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ASCII QuickTime Movie Player

Posted by pudge on from the tasty-ascii-goodness dept.

EccentricAnomaly writes "Do you wish you had some more CLUI multimedia apps? Well, over at Mac OS X Hints I found this link to Apple's sample code for an ASCII QuickTime movie player. So grab some popcorn, make Terminal full screen, and watch some movie trailers the way ubergeeks were truly meant to." You can watch movies over remote login to another box, too, though the sound will come out of the host computer, not the client ...

9 of 36 comments (clear)

  1. Funnies in the source code by aster_ken · · Score: 5, Funny

    Read the source code to get the "Top X Tips for better ASCII QuickTime Movie Viewing". I particularly like number nine.

    1. Re:Funnies in the source code by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      /* Top X Tips for better ASCII QuickTime Movie Viewing
      10) Grow your terminal to fit the Movie
      9) Ask marketing folks if you can incorporate this code into your
      latest QuickTime product and see if they think you're serious
      8) Set your terminal to White on Black for optimal look
      7) Download your favorite movie trailer
      6) While you're at it, download some Graphics Importer sample code (why not?)
      5) Jedi mind trick your manager "...you want to send me to WWDC"
      4) Order the pizza.
      4) Dim the lights and turn up the audio
      2) Turn off terminal transparancy for fastest performance
      1) Usage [smelltheglove:/Volumes/Spock] moof% ASCIIMoviePlayer sillymovie.mov
      */

  2. Make the font size tiny by IRNI · · Score: 4, Insightful

    It makes the images look better. I expanded the terminal full screen, then I made the font a monotype and made it very small with the command keys to shrink the font size. Eventually I could make out butters' mom painting over his face.

  3. Also doable with mplayer by palfrey · · Score: 5, Informative

    mplayer has had ascii output for quite a while (as long as I've known about mplayer. And as announced here mplayer just announced support for sorenson V3, so you can play quicktime (and practically every other video format under the sun...). Quite happy running on OS X (as well as most *nix'es)

    --
    Beware the psychokinetic mimes!
  4. already been done by spatula · · Score: 4, Informative

    You know, it's funny that Apple did this, but it's been done before. Install aalib and mplayer, then try "mplayer -vo aa" sometime. It would be interesting to do a side-by-side comparison of the two to see which one produces more convincing ASCII art.

  5. sourceforge project by hayne · · Score: 5, Informative

    There is a sourceforge project dedicated to improving this ASCII movie player:
    http://quickascii.sourceforge.net/
    Main differences so far seem to be command-line options.

  6. Screenshot by daeley · · Score: 4, Informative

    There's a link in this entry for a screenshot if you're interested in what it looks like.

    --
    I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate.
  7. I'm the chosen one! by dhardman · · Score: 4, Funny

    Having my font color green, and the background black, the first thing I thought of was the last scene of The Matrix. Even though this has been out a while, It's fun to play with.

  8. In color by extra88 · · Score: 4, Informative
    From the comments on the MacOSXHints article.

    ASCIIMoviePlayer in color

    Also, ASCIIMoviePlayer can play/show anything Quicktime can, including many graphics file formats and Flash.

    BTW, if you run it over a remote ssh connection, the sound should not come out at the console since it's a separate session.