Index of /pcaskey/tarot

      Name                   Last modified     Size  Description


[DIR] Parent Directory       20-Apr-08 15:38      -  
[IMG] INDEX01.JPG            09-Apr-96 19:04   337k  
[IMG] INDEX02.JPG            09-Apr-96 19:08   310k  
[   ] riderwaite-big.zip     09-Mar-01 16:58   7.4M  
[   ] riderwaite-small.zip   25-Feb-01 07:54   747k  


			 TAROT CARD IMAGES README
			    Updated 9 Mar 2001
			   (Previous 9 Apr 1996)


   !*!*!*! ATTENTION !*!*!*!      !*!*!*! ATTENTION !*!*!*!


   MARCH 2001

   ALL TAROT CARDS ARE NOW AVAILABLE IN TWO ZIP FILES:

      http://www.swcp.com/pcaskey/tarot/riderwaite-big.zip
      http://www.swcp.com/pcaskey/tarot/riderwaite-small.zip

   THE 'BIG' IMAGES HAVE BEEN ENHANCED AND RESIZED TO 350x600.
   THE 'SMALL' IMAGES ARE ALSO ENHANCED AND ARE SIZED 100X165.



*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

Herein lies a complete scan of the classic Rider-Waite Tarot cards.
These cards were scanned way back in the dark ages (circa 1990) on 
an Epson 24-bit color scanner at a painstakingly slow rate.  I saved
them using a hot new image format (ahem) called JPEG.

My hope was that if I made these publically available, people would
start writing cool Tarot card apps, like maybe a little PC program that
would ship with small copies of the images.

Well, with the advent of the World Wide Web, and the efforts and talents
of many people, we're way beyond that.  There are now several sites
online that use these images.  A list of the ones I know about can be
found on my home page, at:

		      http://www.swcp.com/pcaskey

Thanks to all those web spinners who did the hard half of this job.


************************************************************************
Also, many thanks to U.S.Games, Inc. for providing the permission to
scan and distribute these scans freely.  Use them as you wish, but you
are not allowed to charge money for them.  YOU MAY ALSO NOT REMOVE THE
COPYRIGHT NOTICE THAT APPEARS IN THE LOWER-RIGHT CORNER OF EACH IMAGE.
I have a physical copy of the letter of permission from U.S.Games, so
contact me if you need a fax of it.
************************************************************************


There are two directories:

	big   - Original 24-bit color JPEG images, each about 800x470
	small - Photoshop-enhanced 6-bit color GIF images, all 100x165

There are large INDEX files in each directory that contain composite
images for previewing.

The 'small' images have the following advantages:

	* Very small file size - around 10K each
	* Improved color, sharpness, and contrast
	* Each image has exactly the same dimensions: 100x165 pixels
	* Fewer colors for better viewing on many computers

Their disadvantage is that they are, well, small.  100 pixels is not
very wide, although at least one web site is using this dimension and it
works out pretty well in a tarot layout.

If I ever find the time, I'll crank out a 'medium' set that will be
140x240 and the same contrast and sharpness as the 'small' set.  This
results in GIF file sizes of about 20K, and images that are quite
detailed.  Unfortunately, this task requires one-by-one loading and
tweaking in Photoshop, a time-consuming chore (unless some Photoshop
wizard out there can teach me a way to do this in a batch process).


Thanks to Southwest Cyberport for graciously hosting this repository for
all to access.
	

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Paul Caskey      pc as key at swcp.  com      http://www.swcp.com/pcaskey
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Everywhere is walking distance if you have the time."   --Stephen Wright