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You're looking at the last static copy (1999) of Acheron.org, more recent but partial copies exist in the wayback machine. This site is online out of nostalgia and because of it's historic content, an up to date ANSI/ASCII art archive is available from 16colo.rs

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Why the hell bother using gif2ansi?
by dangermouse
(1st January, 1999)

aoh's ripDoes the picture to the right look familiar? This is, in fact, a picture by Aoh that many of you may or may not have seen. It is a half-drawn picture, one side has been cleaned up whilst the other remains unconverted. (This is not the actual picture but a comparison) Yes, I said 'unconverted'. Yes the shit has hit the fan, it seems Aoh used gif2ansi to convert a gif into an ANSI file.

To some, this may be old news. But the fact still remains why the hell anyone would risk using such a tool when it is widely known that the scene has bitter feelings towards anyone that uses the program. This article is not going to lean towards any one opinion on the matter of gif2ansi, but rather why an artist would want to use the tool in the first place.

I guess the whole gif2ansi taboo started when Sudden Death was accused of using the program earlier this year, but I wouldn't be wrong in saying that the topic has cropped up before. The Extremist came out saying that Sudden Death
used the program on his site 'Operation Rescue', displaying so called proof of the fact. But even then people took their sides, and rightly so. It wasn't until an issue of Gutter, when Sudden Death admitted to using gif2ansi, that the possibility that others could also be using it came up.

Now this is the topic of the month, and has also been a raging discussion on acheron in the month of December. Should an artist who uses gif2ansi be labeled a ripper? Or even further, should such an artist be frowned upon? Some say that yes, they should walk the plank, whilst others say that they shouldn't be shunned at all.

An artist who uses gif2ansi. It still is a tricky matter. Ok, let's look at it this way. A photo-manipulation artist takes a photo that himself or even someone else has taken, and manipulates to form his/her own artwork. Does an ANSI artist who takes a gif and converts it to ANSI and then touches it up and adds their own personality to the picture, fit into the same field? Looking at it in a two-dimensional light, one would say that yes, they are pretty much the same. I don't think anyone has said that photo-manipulation artists should be thrown out of the scene (even though still hirez artists detest photo-manipulation artists -- but that is personal opinion).

The fact of the matter is that a lot of it is personal opinion. Whether or not an artist starts a picture from scratch or gets a little help from gif2ansi, there is still some skill involved, although the skill to create a picture from scratch must be seen as being considerably more. But even then, saying that, I am treading on shaky ground. I can't say that I can say the same thing of hirez airbrushers and photo-manipulation artists.

If we examine the word 'ripper' for a minute we also may shed some light on this topic. Ripper, to me, means that an artist has taken another's work and copied it pixel for pixel, block for block. Calling someone who uses others photos to form their own art in the hirez world is pretty much the norm. Someone in the ANSI scene who uses another's photo or piece art as a basis for the their own is labeled a ripper.

I think this kind a mentality stems from one thing. Is pretty hard to tell who uses gif2ansi and who doesn't. Someone in the hirez would using another's photo is pretty obvious. If someone sees a great ANSI and says "wow!" and bases all of their inspiration on this artist for their own work, and then later finds out that this person in fact did not fully create the picture, they fell justifiably cheated.

What needs to be taking place within the scene, and something which I'm sure will not happen overnight, is that artists who use this gif2ansi program need to say as much when they release their pictures to the public. If this happens or not will remain to be seen, as many artists still find the use of gif2ansi a taboo subject.

By simply having a line saying:

"This piece of artwork is based on the original artwork of someone, by using the program gif2ansi"

or

"I have used gif2ansi on this piece of artwork, and have manipulated the original picture to my own liking"

or

"The original creator of this artwork is someone. I have merely captured it and styled it to my own liking"

Even by saying this, I can see a certain reluctance to even say to myself that using gif2ansi is an okay thing to do. In a perfect world, gif2ansi would not exist, but it does. If you're an artist who uses this product to help to create your ANSIs, and are too chicken shit to come out say so then you mustn't have much of a brain -- people take you for granted, and yes, people probably look up to you.

People are praising you for your artwork, your amazing outlining skills. All along you know you can only touch up and shade, but you still do not acknowledge the real source of your talent. If you use gif2ansi, say so on your ANSIs, if you don't, even better. If you cannot come to grips with the fact that you 'cheat' as so many people put it, then perhaps you don't belong in the scene anyway..

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Discussion Topic this month:
I know this has been a heated discussion of recent times, but let's revisit it! :) Ok, lets discuss it in the context of this month's article. If people use gif2ansi should they say they did? Or should they even be using the program in the first place?

>> discussions (ANSI Discussion)

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