, or [R] to Record a WebM clip.
  4. CAPTURE RAW TEXT: Press [C] to copy the current raw ASCII frame directly to your clipboard, or [T] to download a `.txt` file containing the exact frame.

> COLOR MODES OVERVIEW

The engine runs a custom HTML5 Canvas color mapping algorithm in real-time. Use the dropdown in the Hardware Mod panel to adjust the render output:

  • MONOCHROME: The standard mode. Renders using pure White (or the active theme accent color) calculated via strict grayscale luminance.
  • RGB SNAPPED: Quantizes every pixel forcefully into pure Red (255,0,0), pure Green (0,255,0), or pure Blue (0,0,255). Generates stark neon visuals.
  • CMYK SNAPPED: Quantizes the pixel array map into Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, or pure White. Excellent for dense glitch or bright aesthetics.
  • TRUE RGB: Evaluates the actual true color of beneath the character pixel map and applies it to the font `fillStyle`. Heavy on browser processing due to high context switching.

> VISUAL PARAMETERS

Tune the ASCII rendering engine mathematically:

  • Density: Adjusts the length of the string character array mapped to darkness (e.g. "@%#" vs ".").
  • Texture: Acts as a Gamma algorithm modifier, pushing the mid-tones heavier to dark or light.
  • Brightness/Contrast: Runs through a high-performance 256-level precomputed Lookup Table (LUT) to avoid CPU bottlenecking.
  • Bayer Dithering: Bypasses smooth text gradients and maps luminance to a 4x4 coordinate threshold matrix block. Creates a stippled pixel-art retro vibe.

> EXPORT ENGINE

Extracting data off the digital canvas:

  • [S] Snapshot 4K: Grabs the actual HTML DOM, scales memory coordinates 400%, and processes a pristine PNG via `html-to-image`.
  • [T] Export TXT: Hooks into the underlying core math and parses the frame directly to a pure multi-line string text file.
  • [R] Record Feed: Pipes the active Canvas stream directly into a native browser `MediaRecorder` compiling 15fps WebM chunks in-memory.