# man > ppmlabel(1)
> **TLDR:** Add text to a PPM image.
>
- Add text to a PPM image at the specified location:
`ppmlabel -x {{pos_x}} -y {{pos_y}} {{-t|-text}} {{text}} {{path/to/input_file.ppm}} > {{path/to/output_file.ppm}}`
- Add multiple texts at different locations:
`ppmlabel -x {{pos_x1}} -y {{pos_y1}} {{-t|-text}} {{text1}} -x {{pos_x2}} -y {{pos_y2}} {{-t|-text}} {{text2}} {{path/to/input_file.ppm}} > {{path/to/output_file.ppm}}`
- Specify the line color, the background color, the tilt, and the size of the added text:
`ppmlabel -x {{pos_x}} -y {{pos_y}} {{-c|-color}} {{line_color}} {{-b|-background}} {{background_color}} {{-a|-angle}} {{tilt}} {{-s|-size}} {{size}} {{-t|-text}} {{text}} {{path/to/input_file.ppm}} > {{path/to/output_file.ppm}}`
*Source: tldr-pages*
---
_Ppmlabel_ _User_ [_Manual_(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/Manual/1/markdown) General Commands Manual _Ppmlabel_ _User_ [_Manual_(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/Manual/1/markdown)
## NAME
ppmlabel - add text to a PPM image
## SYNOPSIS
### ppmlabel
[**-angle _**angle_]
[**-background **{ **transparent **| _color_ } ]
[**-color _**color_]
[**-file _**filename_]
[**-size**
_textsize_]
[**-text _**text_string_]
[**-x _**column_]
[**-y _**row_]
...
[_ppmfile_]
## EXAMPLE
ppmlabel -x 50 -y 50 -text hello \
-angle -30 -text there \
testimg.ppm
## DESCRIPTION
This program is part of [**Netpbm**(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/Netpbm/1/markdown).
**ppmlabel **uses the text drawing facilities of **libnetpbm**'s "ppmd" component to add text to a
PBM image. You control the location, size, baseline angle, color of the text, and background
color (if any) with command line arguments. You can specify the text on the command line or
supply it in files.
You can add any number of separate labels in a single invocation of **ppmlabel**, limited only by
any restrictions your environment has on the number and size of program arguments (e.g. a
shell's command size limit).
If you don't specify _ppmfile_, **ppmlabel **reads its input PPM image from Standard Input.
The output image goes to Standard Output.
A more sophisticated way to add a label to an image is to use **pbmtext **or **pbmtextps **to create
an image of the text, then **pamcomp **to overlay it onto the base image.
Another more general program is **ppmdraw**. It is slightly harder to use for simple labelling.
## OPTIONS
In addition to the options common to all programs based on libnetpbm (most notably **-quiet**,
see ]8;;index.html#commonoptions\ Common Options]8;;\ ), **ppmlabel **recognizes the following command line options:
The arguments on the **ppmlabel **command line are not options in the strict sense; they are com‐
mands which control the placement and appearance of the text being added to the input image.
They are executed left to right, and any number of arguments may appear.
You can abbreviate any option to its shortest unique prefix.
### -angle _
This option sets the angle of the baseline of subsequent text. _angle_ is an integral
number of degrees, measured counterclockwise from the row axis of the image.
### -background
If the argument is **transparent**, **ppmlabel **draws the text over the existing pixels in
the image. If you specify a _color_ (see the **-color **option below for information on how
to specify colors), **ppmlabel **generates background rectangles enclosing subsequent
text, and those rectangles are filled with that color.
### -color _
This option sets the color for subsequent text.
Specify the color (_color_) as described for the ]8;;libnetpbm_image.html#colorname\argument of the **pnm_parsecolor() **li‐
brary routine]8;;\ .
**-colour **is an acceptable alternate spelling.
### -file _
This option causes **ppmlabel **to read lines of text from the file named _filename_ and
draw it on successive lines.
### -size _
This option sets the height of the tallest characters above the baseline to _textsize_
pixels.
### -text _
This option causes **ppmlabel **to draw the specified text string. It advances the loca‐
tion for subsequent text down 1.75 times the current _textsize_. That lets you draw
multiple lines of text in a reasonable manner without specifying the position of each
line.
Note that if you invoke **ppmlabel **via a shell command and your text string contains
spaces, you'll have to quote it so the shell treats the whole string as a single to‐
ken. E.g.
$ ppmlabel -text "this is my text" baseimage.ppm >annotatedimage.ppm
### -x _
This option sets the pixel column at which subsequent text will be left justified.
Depending on the shape of the first character, the actual text may begin a few pixels
to the right of this point.
### -y _
acters with descenders, such as "y," will extend below this line.
## LIMITATIONS
Text strings are restricted to 7 bit ASCII. The text font used by **ppmlabel **doesn't include
definitions for 8 bit ISO 8859/1 characters.
When drawing multiple lines of text with a non-transparent background, it should probably
fill the space between the lines with the background color. This is tricky to get right when
the text is rotated to a non-orthogonal angle.
## SEE ALSO
[**ppmmake**(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/ppmmake/1/markdown), [**ppmdraw**(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/ppmdraw/1/markdown), [**pbmtext**(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/pbmtext/1/markdown), [**pbmtextps**(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/pbmtextps/1/markdown), [**pamcomp**(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/pamcomp/1/markdown), [**ppm**(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/ppm/1/markdown)
## AUTHOR
Copyright (C) 1995 by John Walker (<_kelvin@fourmilab.ch_>) WWW home page: ]8;;\‐
lab.ch/]8;;\
Permission to use, copy, modify, and distribute this software and its documentation for any
purpose and without fee is hereby granted, without any conditions or restrictions. This
software is provided ``as is'' without express or implied warranty.
## DOCUMENT SOURCE
This manual page was generated by the Netpbm tool 'makeman' from HTML source. The master
documentation is at
****
netpbm documentation 15 April 2006 _Ppmlabel_ _User_ [_Manual_(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/Manual/1/markdown)