Show HN: Asciilator.com

20 4m1rk 19 6/3/2025, 3:19:34 PM asciilator.com ↗

Comments (19)

1024kb · 1m ago
Looking at some of the popular suggestions, it can't help with some words, because they are too rude, however, "pen is" returns something rather long indeed.
dmd · 17h ago
I'm not sure I understand the appeal of sites that are literally a less-than-a-sentence prompt I could have typed myself.
dwaltrip · 15h ago
But you didn't, and they did :)

It made me smile, I'm glad they built it.

dmd · 15h ago
Well, no, I have many times typed exactly that prompt, because making a hundred billion dollars worth of computer go "brr" to make ascii art is amusing! I just don't understand what the point is of a dedicated site.
4m1rk · 17h ago
Even the UI is created by AI :bushes:
cadamsdotcom · 17h ago
Life is complete, I now have a beautiful 2D ascii elephant!

Random idea: now animate it.

Run the initial generate, keep that result, provide it back to another llm call: “user requested an elephant. you drew this. (object here) generate the next frame of an animation of this.”

Iterate the prompt 2-3 times for cool animated ascii art :)

4m1rk · 17h ago
I like that! Though it's not very smart or consistent at creating ascii art.
dwaltrip · 15h ago
Object: pizza pie

       _      
     _|=|__________
    /              \
   /                \
  /__________________\
  |   ________   ___ |
  |  |      |  |   ||
  |  |      |  |   ||
  |  |      |  |   ||
  |  |      |  |   ||
  |  |      |  |   ||
  |  |      |  |   ||
  |  |______|  |___||
  |_________________|
     ( )      ( )
    (   )    (   )
      ( )    ( )

A flying house?? Very curious!
4m1rk · 15h ago
It was too excited ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
mysterydip · 17h ago
Not quite sure it's working properly. Just saw a shrek face labeled "pikachu", and a column with nothing else labeled "windmill".
4m1rk · 17h ago
Yeah, it sometimes doesn't feel like it. I tried different prompts but it's not that smart at generating ascii art.
Simorgh · 18h ago
Is it using a model to generate the ASCII art?

It’s quite clever.

4m1rk · 18h ago
It's gpt-4.1
Simorgh · 18h ago
Got it — it’s interesting how a text model can generate compelling visual representations that are essentially style-matching.

Matching styles using vision models is not that easy, especially if you want to capture the core subject of the prompt.

shibeprime · 15h ago
Lmao, its so random.

ASCII Art for "bambi":

         ,   ,
        /////|
       ///// |
      /////  |
     |~~~| | |
     |===| |/|
     | B |/| |
     | A / | |
     | M |  |
     | B |  |
     | I | /
     |===|/
     '---'
    /     \
   /       \
  /  .-""-. \
 (  /      \ )
  \/        \/
   |        |
   |        |
   |        |
   |        |
   |        |
   |        |
   |        |
   |        |
   |        |
   |        |
   |        |
  /          \
 /            \
/ \
4m1rk · 15h ago
I'm curious too. Should've make it explain why it generated what generated and as a note :D

No comments yet

4m1rk · 22h ago
Created using FastAPI and HTMX.
Ayushmishra23 · 18h ago
cool
b0dhimind · 10h ago

       ___
     _/   \_
    /       \
   |         |
   |         |
   |         |
    \_______/
      /   \
     /     \
    /       \
   /         \
  /           \
  |   ___     |
  |  (___)    |
  |           |
   \         /
    \_______/