NAME

       chafa - Character art facsimile generator

SYNOPSIS

       chafa [OPTION...] [IMAGE...]

DESCRIPTION

       chafa is a utility that converts all kinds of images, including animated GIFs, into
       (potentially animated) ANSI/Unicode character output that can be displayed in a terminal.
       It supports alpha transparency and multiple color modes and color spaces, and combines a
       range of Unicode characters for optimal output.

       You can specify one or more input files, but the default behavior is slightly different
       with multiple files -- for instance, animations will not loop forever when there is more
       than one input file.

OPTIONS

       --bg color
           Background color of display (color name or hex). Partially transparent input will be
           blended with this color. Color names are based on those provided with X.Org. Defaults
           to black.

       --clear
           Clear screen before processing each file.

       -c mode, --colors mode
           Set output color mode; one of [none, 2, 16, 240, 256, full]. Defaults to full
           (24-bit). The 240-color mode is recommended over the 256-color one, since the lower 16
           colors are unreliable and tend to differ between terminals. 16-color mode will use
           aixterm extensions to produce 16 foreground and background colors. 2-color mode will
           only emit the ANSI codes for reverse color and attribute reset, while "none" will emit
           no ANSI color codes whatsoever.

       --color-space cs
           Color space used for quantization; one of [rgb, din99d]. Defaults to rgb, which is
           faster but less accurate.

       --dither type
           Type of dithering to apply during quantization. One of [none, ordered, diffusion].
           "Bayer" is a synonym for "ordered", and "fs" (Floyd-Steinberg) is a synonym for
           "diffusion".

       --dither-grain widthxheight
           Dimensions of grain used when dithering. Specified as width x height, where each can
           be one of [1, 2, 4, 8] pixels. One character cell is by definition 8 pixels across in
           both dimensions. Defaults to 4x4.

       --dither-intensity intensity
           Intensity of dithering pattern. Ranges from 0.0 to infinity, with 1.0 considered
           neutral. Lower values tend to reduce the amount of dithering done, while higher values
           increase it. In practice, values higher than 10.0 are unlikely to produce useful
           results.

       -d, --duration seconds
           Time to show each file. If showing a single file, defaults to zero for a still image
           and infinite for an animation. For multiple files, defaults to 3.0. Animations will
           always be played through at least once.

       --fg color
           Foreground color of display (color name or hex). Together with the background color
           specified by --bg, this specifies the terminal's palette in color modes 2 and none.
           Color names are based on those provided with X.Org. Defaults to white.

       --fill symbols
           Specify character symbols to use for fill/gradients. Defaults to none. Usage is
           similar to that of --symbols; see below.

       --font-ratio width/height
           Target font's width/height ratio. Can be specified as a real number or a fraction.
           Defaults to 1/2.

       -h, --help
           Show a brief help text.

       --invert
           Invert video. For display with bright backgrounds in color modes 2 and none. Swaps
           --fg and --bg.

       -p bool, --preprocess bool
           Image preprocessing [on, off]. Defaults to on with 16 colors or lower, off otherwise.
           This enhances colors and contrast prior to conversion, which can be useful in
           low-color modes.

       -s widthxheight, --size widthxheight
           Set maximum output dimensions in columns and rows. By default this will be the size of
           your terminal, or 80x25 if size detection fails.

       --stretch
           Stretch image to fit output dimensions; ignore aspect. Implies --zoom.

       --symbols symbols
           Specify character symbols to employ in final output. See below for full usage and a
           list of symbol classes.

       -t threshold, --threshold threshold
           Threshold above which full transparency will be used [0.0 - 1.0]. Setting this to 0.0
           will render a blank image, while a value of 1.0 will replace any transparency with the
           background color (configurable with --bg).

       --version
           Show version, feature and copyright information.

       --watch
           Watch a single input file, redisplaying it whenever its contents change. Will run
           until manually interrupted or, if --duration is set, until it expires.

       -w num, --work num
           How hard to work in terms of CPU and memory [1-9]. 1 is the cheapest, 9 is the most
           accurate. Defaults to 5.

       --zoom
           Allow scaling up beyond one character per pixel.

SYMBOLS

       Accepted classes for --symbols are [all, none, space, solid, stipple, block, border,
       diagonal, dot, quad, half, hhalf, vhalf, inverted, braille, technical, geometric, ascii].
       Some symbols belong to multiple classes, e.g. diagonals are also borders.

       You can specify a list of classes separated by commas, or prefix them with + and - to add
       or remove symbols relative to the existing set. The ordering is significant.

       The default symbol set is all-stipple-braille-ascii+space-extra-inverted for all modes
       except for "none", which uses all-stipple-braille-ascii+space-extra.

EXAMPLES

       chafa in.gif
           Show a potentially animated GIF image in the terminal. If this is an animation, it
           will run until the user generates an interrupt (typically ctrl-c). All parameters will
           be autodetected based on the current environment.

       chafa -c full -s 200 in.gif
           Like the above, but force truecolor output that is 200 characters wide and calculate
           the height preserving the aspect of the original image.

       chafa -c 16 --color-space din99d --symbols -dot in.jpg
           Generate 16-color output with perceptual color picking and avoid using dot symbols.

       chafa -c none --symbols block+border-solid in.png
           Generate uncolored output using block and border symbols, but avoid the solid block
           symbol.

AUTHOR

       Written by Hans Petter Jansson <hpj@copyleft.no>.