NEOchrome is an early color

bitmap graphics editor A raster graphics editor (also called bitmap graphics editor) is a computer program that allows users to Computer graphics, create and image editing, edit images interactively on the computer screen and save them in one of many raster graphics I ...

for the

Atari ST Atari ST is a line of personal computers from Atari Corporation and the successor to the company's Atari 8-bit computers, 8-bit computers. The initial model, the Atari 520ST, had limited release in April–June 1985, and was widely available i ...

. It was written by Dave Staugas, a programmer at

Atari Corporation Atari Corporation was an American manufacturer of Home computer, home computers and Video game console, video game consoles. It was founded by Jack Tramiel on May 17, 1984, as Tramel Technology, Ltd., but then took on the Atari name less than ...

and co-author of the ST's operating system. ''NEOchrome'' supports hardware-supported

color cycling Color (or colour in Commonwealth English; see spelling differences) is the visual perception based on the electromagnetic spectrum. Though color is not an inherent property of matter, color perception is related to an object's light absorpti ...

to give the impression of animation. A color cycling waterfall, created with ''NEOchrome'', was one of the iconic images of the early Atari ST. Following in the footsteps of

MacPaint MacPaint is a raster graphics editor developed by Apple Computer and released alongside the original Macintosh personal computer on January 24, 1984. It was sold bundled with its word processing counterpart, MacWrite, for US$195. MacPaint was n ...

and the Apple II version Mouse Paint, both released in 1984, ''NEOchrome'' uses the then-novel representation of painting tools by icons (in addition to other

GUI Gui or GUI may refer to: People Surname * Gui (surname), an ancient Chinese surname, ''xing'' * Bernard Gui (1261 or 1262–1331), inquisitor of the Dominican Order * Luigi Gui (1914–2010), Italian politician * Gui Minhai (born 1964), Ch ...

elements). A pre-release version (v0.5) was included with the system disks of the first STs. Version 1.0 arrived later, and was bundled with several versions of the ST. Although not officially

public domain The public domain (PD) consists of all the creative work to which no Exclusive exclusive intellectual property rights apply. Those rights may have expired, been forfeited, expressly Waiver, waived, or may be inapplicable. Because no one holds ...

, this version was often treated as such, and was never actually sold. NEOchrome enjoyed a relatively high level of popularity within the ST community, even in the face of more advanced packages such as

DEGAS Edgar Degas (, ; born Hilaire-Germain-Edgar De Gas, ; 19 July 183427 September 1917) was a French people, French Impressionism, Impressionist artist famous for his pastel drawings and oil paintings. Degas also produced bronze sculptures, Print ...

and

Deluxe Paint Deluxe Paint, often referred to as ''DPaint'', is a bitmap graphics editor created by Dan Silva for Electronic Arts and published for the then-new Amiga 1000 in November 1985. A series of updated versions followed, some of which were ported ...

NEOchrome Master

Although there were no further official versions, an unofficial revision called NEOchrome Master was released by the Atari

demo scene The demoscene () is an international computer art subculture focused on producing demos: self-contained, sometimes extremely small, computer programs that produce audiovisual presentations. The purpose of a demo is to show off programming, visu ...

group Delta Force's Till BubeckTill Bubeck(Germany)...a.k.a. "Chaos Inc.", coder in Delta Force (DF)...Famous for: NeoChrome Master
Atari Scene and STNICCC News (programmer of The Return of Medusa) in the early 1990s.What's new...
NEOchrome Master Manual, Alive 9

References

{{reflist

External links

NEOchrome (.neo) file format
archiveteam.org
NEOchrome Animation (.ani) file format
archiveteam.org 1985 software Atari ST software Raster graphics editors