How the DOOM/JFK image was created
(using nothing but free software)
1. The DOOM portion
On a LINUX machine, I ran
xdoom
, the shareware X-Windows version of DOOM, the game by
id Software
xwininfo
(a standard X11 utility) returned the X window ID of the DOOM window, for use with
xwd
, another standard X11 utility that dumps window images
A
GNU
bash
shell loop like this began a series of window dumps:
i=0 while true; do xwd -id WINID -out $i.xwd i=$[$i+1] done
I fired the rocket launcher in the DOOM window, then stopped the shell loop
Using
xwud
(X Window UnDump - the inverse of
xwd
), I previewed the captured window dumps until I found one I liked -
34.xwd
I used
ImageMagik
to convert the X Window Dump into a MIFF (ImageMagik interchange format), and then into a GIF -
34.gif
The most time consuming step was using
XPaint
to replace the background with solid cyan, creating
34overlay.gif
ImageMagik was used again to build another MIFF, this time specifying
-transparent #00ffff
to make the cyan transparent
2. The JFK portion
I downloaded
Z186-207.mpg
, a clip from the Zapruder film, from ??
ImageMagik (compiled with the MPEG option, using the UCB/MNI
MPEG library
) broke the MPEG into a set of MIFFs
I selected the third MPEG frame, Zapruder frame 188 -
Z188.gif
3. Combining them
The ImageMagik
combine
utility was used, with the
-compose over
option to overlay the images. A
-geometry
switch was also needed for correct alignment
ImageMagik converted the resulting MIFF to final GIF, using
-interlace none
to prevent progressive loading, which might ruin the surprise...
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