Color Without Color: Apple II Computer Graphics #Apple #Hacking #Video #AppleII

Color Without Color: Apple II Computer Graphics

A great write-up by paleotronic on how Steve Wozniak was able to get color from monochrome for the Apple II computer:

Released in 1977, the Apple II was one of the first personal computers marketed towards households rather than businesses. It was a complete computer – it had a keyboard for data entry and the ability to connect to a CRT monitor or a television set. However, unlike its competitors, the TRS-80 Model I and the Commodore PET 2001, the Apple II was able to display colour – but remarkably, it accomplished this without a dedicated colour video chip. The Apple II’s video hardware is actually monochrome!

So how does it display colours? The Apple II’s designer, Apple co-founder and chief engineer Steve Wozniak, discovered that if he repeated portions of the outgoing digital luminance signal (black or white) and injected it into the “colorburst” or NTSC colour signal, various patterns of pixels produced lines of different colours.

The “native” monochrome resolution of the Apple II is 280 pixels wide by 192 pixels deep. Each pixel is either on (1) or off (0). Steve found that using blocks of two pixels, he would get black (00), purple (01), green (10) and white (11). By shifting the timing of the colour signal, Steve was able to get an additional two colours, blue (01) and orange (10). This left him with a “high resolution” graphics mode (HGR) of 140×192.

Read more in the article. Subscribe to paleotronic.


Adafruit publishes a wide range of writing and video content, including interviews and reporting on the maker market and the wider technology world. Our standards page is intended as a guide to best practices that Adafruit uses, as well as an outline of the ethical standards Adafruit aspires to. While Adafruit is not an independent journalistic institution, Adafruit strives to be a fair, informative, and positive voice within the community – check it out here: adafruit.com/editorialstandards

Join Adafruit on Mastodon

Adafruit is on Mastodon, join in! adafruit.com/mastodon

Stop breadboarding and soldering – start making immediately! Adafruit’s Circuit Playground is jam-packed with LEDs, sensors, buttons, alligator clip pads and more. Build projects with Circuit Playground in a few minutes with the drag-and-drop MakeCode programming site, learn computer science using the CS Discoveries class on code.org, jump into CircuitPython to learn Python and hardware together, TinyGO, or even use the Arduino IDE. Circuit Playground Express is the newest and best Circuit Playground board, with support for CircuitPython, MakeCode, and Arduino. It has a powerful processor, 10 NeoPixels, mini speaker, InfraRed receive and transmit, two buttons, a switch, 14 alligator clip pads, and lots of sensors: capacitive touch, IR proximity, temperature, light, motion and sound. A whole wide world of electronics and coding is waiting for you, and it fits in the palm of your hand.

Have an amazing project to share? The Electronics Show and Tell is every Wednesday at 7pm ET! To join, head over to YouTube and check out the show’s live chat – we’ll post the link there.

Join us every Wednesday night at 8pm ET for Ask an Engineer!

Join over 36,000+ makers on Adafruit’s Discord channels and be part of the community! http://adafru.it/discord

CircuitPython – The easiest way to program microcontrollers – CircuitPython.org


Maker Business — “Packaging” chips in the US

Wearables — Enclosures help fight body humidity in costumes

Electronics — Transformers: More than meets the eye!

Python for Microcontrollers — Python on Microcontrollers Newsletter: Silicon Labs introduces CircuitPython support, and more! #CircuitPython #Python #micropython @ThePSF @Raspberry_Pi

Adafruit IoT Monthly — Guardian Robot, Weather-wise Umbrella Stand, and more!

Microsoft MakeCode — MakeCode Thank You!

EYE on NPI — Maxim’s Himalaya uSLIC Step-Down Power Module #EyeOnNPI @maximintegrated @digikey

New Products – Adafruit Industries – Makers, hackers, artists, designers and engineers! — #NewProds 7/19/23 Feat. Adafruit Matrix Portal S3 CircuitPython Powered Internet Display!

Get the only spam-free daily newsletter about wearables, running a "maker business", electronic tips and more! Subscribe at AdafruitDaily.com !



No Comments

No comments yet.

Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.