Emu48 Skins for Android Smartphones I (9:16) - SMART CHARLEMAGNE (3/4)

[Giuseppe Donnini]

 
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VII. SKIN CATALOGUE.

All colors mentioned in this catalogue refer to optimal contrast settings (level 11).


A. THE ORIGINALS.

1. CHARLIE BLUE
2. CHARLIE COAL

This group includes all CHARLIE designs, featuring the original, unmodified faceplate of the HP-48SX.

The display colors of CHARLIE BLUE are modelled after the (photo-edited) LCDs seen in official HP brochures and advertisements of the time:





The hue of the blue ink, in particular, is taken from the stunning screenshots published in the June 1991 issue of the HP Journal:



(cf. Ted W. Beers, Diana K. Byrne, Gabe L. Eisenstein, Robert W. Jones, and Patrick J. Megowan, "HP-48SX Interfaces and Applications" in: Hewlett-Packard Journal, Vol. 42 no. 3, June 1991, pp. 13-21.).

CHARLIE COAL is the black-ink version of the CHARLIE design, inspired by the LCDs used in late-production HP-48G/G+/GX units. In order to achieve a better color balance, the paper was slightly darkened in comparison to the blue-LCD version:

B. THE HP-48SX OVERLAY KIT (HP-82220A).

3. ALPHA-CHARLIE BLUE
4. ALPHA-CHARLIE COAL

My first attempt at reproducing the HP-48SX faceplate as enhanced by the alpha keyboard markings from the official Overlay Kit was based on a high-resolution scan of the calculator with the overlay attached. The result, however, was not convincing, mainly due to the semi-opaque appearance of the overlay, which bleaches the background area and makes the normal labels harder to read. I therefore decided to recreate the additional markings by hand, lending them the appearance of labels directly silk-screened onto the keyboard:

In addition, ALPHA-CHARLIE includes three features missing from the original overlay:

• The label "LC" for the [LS]+[ALPHA] combination, which locks the alpha keyboard to lowercase letters.
   
• The label "INS" for the [RS]+[ALPHA] combination, which toggles between insert and replace modes.
   
• The label "ALT" for the [RS]+[9] combination, which modifies the following characters:
  
   A ⟶ Å      a ⟶ å
   C ⟶ Ç      c ⟶ ç
   D ⟶ Đ      d ⟶ ð
   E ⟶ Æ      e ⟶ æ
   O ⟶ Ø      o ⟶ ø
   P ⟶ þ      p ⟶ þ
  
  

The first two abbreviations ("LC", "INS") are borrowed from the keyboard nomenclature of the Clamshell calculators, the last one ("ALT") was chosen for its brevity and widespread use as a modifier-key name.

[ A future version will include labels for the softkey row which, unfortunately, is not covered by the original overlay. The missing letters are, from left to right: α, β, Δ, δ, ε, θ. ]

ALPHA-CHARLIE comes with the original BLUE, and an alternative COAL, display:

C. Emu^2 I : THE HP-41CV EMULATOR FOR THE HP-48SX (HP-82210A).

5. SILVERBIRD BLUE
6. SILVERBIRD COAL

As with the alpha keyboard overlay, hand-crafting the overlay accompanying the HP-41CV emulator card produced significantly better results than working with complete scans or photographs:

Like ALPHA-CHARLIE, SILVERBIRD comes in BLUE and COAL:

D. Emu^2 II : THE HP-16C EMULATOR FOR THE HP-48 (by Schwartz & Grevelle).

7. PROGRAMMER BLUE
8. PROGRAMMER COAL

The same goes for the overlay that comes with the excellent HP-16C emulator by Jake Schwartz and Rick Grevelle:

Like ALPHA-CHARLIE and SILVERBIRD, PROGRAMMER comes in BLUE and COAL:

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