A guide by Long Hair 7

This guide only teaches you how to draw without your picture messing up. It won't exactly make you an expert.

1. The size of the character you use determines how much you can put on one line. These characters are recommended for drawing: _ $ ? #. You can put 76 of those on one line.

1 1/2. When you get finished with one line, press Enter; don't let it go to the next line automatically.

2. No matter how many times you press the space bar in a row, it will only show as one space.
| |
I pressed the space bar 10 times there, and it only showed as one. It's good to use periods as spaces.
|..........|

For bigger drawings, you can use bigger symbols for bigger spaces.
|__________|

**Usually people put periods for the middle of an object, and the line for the top and bottom of an object.

._____
|.........|
|..HI....|
|_____|

2 1/2. Again, it's best to avoid using characters that are different sizes if you're a beginner. If you want to try drawing this way, go on a Word document and set the font to Arial, then draw your picture. When you're done, copy it (highlight it and press Ctrl+C), then paste it (Ctrl+V) in the Reply screen.

3. Some symbols are bigger than others. Before you press Post, it looks like it's all the same length. After you hit Post, you'll notice that some symbols are bigger than others.
..........
__________
There are 10 of each of those symbols. They looked the same length before I pressed Post.
So try to use symbols that are the same size if you want your drawing to come out right.
If you want to find out what symbols are the same size, use this method:
Press Shift+\ to make |
Make two of them together, then press enter and make another two together, like this:
||
||
Put the symbols you want to measure in between the lines. If I wanted to measure + and *, this is how I would put it:
|+++++|
|*****|

I put 5 pluses+ and 5 asterisks* in between the lines.
The lines at the end aren't even. The five asterisks* doesn't take as much space as five pluses+, so if I try to use those together in a drawing, it's going to mess up.
You can tell that these next two are the same size because the last | are lined up:
|+++++l
|=====l

3 1\2. Ignore the last part of Tip #3 if it's too confusing. Just use $ _ # ? because they don't censor and they're the same size.

4. Shapes are a good start for beginners.
Here's a circle.
################
##???????????###
#??#########??##
??###########??#
??###########??#
#??#########??##
##???????????###
##### ###########

5. Shading is a nice little technique that can make your picture look more realistic. Example:
################
##???????????_##
#??_########??_#
??_##########??_
??_##########??_
#??_########??_#
##???????????_##
#### ############

Obviously I used _ to shade my circle.
There are other ways to shade, but this is my way.

Ghostly - RoyalScape Developer Team