Thermal Printer Camera

Pointillist turns your phone into a simple instant camera for Bluetooth receipt printers. Take a photo, choose an image from your library, and print it as bold black-and-white dot art on inexpensive thermal paper.

No ink, no cartridges, and no complicated editing. Just pair a compatible printer, frame your image, and print. Dither like it’s 1976.

Important compatibility requirement

Pointillist is designed specifically for Bluetooth thermal printers that support standard ESC/POS commands.

• You must already own a Bluetooth ESC/POS printer.
• The printer must be paired with your phone before printing.
• Paperang, PeriPage, and other printers that require proprietary manufacturer apps are not supported.
• This app does not add Bluetooth support to USB-only printers.

If you are unsure whether your printer supports ESC/POS, check its manual or product listing before installing.

Features

• Take photos directly in the app
• Print images from your photo library
• Convert photos into distinctive black-and-white dithered prints
• Adjust image size, print width, slicing, density, and transmission delay
• Support for common 58 mm and 80 mm ESC/POS printers

Printer setup and troubleshooting

• Print stops early or produces long strips of random text: Enable image slicing and increase the buffer-overflow delay in the printer settings.
• Print contains many horizontal white lines: Disable image slicing or reduce the buffer-overflow delay.
• Print is garbled, compressed, or too narrow: Confirm that the configured pixel width matches your printer. Many 58 mm printers use 384 dots per line, while many 80 mm printers use 576 dots.
• Printing is slow or unreliable: Use the printer manufacturer’s computer utility, when available, to adjust Bluetooth baud rate, print speed, and density. Enable Bluetooth 4 mode if supported.

Printer hardware varies considerably, so some models may require experimentation with the slicing, width, and delay settings.

Questions, suggestions, or problems?

Send an email to the support address listed below. Pointillist is a free project developed in my spare time, so responses may not be immediate, but I will do my best to help.